October 2024 - Our final few days - a very belated post

Ladder Bridge - No 129 (Oxford Canal) - Friday 11th October

A beautiful autumn day 🙂  It was a joy to get moving today.  

The five Claydon Locks were easy peasy today.  The locks were all full but who cares when the sun is shining!  It was a tad chilly and Rio had to have his jumper on.  There were four lockies on but only one helped us, not sure what the other four were supposed to be doing!

We were going to have a short day today, we needed it after all the stresses of the last couple of weeks.

Ladder Bridge was our destination and we managed to get a nice spot where the hedge had died off!  From the dinette we could see right the fields across to a new HS2 bridge and another in the building.  Such a shame but I won’t go on about it.

What about Over the Moon?  Well Steve stayed onboard for a week with his son bringing him water!  He and the other boats got away on Monday and Steve has been single handing as Tracey is on Grand-dog sitting duty.  At the time of writing Steve was at the bottom of the Stockton flight and had done 43 locks and had another 43 to do.  Tracey is joining him tomorrow to do those.

7 miles

5 locks

Above Napton Bottom Lock (Oxford Canal) - Saturday 12th October After yesterday’s lovely blue sky and sunshine we were back to grey and rain. We started off on the Napton flight in the rain, then it brightened up and we got some blue sky, however as soon as we had stopped down came the rain again! All the locks were with us though they all leaked so Richard still had to top the levels up. It was pretty chilly so I wrapped up warmly and Rio decided to stay down below.

We had a quiet afternoon before putting on our glad rags and walking down to the Folly for a meal. There were a lot of dogs in the pub and Rio had a whale of a time though he was put firmly in his place by a grumpy Jack Russell. The food was excellent as usual. As we came down the locks I could just see the sails of Napton Windmill. The original windmill was built in 1543 and produced raw material, which was transported out of Napton and later used for textile goods. This created jobs for people, such as shirt and dressmakers The village was one of the largest settlements in Warwickshire during the Middle Ages. The mill stopped working with sails around 1900 and was converted to steam power, but stopped working with steam around 1909. The mill fell into disrepair and was derelict by 1966. The mill lay derelict until about 1972 when it was restored and converted into a house. The mill was designated a Grade II listed building in 1952.

6 miles 8 locks Dunchurch Pools Marina (Oxford Canal) - Sunday 13th October Boy it was chilly this morning. Even after putting in new batteries on the Thames, the heating will still not start up unless the engine is on. If we are miles from anyone else Richard can start the engine and we can have heat, but this morning we had a boat right behind us. The heating is number one on the list of winter jobs! We had our last lock to do, we have done 135 locks in total, it felt good to just have an easy cruise back to the marina. Firstly, we had a stop to catch up with Trish on Travels with Tea, Jem was sadly away. They have a Flat Coat Retriever puppy the same age as Rio and they wanted to play but I didn’t think that boisterous play on the towpath was a very good idea! We were soon back at the marina and had the usual “which pontoon is ours”! When we have been away for so long we just forget.

The car started which was a relief as I knew that Richard had been worrying about it. A quiet afternoon before packing up and driving home tomorrow. 10 miles 1 lock Hayling Island - Monday 14th October I hate packing up! I usually work from the front to the back and know what I am doing but then someone else (I’m not mentioning any names!) comes along and messes up my routine. Once the car was loaded we set off for Allen’s Lock to collect our other car. We found it safe and sound, thank goodness. We had a good journey home, one of the best we have ever had. We are now at home, having unpacked and done the washing! We did 360 miles 164 locks We had a great trip, doing it with friends made it so much more enjoyable. We did, however, seem to leave a lot of wine bottles, beer cans and crisp packets behind at rubbish points!! Thank you Steve, Tracey and Ted for putting up with us, especially Rio who ate all Ted’s food! Our next boating blog will come from the Canal du Midi in France 🙂

I found this video on You Tube.  From it you can see the extent of the flooding.  There is also an aerial view of Mary H!