The clocks changed overnight and we lost an hour, so we were hoping Macc might sleep a bit later. It didn’t really work out that way, although after he’d been out for the toilet he went back in his crate for a while. We set off about 9.15 with Adrian bringing the boat round the corner while I walked to the first lock to set it. Below the lock is the rail bridge my train went over on Thursday.
The next lock was full which was a bit of a surprise. There’s a school immediately above it, but of course today is Sunday and it’s also the Easter holidays so all the blinds were closed.
While the boat was descending I popped down to the Elsan just below. Then once the boat was out I walked down to Yard Lock, which was empty. There seemed to be lots of hire boats at the yard, in spite of it being school holidays.
Adrian held back after leaving this lock, expecting I’d have to fill Star Lock. But it was another that was full; it’s had new bottom gates so doesn’t leak at that end any more.
We wanted to use the water point below the lock, and had a couple of minutes wait while another boat finished up. Our new extension to the hose pipe worked really well, which was good. Another boat turned up and had to wait for us to finish; fortunately we didn’t take too long. We moored just round the corner, and were all tied up by 11. Since then it’s been raining pretty steadily, but there have been plenty of boats past in both directions.
Macc was supposed to sleep while we did the locks, but flatly refused. He doesn’t want to miss anything, but it does make him very tired. Fortunately he had a nap after we moored up, and then a longer sleep after lunch. When he woke up, we took him to the park alongside the towpath and put him on the 10 metre line that Cal suggested we get. He was able to have a good run about while still being secure.
He also met a couple of other dogs and had a great time chasing about with them, first a ten month old Cocker Spaniel and then a much bigger Golden Retriever. He absolutely loved it, and it’s something we’ve wanted to do for a while, just not had the right location. We’ll have to moor in more places with a park or a field nearby. The other plus was that it wore him out!
1 mile, 4 locks. (34 miles, 27 locks)