Well, we got Bella out of sheds and she looks beautiful. We have taken pictures, but we haven't had time to get them ready for web yet, but we will. We came back from our various travels (Oxford, Cambridge, Oxford, Salisbury, Newcastle under Lyme, Manchester) on the 18th of April to discover Bella had been taken out of sheds and lovingly moored up next to our usual quayside. It was SO good to be home after having managed 6 different beds while she was in the beauty parlour!
We had various bits of work to do, including a few days in London, so we finally able to untie and cruise on the 23rd (James' 29th birthday) and went south a little bit. We moored just north of Braunston. If you put "willoughby northamptonshire uk" in to Google maps, you'll see the little curl of canal just south of the Willoughby bridge where we found the most heavenly quiet spot. You could look at: http://maps.nationalgeographic.com/map-machine#s=r&c=52.30639695836349,%20-1.2282371520996027&z=14. If anyone call tell us how to get the satellite data, then we will and put it here regularly. Back to us, it was warm enough for a G&T on the bench on the towpath, a fabulous break from all the cities and all the driving and for Bella, it was OUT.
The next day, we trekked (!) just over two hours to the Bridge pub at Napton to see our friends. We had an odd moment when Bella's engine stopped after having run over something in a section where there were lots of moored boats and not a few wrecks, but she recovered well and we moored up in a lovely walking distance (http://maps.nationalgeographic.com/map-machine#s=r&c=52.25713439881985,%20-1.321878433227538&z=15) from the pub. Wonderful. The Sunday morning, we turned around and headed back - not to Blue Haven, but Willoughby corner again. Just opposite the mooring, the farm is full of bullocks, all languidly wandering around and variously looking at us. We called Pete's photo on flickr, Brothers in Farms: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pete_gray/4553933105/. It was such a lovely place to be.
We returned to Blue Haven on the 26th and have been firmly moored ever since. Pete's had two weeks in a row working out of offices in Cambridge and Elizabeth has been back and forth to London, Oxford and Cambridge. Our plans are, despite the weather, to head south to Thrupp starting on Saturday. We would like to do a huge circuit again this summer, taking in hundreds of miles, but we have a range of commitments in different places so may just take long weeks or long weekends. But then again, we may change our mind!! We have joined a virtual boating club called cutweb - http://www.cutweb.org.uk/ - which means we have visiting rights at other boating clubs. If this is the case in reality, then we may stay out a bit more if we can leave Bella in secure locations to pop up to, say, Scotland.
We'll let you know!
