Another fabulous day cruising in glorious sunshine. A great day for climbing to the Summit of the South Oxford Canal.

Fenny Compton Tunnel – with the top removed

Turnover bridge

The ‘tunnel’ is now a butterfly sanctuary

Remains of what once would have been a fantastic railway bridge

Wonder where this could have led too?

Wondering what these ‘chaps’ are supposed to be? For some sort of war game? We’ve seen similar ‘guys’ further on.

Today we’ve travelled just over 6 miles, and 8 locks.

On Saturday afternoon, after a ‘bit of a shop’ at Banbury’s Castle Quay Shopping Centre, and after watching ‘The Wedding’, we cruised just half a mile to the ‘other end’ of Banbury. We stopped just before Tom Rolt Footbridge (#164) as John wanted to visit Halfords, and I wanted some compost, plants, and pots from Homebase. The mooring was great, it was right next to a park for Rusty.

This morning (Sunday) we set off, with the shopper to visit Homebase, and Halfords. We were pleased to see a new Waitrose had been built, so new it’s not yet on Google Maps. It’s just across the road from Homebase and Halfords. We popped in for Strawberries and other fresh fruit.

At around 12:30 pm we left our mooring, just before Tom Rolt footbridge

Approaching our first lock of the day, we noticed the lock was being emptied

Colourful towpaths

We’re now back in the land of ‘ridge and furrow’

Today’s mooring’s at the top of Cropedy Lock. After dinner we took a stroll for a drink at the ancient Red Lion pub. We were disappointed with the pub; what a shame!

Cropedy has Britain’s largest ‘Folk Festival’ “Fairport’s Cropredy Convention attracts up to 20,000 people each year, making it the largest annual festival of its kind in Britain. The festival features a single stage at the lower end of the sloping arena field. There are also ancillary events, such as morris dancing in the streets and live music at the village’s two pubs.” More…. This year’s date is 9th – 11th August.

Today we’ve travelled 4.5 miles, and 4 locks.

Woke to glorious sunshine, but had a shock when I popped out of the boat at about 6 am, to find Cyan was encased in ice! It didn’t take long for the strength of the sun to warm us all up.

We’ve not planned to travel far today, though we’ve planned for quite a bit to do.

Our last night’s mooring with the King Sutton church in the distance.

Approaching Banbury, we noticed heavy work going on. At a lift bridge John found a notice that confirmed the ground works were part of a development for a canalside pub, restaurant and a canal basin.

We stopped just before bridge 168 to pay Morrisons a visit. I popped off with the shopper, while John stayed on board with Rusty. It took about an hour for me to return with fresh fruit and veg, tins of beer, and bits ‘n’ bobs, including a few garden plants. We were soon on our way again.

Just before Banbury Lock we stopped for sanny duties, and to top up the water tank. It was a bit scary as dodgy ‘goings on’ was being performed under the bridge by the sanny station. There was about a dozen people, teens and adults, with drink and possibly more was involved. Rusty was in full barking mode. He couldn’t believe his luck when we didn’t tell him to stop barking. As soon as we finished watering up, about four boats turned up at the lock. Where on earth had they all come from? We managed to keep our ‘first’ place, and we were soon through the lock.

Passing the famous Tooleys Boatyard

Mooring in a great spot, just after Tooleys 

We hadn’t moored up five minutes when there was chaos! Two boats cruising between two lines of moored boats, meeting each other bow to bow, with not enough room to pass. Unfortunately both boaters wouldn’t give way – the result was a gridlock. They were stuck fast!

It took about half an hour to free the boats. Boats were trying to pull both stuck boats free. After a lot of pulling, rocking, and revving engines, it was a bottle of washing up liquid that freed them. To add more confusion a boater insisted in raising the lift bridge and joining the squeeze.

All was conducted in good humour. Great entertainment for all boaters and gongoozlers!

We have to make a special mention about Tooleys’ staff – they were extremely helpful, and they orchestrated the ‘rescue’.

The Tug from Tooleys Boatyard tried to separate the jam, but without success

We’re moored right by the shopping centre, where tomorrow I’ll be paying the shops a visit. Banbury has a Saturday market, which will be a ‘must’ for me. We hope to move on towards the other end of Banbury where John has a shopping list for Halfords and B&Q. He’s also got to fit in the FA Cup Final, which has been delayed until 5:15 pm to accommodate ‘something’ that’s going on in Windsor. 

Today we’ve travelled 3.5 miles, and through 2 locks.

Yesterday was pretty miserable ‘weather wise’, the wind was blustery and cold. After the overnight rain; dust, flies, and pollen had been ‘dampened down’; making it a perfect day for varnishing. Cyan’s cratch cover was removed, and the cratch was stripped of it’s contents, including flooring, using the towpath for temporary storage. John removed the ‘brass furniture’ from the two front doors. I set too sanding down the cratch’s ‘A’ frame, and the two front doors. The wood was then ‘yacht’ varnished. It didn’t take long before the varnish had dried enough to put the newly scrubbed cratch cover back, and the towpath relieved of its ‘storage’. John screwed the polished brass fittings back in place, and I re-hung the roman blinds.

The blinds are made from the same material as the other window curtains, and I cursed myself when I discovered the material was ‘dry clean only’. It would cost quite a bit of money to get them dry cleaned, plus it would be very inconvenient, so it would be great if I could wash them. It was by a strange coincidence that we shared several locks on the Grand Union with a boat which had the same curtains. After chatting to the boaters about the dry cleaning problem, the lady boater told me she had made a mistake by washing them, resulting in the curtain dye running, turning the lining pink. She rewashed them, putting a couple sheets of ‘Dylon Colour Catcher’ in the washing machine, with a successful result. Our roman blind was washed at 30C, with two sheets of the ‘Colour Catcher’; success!  Enough of the domestics….

We left our mooring early this morning, the weather was once again glorious.

The hedgerows are full of white blossom, reminds me  ‘Anne of Green Gables’, a favourite child’s book about a red-headed orphan girl who used to rename places. She named an avenue of white blossom “The White Way of Delight!” Very fitting!

Me and Cyan, ‘popping’ up in Sommerton Deep Lock, at 12ft it’s the deepest lock on the Oxford, and one of the deepest in the UK.

Rather a scary few moments as we sailed under the lift bridge (it’s kept raised), the heavy beef cattle were rubbing themselves on the bridge, The bridge is counter-balanced, and we held our breath as we cruised under it hoping the cattle wouldn’t ‘drop’ the bridge.

Today we travelled 7 miles, and through 4 locks.

We had planned to stay at our idyllic mooring for another day, the simple reason we left was because of the practically zero WiFi, TV digital signal, and mobile phone coverage. I’m itching to re-varnish the ‘A Frame’ in the cratch, re-varnish the two doors at the front of the boat, give the cratch cover a good scrub, and finishing off with sewing new seat cushions! Oh well, another day will have to suffice! 🙂

Leaving yesterday’s mooring

Thank you Paul (from Waterway Routes), John Hartill, Carole Biggs, and Steve NB Tumbleweed, for your kind advice helping us through ‘the ‘shall we/shan’t we’ get a Gold Licence decision’.

We recently paid £182.30 for a month’s ‘Environment Agency’ licence to cruise (only) the Thames, as at the time we only had a basic C&RT licence to cruise C&RT navigations. If we’d have had a C&RT ‘Gold Licence’ it would have allowed us to cruise the Thames, and all the other Environment Agency’s waterways (EA navigations include the River Thames, Anglian waterways, River Medway, etc.), as well as C&RT’s waterways. We’re planning our next trip to Cambridge which, will take us on the Rivers Nene, Ouse, and possibly the Cam. So we’ll need a licence.

We’ve now moored in a slightly better mobile reception area than yesterday, which was good enough to allow John to phone the ‘licensing dept’ at C&RT (despite the signal dropping several times). The upshot of the discussion, and our decision:

A Gold License is from 1st January till 31st December (you can’t purchase a full year’s licence, say in June). For us to purchase a Gold License now, is complicated. So…. this is what we’ve decided and agreed with C&RT:

• We purchase a Gold License (backdated from January 2018) costing £1,314.00
• C&RT will refund us £669.13, which is what’s left of our current licence (our licence ends 30th September) – at the end of last September 2017 we paid C&RT £892 for licensing Cyan for a year.

Example of the calculation:

• £892 per year > divided by 12 months = £74.33 per month
• 3 months (Oct, Nov, Dec ’17) @ £74.33 = £223
• £892 (paid) – £223 (months used) = £669.13 refund

If we’d have thought ahead, we could have saved ourselves £182.30! Still we live and learn, and it wont happen again.

Love nature taking over

Our luck was ‘in’ today, 2 of today’s 4 locks was set for us.

‘Life’s a bitch’ but someone has to ‘patrol’ our inland waterways!

Who said sheep were stupid? This flock is keeping cool in the shade – think I’d make for the shade if I wore a thick woolly jumper

Please, please don’t let us meet another boat at the bridge

Now where are we going to moor today?

Today we’ve travelled 5 miles, and 4 locks.

What a glorious and beautiful day!

Leaving our ‘weekend’ mooring outside ‘The Jolly Boatman’

Our first duty was Service chores.

Looking at the bricked up doorway, with the hinges still left in, could this have been stables for barge horses at one time?

For conspiracy theorists (which I’m not); a beautiful display of chem trails?

Another one for Conspiracy Theories; an ‘Earth Station’!

We stopped overnight at an idealistic mooring, where the birdsong was enchanting!  Sadly though, the mooring was a little too ‘secluded’ as there was hardly any WiFi – tomorrow we’ll be moving on for a better signal.

Today we’ve cruised 5 miles, and 3 locks.