The Buscot lock keeper arrived about 7pm yesterday evening to padlock shut the lock, and she spent some time fishing with a magnet. Speaking to her afterwards, she said one of her colleagues had dropped a length of fairly expensive chain in the lock, and she’d managed to get it out. She said she’d bought the magnet a few years ago when she was a new lock keeper, because she was swapping over the sign a one lock and dropped one of the retaining nuts in the water; when she fished for it, she found four! She also told us we wouldn’t be charged for staying on the lock island mooring, because of the locks being on restricted hours.
This morning was much cooler and cloudier. We set off about 20 past 9, and just up the river saw a boat like the one we hired in the late 90s. It’s the one in the middle of these three; there’s a photo of ours on the About Us page of this blog.
The next section has some very tight turns, including one where you double back on yourself completely. Then you see a bridge off to the side, and a few moments later you’re going underneath it.
We got to St John’s lock at about 9.40, and the lock keeper waved us straight in. This is the one with Old Father Thames on the lock side.
The lockie here also said he’d had a message about us staying on the Buscot mooring, so we owed £11. We told him what yesterday’s lock keeper had said, and he claimed she was a relief keeper who didn’t know what she was doing. It turned out he couldn’t take card payments anyway, so we said we’d sort it out on the way back down. We carried on the field moorings before Halfpenny Bridge, and found a nice spot. The stern is a way out but the bow is in. I think it’s pretty much the same place we had last time we were here.
We were secure less than an hour after setting off. I then walked into town to get a shop of fresh stuff from Budgen’s. Unlike many convenience stores, this one is really very good with a selection of things you actually want. As I walked over the bridge, I could see the Riverside pub was doing a roaring trade in breakfast or brunch.
Lechlade is a pretty town, in spite of the traffic. There’s a lot of work going on at the church at the moment, and the Cotswold Christmas Shop is still going strong.
We hadn’t been moving long enough for Macc to have enough sleep, but he wouldn’t settle so I took him for a walk to try to wear him out. We walked down to the Roundhouse, the technical end of the navigation. The very first time we came here (in 2011) we came right down here to turn, but the next time we thought it looked much too shallow. It looked shallow today, and the bridge now has a sign on it advising against turning beyond it. The Roundhouse and the buildings around it make for an attractive scene.
Lunch was some very expensive sourdough bread from the Italian food shop in town. All afternoon the river has been busy with boats from the hire base. Well I say boats, but they’re mostly pedallos, in the shape of either swans or flamingos.
Later in the afternoon, we walked up to the pub because we’d ordered a Tesco delivery. We seem to have badly planned this section of the trip, because we’ve been running out of all sorts of things, so this was an order of store cupboard staples — things that can be heavy to carry too far. It worked well. Adrian went up to the pub when we knew the driver was close, then I followed when he’d arrived to help carry the stuff back. Macc was asleep and didn’t even realise we’d gone.
We haven’t been asked for money for the mooring yet, but we’re expecting it to be a fiver.
2 miles, 1 lock, £5. (113 miles, 42 locks, £129.50)