August 18 - 21 Back in Bella's old home & a fire

We write this from the end of August, moored up again at Bridge 177, which we'll show later. By the 18th, we'd got to Lower Heyford, home of Oxfordshire Narrowboats, where Bella used to be the Heyford. We'd moored up ready for engine works on the 19th with a few other little snagging fixes. With engine work done on the Tuesday, we pulled away on the 19th, only to moor up just south of the wharf with a glowing alternator light. Wednesday we realised that due to busy weekends, Wednesdays are generally a wharf staff day off. So we stayed another night and waited for the engineer on Thursday. We then reversed back to the wharf (Pete is getting SO good at this!) to have the new alternator fit. Well, it sent out too many wiggly amps and we had a real fire - wire insulation burning by too much heat in the wires. Fire extinguisher, complete engine clean up and old alternator re-fit later, we were on our way toward Oxford city. The new alternator was on its way to repair and we were booked back in Heyford for the following Thursday.