We caught the good weather today. We had some idea that we would be out for ages after Warwick and before we sat a spell in Blue Haven. But we realised we needed to do some serious work stuff which needed us to feel settled, so getting to Blue Haven earlier, then setting out for a serious trek later made sense. Then Pete went on to the Met Office website and realised that today was IT for this week and travelling. The rest of the week is to be windy with gusts up to 40+ mph, making steering more than difficult. And it is due to rain and wind and rain makes for dismal travel. So we set out for Blue Haven and travelled the 28 clicks (13 locks + 15 miles), mooring up in our slip at 3pm. Along the way, we saw Calcutt Marina (HUGE) just east of Ventor Farm Marina (HUGE huge), mooring up perhaps nearly a thousand boats between them. The picture shows just a bit, from Elizabeth's viewpoint at Calcutt top lock. By this picture, we had already done 10 locks, including the Stockton Flight. Just after this picture, we rounded the corner from the Grand Union Canal main line turning north onto the Oxford Canal and Grand Union Canal shared section. North a little, we saw one of those grass covered bridges used to move livestock from one side of the canal to the other. And what fun! Sheep and lambs were travelling across! In a car, we'd have to stop and wait while a flock or herd moved across a road; here, we just travelled under them. You have to enlarge what looks like just a landscape to see them, but its worth it :-).
We stopped at Braunston, where the Oxford and Grand divide and pulled across to use the British Waterways Services. The pics show Bella moored up with the Bridge to the South Oxford/Grand just behind and then Pete happily walking away from the Elsan point with our waste cassettes.
Along the next stretch of the Oxford, BW are doing some towpath repair. The next picture shows one of the methods of strengthening the edge. Posts are pushed deep into the edge, then string bags of straw are wedged next to them. Over time, this rots down and becomes very firm. This photo shows last year's layer and this year's layer.
We pulled so neatly into Blue Haven, you'd have thought we'd done it before. It helped that the pound was very full, an unusual occurance for this stretch! The bank near our mooring is blooming blue and in no time at all, we had the bench unfolded from the roof, pot plants out on the grass, electric and water hose connected and Josie bounding along the bank. We feel settled enough now to do the work we need to do.
And now for some stats. For this last trip, the March journey round the Warwickshire Ring counterclockwise, we have travelled 196 clicks, breaking down into 104 miles and 92 locks. Doing this at just over 54 travelling hours, we averaged 3.61 clicks per hour, which means that with all the moorings we passed having to travel at 2mph, we are certainly managing locks at more than 4 'mph'. Add those stats to our January travelling back from Oxford for Christmas and New Years, we have travelled 241.5 clicks so far in 2009, working110 locks and travelling 131.5 miles.
