Arrived and cruising

Hello everybody from jolly old blighty. No, seriously, I’ve made it back to England, onto the narrowboat, and loving every minute, just like last year. The boat survived quite well through the winter, with only some minor issues to deal with. I’ll see if there’s more serious stuff once we get moving on the canal, I suspect if a problem is going to show up it’ll be there. Most likely at the worst possible moment, in the worst possible place. No matter, I’ll deal with it. Or rather, <we> will deal with it! I have my son Robbie here for a couple of weeks, someone to work the locks and take out the garbage (as if). We’re having a blast together so far, getting things unpacked and working. It’s still early spring so the heating system has been tested, no serious problems yet but some strange noises that I’ll have to look into. There was an intermittent beeping but it turned out it was the boat next door. It had been left here for three years and the CO alarms’ batteries were all dead. The lady is from Australia but her (now late) husband was ill and they couldn’t come back.

The trip here was quite uneventful, although it was as tiring as usual. The inside cleaning and dusting is done (goodbye cobwebs!), the outside washed down. That job was delayed a bit however, because instead we cruised a mile along the canal to Foxton Basin, moored up at the pub and had a late lunch!

We (he) did get around to it however:

Foxton locks is a flight of 10 locks, two sets of five ‘staircase’ locks. There’s no space between them so it’s a quick run through (considering the length and height drop). I went through at the end of last year’s cruising, it’s quite an experience. I think going up will be less dramatic…

Here’s the view from the top, pretty spectacular actually (except for the two photobombers):

Alan and Abigail were with us for a few days, we had a great time together. It was fun to share my ‘other’ life with a ski buddy.

No, we didn’t JUST visit pubs, here’s Abi doing all the hard work…

We’re going to miss having them aboard!

Robbie and I have headed back down the way I came last year, toward Crick (the big boat show) and Braunston. Not sure how far we’ll make it, we’ll have to turn back to leave the boat for a few days while we go to London to ‘tourist’ a bit.

I hope everything back home is going well for everyone. Please feel free to comment or send me a message, love to hear from you!