The forecast for today was pretty awful, but the least awful bit was early on; so when Macc woke up before 7 we got up and started our day. When I took him out for a walk it was actually quite nice, but by the time we set off just before 8.30 the drizzle was starting. The first lock was just a short walk away.
We made steady progress up the arm, with all the locks fairly close together. I was walking in between, and haven’t actually been on the boat while it’s been moving today.
Above Lock 5, a dead deer which was there the other day was still floating about, and I had to get the pole to move it away from the lock gate. We were wondering what the pound above Lock 4 was like, as this one seems to drain every night (it’s the one that held us up on the way down on Monday) but a local dog walker told us that much to his surprise it had water in it and wasn’t empty. The pound above Lock 3 was more depleted, but we could still get across and into the staircase locks.
There’s only one paddle between the two locks in the staircase and it seems to take a long time before you can get the middle gates open and get moving.
We’d made good progress and the rain had so far been only light. We’d decided that we’d wait on the visitor moorings on the junction level while I walked up to see if there were any spaces one lock up, near the reservoirs. There was, and there was a volunteer lock keeper on duty, so we came up the first of the seven Marsworth locks, so we were back to broad locks.
The best mooring space available was on the left hand side, so not on the reservoir side, but it had the advantage of piling to moor against and a nice wide towpath. There wouldn’t be any proper sunshine, but at least the solar panels would get whatever light was available. We were all done by about 10.30.
Shortly after we’d moored up the rain properly started, and it’s also been tremendously windy. It was chilly too, so we got the chimney out of storage and lit the Refleks stove! In June. After lunch (we decided soup and toast would be appropriate for the autumnal conditions) we took Macc for a walk in a dry spell, going back to the bottom lock to cross over the canal so we could have a look at the reservoirs. There were waves on the water and the birds were bobbing up and down.
We ended up walking up the locks we’ll be doing tomorrow, and came back by crossing one of them and walking down the path on the side we’re moored. The rain has turned lighter again but the wind is still howling; tomorrow and the next few days are supposed to be a bit better though.
1 mile, 9 locks. (65 miles, 68 locks)