I’m beginning to feel more human in the mornings again!!
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| Ware Town Bridge |
We set off before 10am to Hertford.
We had Hardman’s Lock to do again then up into Ware. There is a lovely town bridge with a weeping
willow beside it and flowers on the railings, though they are facing
inwards. Then we passed the gazebos and
apparently there is nowhere else in Britain where you can find so many gazebos
along a single riverside. Their origins
can be traced back to their construction in the 18th and early 19th centuries,
with a few dating from even earlier, in the late 1600s. They were built by
innkeepers and other owners of property on the high street, and were intended
as a means of finding some peace and quiet away from their hectic lives in
town. Over time the gazebos became in
need of repair, with some of them sadly not surviving to be seen today. In the
1830s there were 25 gazebos, but by 1980, only ten remained. Fortunately, during the 1980s the East Herts
District Council stepped in and, with additional funds provided by the Ware
Society and others, they set about restoring the gazebos to their former glory.
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| The Ware Gazebos |
Ware Lock is strange as it is operated by the Environment Agency and
not C&RT and is the only lock on the Navigation to be operated and
maintained by them as it is part of the Environment Agency's flood defence
system. Beside the lock is one of the
GlaxoSmithKline locations.
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| Ware Lock |
After Ware it was a windy cruise up to Hertford. I was miles away and almost missed the lock
cutting! I should add that the sign was
very small. One of the paddles on
Hertford Lock wasn’t working and apparently had put some people off going to
Hertford – it was a bit slow but we canal users are used to paddles not
working!
We used the services as at Hertford then went up to the basin to wind
and then back down to the visitors moorings – 3 spaces and 14 day ones at that!
Dot
has been making as a piece of stained glass to put in the window on Mary
H. I had seen her work in Bristol and
thought it would be nice to have one.
Richard has recently sold his sailing boat that he had for 23 years. Shockwave just wasn’t getting the use as we
are always on Mary H consequently the decision was made to sell her so I
thought it would be nice to have a memory of her in stained glass. A lot of tooing and froing of emails and then
the finished item when we were on the Basingstoke Canal but it didn’t fit our
window so Dot took it back and redid the hooks.
Today she gave it to us and it now hangs in pride of place on one of the
windows. Thank you so much Dot – it is
beautiful and a lovely reminder of Shockwave.
We joined Dot and Gordon for “early doors”. This seems to be something that a crowd of
moorers at Aston Marina got into the habit of doing during the winter. I read lot of blogs, including many from the
Aston crowd so knew about this so I felt very honoured to be invited to an
“early doors”!!! Oh I guess I should say
what “early doors” is! It’s going to the
pub around 4pm for a drink and then, supposedly, going back to the boat for
dinner. Wikipedia says “a slang phrase
meaning those who arrive earlier than is customary, and was often associated
with pub customers who wait for or arrive soon after evening opening, around
5:30 pm.” We went to the Old Barge and
managed 4 rounds – I’m sure that is not the idea!
It was then back to Ewn ha Cul where we sat on the bank and Dot cooked
dinner – and very nice it was too. It
got chilly around 9.30pm and I had to wear a cardigan – the first time for
weeks. A lovely evening :-)
3.97 miles
3 locks
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