All aboard!

Yes dear reader, we are still alive  (not sure about 'and kicking') and Herbie is till afloat and we are on board for a week.  CRT promised an October 1 update on the closure of the canal hereabouts and true to their words we now have that update. Nobody at all is surprised to read that the canal between Claydon and Aynho is to remain shut until water levels improve. Folks I talk to predict another month at least.  CRT says "We understand that this continued closure may be disappointing and we would like to thank you for your patience, understanding, and cooperation during this challenging period."   Yes, we do understand and we are patient folk so we are just using Herbie as a staionary holiday cottage for now. 

I suppose that places like Tooleys yard in Banbury must be suffering badly from lack of business, although I read that they have secured a grant to take on an apprentice to teach him (it is a him) all about boat maintenance and repair and painting and all that good stuff.  That, I think, is a Good Thing. More power to their elbow.

The weather is unfeasibly pleasant for early October and I have got a weeny bit more painting done, although my tin of light grey paint has suffered from the rim getting all painty and not sealing properly.  So it gets a skin on which is hard to remove without getting bits in the paint. I must learn not to wipe brushes on the edge of the tin. Clever people stretch a bit of string across the middle and wipe their brushes on that. Or perhaps a better way is to ladle the paint out into a paint kettle and paint from that.  I promise to try harder in future. At £30ish a tin, wasteing paint is not a Good Thing.

One thing that I have never written about before (although it's been happening for all the years we've owned Herbie) is the early mroning rumble. There we are lying in bed and a curious faint drumming sound  creeps into our consciousness.  At first I used to think it was some small wild critter scampering along the roof. Maybe a squirrel or a bird or a a rat.  It was some time before I realised the culprit and it wasn't the roof at all.  It was the ducks,  inevitably mallards of course, nibbling at stuff along the side of the hull at the waterline. I'm not sure what they are eating, tiny bits of silkweed or insects or algae maybe. I suppose it might be why the waterline seems to be the place where the blacking wears off first and rust begins to form.  Anyhow there is nothing we can do to stop the little darlings and these days I actually find the sound sort of comforting.

So here we are.  Rest assured that should anything exciting happen here this week, you'll be the first to know.

1976 and all that.

 In a couple of weeks it'll be just 50 years since Kath and I got married.  1976.  It seems oddly appropriate that exactly like then we are now hoping for the end of a long hot drought.

At the time we were pretty skint so our wedding was a DiY affair.  We made the food. A friend made the beer. The man at the local home brew supplies shop gave us a gallon of home made wine. Another friend wangled a free hire of the old gospel hall, and pals of mine made up a band for a ceilidh.  Others got up and sang old folk songs and Kennet Morris Men did what Morris men do (mostly drink beer). Someone commented that the reception was like something out of Thomas Hardy which I suppose it was. It was wonderful. After it finished, we were left to sweep up.

Next day we set off on honeymoon in our beloved Citroen Dyane (the only one of the fifteen cars that I have owned that I truly miss). After a night B&B in Cheddar where we bought 5 gallons of scrumpy in a polypin, and a pound of Cheddar cheese strong enough to peel the skin off the roof of your mouth, we headed on to Dartmoor where we pitched our little two man tent somewhere near Mary Tavy. I remember chickens scratching round the tent in the morning.

On the Wednesday the long drought came to a sudden and dramatic end with pelting rain and thunder and lightning, so we packed up and headed home. So a four day honeymoon.

We don't want a big fuss for our golden wedding so we've booked a few days in a hotel in Lyme Regis which is a favourite place of ours.  Looking at the weather forecast it seems like it will probably rain which seems strangely appropriate doesn't it. We don't mind a bit. At least we can afford a hotel these days.

Making the best of it.

 Well, it's official; the Oxford canal from Claydon to Aynho is now shut. All the locks will be padlocked shut and boats will stay where they are. The reason of course is lack of water in the feeder reservoirs.  There are quite a few boats moored around Cropredy for next week's Fairport festival, so they'll be worried about getting home afterwards. I think there's some talk of a short window to let a few boats escape around festival time.

Meanwhile Herbie is lucky to be on her home berth here in the marina, while we potter about tidying her up inside and out. It's too hot for painting a lot of the time, but I have got a few bits done, most notably the rear deck port side handrail. After removing most of the wooden handrails earlier this year, I opted to keep the wooden rail by the aft deck as it was in better condition and it's nice not to handle very hot or cold steel when climbing on and off the boat. It still needs stripping and repainting of course.

 So I sanded it down and undercoated it and now it waits for the right temperature to put the red top coats on.

I've also made a small start on the port name panel which wasn't included when we repainted that side of the boat a couple of years ago, the main reason being what to do about the sign writing. I don't want to strip the panel right down because the existing paint is mostly sound but has gone chalky and there are some rusty spots on the coach line and the border. I have already prepped the upper border and that's ready for a topcoat.

One bite at a time I'm slowly eating the elephant!

So the plan is to overpaint it all in the dark grey. Then  hopefully I will still be able to detect enough of the signwriting to repaint it over the top. It might work and it might not! I won't use so much masking tape this time and do it a bit more freehand as taught on the signwriting course I did last year.

Anyhow Mikron Theatre are in Cropredy tonight, so that's our evening entertainment sorted.

Catcalling

 Here we are moored below Slat Mill lock on the dear old Oxford. We're slowly making our way back from Banbury where we spent the last two nights. Mooring was not a problem and we got a favourite spot by the entrance to Spiceball Park. 

Cat calling

Ship's cat Gertie liked it a lot and spent all her time hunting in the bushes. This was not mainly a Good Thing. One, because she presented us with a couple of voles which we had to catch in the boat before releasing them outside and Two because we couldn't get her to come back into the boat at night. She just sat deep in the hedge ignoring our inducements to come back onto the boat. One of the voles was brought in at about 1:30am.  Grrr.

Slow progress 

We had all sorts of plans for where we might cruise, but a mixture of hot weather and our old age proved a limiting factor so we've slowed right down.  Like the old saying "the bottom is too near the top" hereabouts and we've run aground two or three times.

Water issues

Our marina manager warns us by email that CRT is considering closing the canal between Claydon and Aynho sometimes soon. No decision yet but we wouldn't be at all surprised.

Here's a thing.  I just did some sums.  Cropredy lock drops the canal 5.5 feet and the next lock down hill is Slat Mill which drops 8 feet.  If my calculations are right  that means that Slat Mill takes 2500 gallons out of the pound whereas Cropredy only puts 1700 back in. I'm not aware of a feeder in between. No wonder that pound is notoriously low. 

Are we whimps?

 Once again we've decided not to go boating because it's too flippin' hot. We can just about keep cool at home but with temperatures in the 30s again this week we really don't fancy living in a steel box, no matter how good the insulation is.  As for doing any more exterior painting on bits of the boat right now, you'd have more chance of frying eggs on it. Bearing in mind that Kath and I between us are  now 158 years old do you think we're too chicken?

Nature notes

 Well, we're told that Claydon bottom lock is now working. I think they've even fixed the top paddle.  We're not ready quite yet to get back on Herbie because of home commitments but it won't be long, although they say another heatwave might be on the way.  I'm never going to get the rest of the roof painted at this rate.  Meanwhile, it's now cool enough to potter about outdoors to see how all the wild critters and plants have been faring, so I thought I'd write about that for a change.  These photos were taken today.

This morning we took a stroll (with ship's cat Gertie) over in the old graveyard behind our house. The half of it just beyond our back hedge is now preserved as a wildlife area and we love it. We just walk through a gap in our hedge and there we are.

Now's the peak time for my favourite butterflies.  One I like to see is the marbled white. I didn't see any in the last couple of years, but today there were lots of 'em in the churchyard.  Perhaps they like heatwaves.

Like this one, they seem to like feeding on the knapweed, and there's a lot of that over there.

Another welcome returner is the Small Skipper. These are dead cute with the strange way it holds its double wings and they're very small. This one hasn't been reading the right books because it's supposed to be feeding on Yorkshire Fog.

You might not know that Yorkshire Fog is not a weather phenomenon but a fairly common type of grass. I confess that I didn't know that either until  a couple of years ago. Long grass is not exactly in short supply in our churchyard, neither are wild and not so wild flowers. Almost at every step you disturb little clouds of insects. The birds must have no trouble getting enough to eat, although I'm not sure if they are quick enough to catch the grasshoppers. I certainly failed to get a photo of one although there were loads of them.

While I was chasing a marbled white (the little b***ers won't stay still to pose for a picture), I stumbled across this Ringlet.

 He wouldn't sit still either so he's a bit blurred.  Actually I suppose he might be a she. How do you sex a butterfly?

Meanwhile, back in our (somewhat dessicated) garden we are walking through sawdust.

It's everywhere. The floor is covered in it. You have to brush off the seats before you can sit and the spider webs in the hedge are clogged with it. It gets in your hair too if you stay still for a couple of minutes. 

Of course it's not really sawdust but the flowers from the huge lime tree that overhangs us. It's a love hate relationship with that tree.  There isn't a week in the year when it isn't dropping stuff on us -flowers, sticky goo, seeds, leaves and all winter, daily deposits of dead twigs and branches . It also blots out most of the sky, which is in itself is a mixed blessing because at least it offers us shade in hot weather.

See those dead branches? I hope I'm not underneath when they drop off.  Lets have a closer look at those flowers

Still plenty of them to come down.  BUT we can't complain because for the last week they've bathed us in the most incredible fragrance.  It's absolutely gorgeous and it's really powerful.

We keep a buddelia in the garden especially for the butterflies, but to be frank, the butterflies don't seem to like it much. At the moment it's feeding the bumble bees.

I'm a really rubbish gardener.  I recently bought a little bay tree in a pot and it fell over behind the wall and I forgot about it in the hot dry weather and I think it might be dead.  Conversely I seem to have killed yet another thyme plant, and I think it might be because I over watered it. Doh!

Anyway that's it for now. We  hope to actually go out on the canal this summer. See you then.

Toodle pip.

Herbie takes a short cruise.

 Someone once said to me ( or did I say it to someone?) Don't make plans then nothing can spoil them.

Well we had a sort of half plan for our current spell on Herbie and half of it has gone wrong, so that's about right.  The idea was to stay in the marina for a few days to let Gertie the cat acclimatise, maybe do a bit more painting and then to poottle up the hill to our favourite mooring spot below Claydon locks.  Well I got some painting done. Now the port side handrail is a nice shiny red to match the starboard side.

Before:

After:

Claydon bottom lock is still not properly fixed and only open for four hours a day, so we decided not to try going up there.  Quite a number of hire boats were stuck up there and the hire companies took the holiday makers off the boats if they wanted it.  I heard that some had provided hotel accommodation whilst others hasd spare boats so the punters could cruise off in another direction. A Black Prince hire boat, now empty was brought into our marina at Cropredy and this morning (Sunday) some of the marina staff moved it up to above Claydon for the Black Prince guys to collect.

I'm not sure any hirers will be all that happy in the coming week with three or four days forecasted to get to 37 degrees.  The news channels say that's not good at all for the elderly.  I looked up the definition of 'elderly' to find that I have already been elderly for 14 years!  So we're going home for a bit until it cools down.  Our house is relatively cool thank goodness and I don't think Gertie likes this heat much. We'll be off this evening crying 'Abandon Ship!!'

I got into trouble yesterday.  The gas ran out when Kath was making a cuppa, and when I went to change the gas bottle I found that the spare was empty too. Naughty me for not replacing that one when it ran out.

Anyway that gave us an excuse to go cruising this morning, all the way to the other end of our basin to get two new gas bottles (£109!).  Out in the middle of the marina basin, which is a lot wider than most, there was a lovely cool breeze. I don't suppose the marina staff would have been supportive of the idea of lettng us drop anchor out there for a few days. I thought it best not to ask.

In a previous post I mentioned the beautiful skies we seem to get hereabouts. Here are a couple of pictures from the last two nights.

Stay cool folks. We'll come back when  the temperature is more reasonable.

A novel way to damage a canal lock

 While we wait for CRT to fix the lock gate at Claydon (see previous post). Here's a little tale the CRT man told me about the stoppage at Grants Lock below Banbury last week.

Boaters will know what a bottom gate paddle looks like. They can skip the rest of this paragraph if I'm teaching them to suck eggs.  Here'a very rough sketch I just knocked up.

When you turn the windlass it rotates a cog against a toothed rack which then lifts or raises. The rack is at the upper and of a long rod (usually square section for some reason) and the bottom end of the rod is attached to the actual paddle wich is a large rectangular plate covering a hole in the lock gate. Raising the paddle lets the water in the lock escape, so emptying the lock.

Boaters will also know that when you are ascending a narrow lock, the strong currents produced by the water rushing in can really shove the boat back and forth strongly.  Two techniques can overcome this. One is to position the boat hard against the top gate and have the engine running in gear. The other is to keep the rear of the boat a yard or so ( or a metre if you prefer) from the bottom gate and using the engine, keep the boat in position by driving it against the current, forward and back, as it pushes and pulls. 

Well at Grants lock, some clever boater had another idea. He looped his stern rope around that long paddle rod, like you might on the riser rods in big river locks. I'm guessing he might have also had his engine in gear pushing forwards. Well those rods and paddles are designed to go up and down only and so when the boat lurched forward the paddle didn't resist much and gave way ,thus emptying the lock faster than it filled. Doh!

So lots of boaters had to patiently wait for CRT to come and fix the paddle. Best part of a day's cruising lost I suppose. I do feel sorry for those poor folks on a week's boat hire when something like that happens.

While writing this we got a notification from CRT that they are offering assisted passage through the broken lock gate at Claydon (see previous post), so it looks like it's not fully fixed but they need to clear the backlog of queueing boats. So I guess we might at last take Herbie up the hill today. Gonna be scorchio!

Nearly out on the canal

 

Spot the fifth man!  Oh there he is lying under the balance beam vainly attempting to fix the bolt that holds the lock gate in place. I can tell you he was puffing and grunting quite a lot. "Need more washers" shouted the man.  "We haven't got any" came the reply. Anybody that thinks these guys have an easy life should come and have a go.  Up here, some way from the road, these's no heavy machinery to help or no spare parts store handy.

This is Claydon bottom lock on the South Oxford and it is the reason why Herbie isn't out on the canal today.  Apparently the old fixing bolt had sheared off for no apparent reason except perhaps old age.  When I spoke to the CRT guys they thought they'd have it fixed by the end of the day yesterday but there was nothing about it in the batch of CRT updates we got this morning.  Never mind, it gives me a chance to get a bit more painting done. I'm now nearing the finale of the restoration of the port side handrail. Just the red top coat(s) to go. That'll be five coats of paint in all. Two anti rust primers, one lovely Craftmaster undercoat (how do they get their paints to flow so well?) and two red top coats in Hempel paint. The Hempel is ok, but not as lovely as the Craftmaster. However Hempel has the Bordeaux Red colour we want to match the other reds on the boat. This warm weather is good for filling the old rust pits with  Isopon providing you work fast, but when the sun is out the metal gets hot really quickly and you can't paint, so you have to be opportunistic and dash out there with the paint brush when the weather looks right.

Now then I should explain while we've been gone missing for so many weeks. Well the primaary reason was that we were at home looking after our son Richard who was convalescing from a double hernie operation.  He was told not to lift anything heavier than a kettle for six weeks and as he normally lives on his boat, that wasn't going to work.  Anyway he's recovered now so we're able to get away for a bit.

Apart from getting a bit of painting done, our plan was to go up the hill to our favourite spot below Claydon and indulge in a mixture of chilling and odd jobs.  So we don't want to go through that busted lock at all. However the queue of boats moored up there now  stretches back as far as where we want to tie up, so we're waiting until they can move away.  I worry for the possible hire boaters who have booked an expensive week aboard and then get stuck waiting for days.  If there are any above those locks, they have nowhere to turn round.

Meanwhile here in Cropredy marina is not a bad place for us to wait. Gertie the cat quite likes it and we have a pleasnt sopt to sit outside and watch the world go by.  People often go on about the amazing skies we get round here and they're no wrong. Here's the view from the other end of the marina yesterday.

Banbury cut in half - plus Herbie sea trails

 Banbury cut in half? What's he on about?  Is it just click bait? Well I'll explain that at the end.

Meanwhile for the first time in many months Herbie has left the marina.  I don't know who was more nervous about it, Herbie or us. Well we needn't have worried the old BMC engine chugged along as normal and we remembered how to steer and do locks. It was not without incident however because we got stuck for nearly half an hour in Slat Mill lock. Same old problem, something stuck behind a bottom gate so it wouldn't open wide enough for us to squeeze out. A small crowd soon gathered and another boater offered his extra long boat shaft for me to poke around from Herbie's bow.  I couldn't really feel anything but suddenly the gate got freed and we were on our way.  Later on we heard that the culprit had been a plastic baker's tray,

 Anyhow we got to Banbury and decided to pull in by spiceball park which would be a nice quiet spot if it wasn't for the 24hr baking factory opposite. So that's twice in one day we got annoyed by bakers. Actually I don't mind that king of industrial noise as long as I know what it is.  They have these huge silo things

You have to suppose they're full of flour, I can't think what else. At the weekend, Spiceball park seems very popular and there were throngs of people about on Saturday afternoon. After they'd all gone home I took a stroll round.  It's a big park with several large fields, some woodland, a riverside (Cherwell) walk and a BMX thingy for the yoofs to fall off their skateboards and bikes on.

and it's only a short walk to the shops and entertainments in Castle Quay, see here in the sunset.

earlier I was very surprised to walk up to the Castle Quay moorings and found them empty -on the towpath side at least. Most unusual.

Ship's cat Gertie doesn't like the sound our engine and it took some time after we arrived to coax her out of her hidey hole on the wardrobe shelf, but I eventually coaxed her out onto the towpath where she followed us about and took a great interest in the many rabbit holes in the bushes.

We decided to go and turn the boat which meant going through the lift bridge by Tooleys Yard, down Banbury lock  and about half a mile up to the Tramway winding hole and back. Ariving at the lock on the return trip I was accosted by a suspicious looking gent saying "How are you and where you been you old $%$£*"  "Aah hello Maffi" quoth I, for it was he along with the lovely Susan (I can't see what she sees in him) Anyhow we had a quick catch up while we worked through the lock and by the time we waved goodbye we had learned that the lovely Mort Bones has moved her boat Bones (I know) from Cambridge to somewhere near Audlem on the Shroppie where she now resides. That could explain why we couldn't see her boat in cambridge then.

There were lost of very young kids kids about with their parents so in the interests of public education I allowed them to open and close the top lock gates and off we tootled back to the very place we had left an hour earlier but now facing in the opposite direction. 

And there I sat it a camping chair on the back deck enjoying the warmth of the rays from the setting sun.  I was not alone in this, for just across the towpath I had a sunbathing companion.

A peacock butterfly. just look at those markings.  They look like they've been painted on.

Earlier that day we made the sad discovery that the inverter on Herbie wasn't working. Dead as a doornail. Now that was a problem because the only chargers and leads we had brought for our phones and computery gubbinses were 240volt ones. So out of necessity we strolled into the shops and payed over the odds for some leads to plug into Herbie's 12v cigarette lighter type socket. 

We later realised that we could have moved the boat up to the electricity bollards at Castle Quay. I took a closer look at one earlier.

I did some research and found out that you use their app to deposit some money, then log on to the bollard number and hook up and switch on.  I couldn't find the latest tariff but in 2023 it was 95 pence for a kilowatt hour, which seems a lot, but as someone on CanalWorldForums pointed out it compares favourably with what you would spend on diesel to charge from a genny or your engine, and of course you get 240v which is what we needed.  I might give it a go one day.

With bit of luck the inverter might have blown the gert big fuse that hides somewhere in the engine 'ole. When I feel up to doing a contortionist act and squeezing my old frame into it's dark recesses I'll take a look. No hurry.

While we were in town buying leads and it being a sunny day we popped along to the market square where our favourite bread and cake man was plying his wares. Fortunately for the state of our health he had sold out of his delicious but deadly lardy cakes so we had to settle for a piece of cold bread pudding (yum) and a Banbury cake. A Banbury, for those not in the know, is very much like an Eccles cake  but a different shape. 

Returning the the boat we divided the Banbury between us, hence today's blog headline. Sorry about that.

Waking up a sleeping boat.

Well here we are back on board. Herbie seems to have survived that long wet wet wet winter and we're reasonably shipshape. We may even venture out down the canal later this week although we've abandoned any ideas of taking her through the Straits of Hormuz. And just like HMS Dragon, now at last bound for Cyprus, we need a day or two to get victualed up and test all the equipment first.  

I always suffer from some trepidation at this point, all of this equipment isn't really meant to lie dormant for some months, so I go through it all with fingers crossed and mentally prepared for disappointment.

So far the electrics, gas and plumbing all seem hunky dory as does the Eberspacher heater.  I feared to open the door of the coal stove because one casualty of the winter has been the chinese hat on the chimney which we found lying on the bank minus its legs and with a gert big hole in the middle.  Lots of rain must have got down the chimney, but probably because our grandson Jacob left the stove full of ashes, they soaked it up nicely and no harm was done.

Just hang on for a couple of minutes and I'll go and attempt to start the engine . . . . (Yes I'm typing this in real time folks!)

I'm back.

Oooh it very nearly didn't start. It took along time on the starter key and the old battery was struggling but it finally rattled into life. I dare say the fuel took some time to make its way back to the injectors, a bit like when yo have to bleed the engine after  some jobs. I've left it running for half an hour now while it gets its breath back and get a nice bit of hot oil flowing through its veins.. You'd take a while to wake me up if I'd been asleep for several months. There's a bit of rainwater in the old engine 'ole bilge but not too much.  The domestic batteries were of course fine thanks to Bright Phoebe or Helios or whatever you call the sun. Solar panels rule!

Next job, waking up the dear old Morco gas water heater.  Wait there . .

Well I got it going, and hot water came out of the tap, but the  Morco gave me a hard time as it often does. The Morco and I have a fractious relationship at best. When it works it's a boon, but it does like to play up after  a long rest. The best treatment seems to be to use an old toothbrush to clean the gas jets but that means taking of the outer cover.  

If anybody has a good trick for getting these covers back on again without twenty minutes of cursing and swearing I'd be eternally grateful for their input. Anyway it's done now and it seems to be working.

And outside the boat the paint I put on the roof last summer seems to be holding up despite it only being a couple of coats of rust beater primer undercoat. Quite impressive after all the rain we had. I need to finish the job this spring.

So not a bad afternoon's work.

Meanwhile Gertie the ship's cat is tentatively refamiliarising herself with the surroundings. Actually she likes it here in the marina and goes off exploring for hours.  She's not so fond of Herbie's engine noise though. We might have another day in the marina tomorrow then for sea trials we can pootle down the four locks to Banbury on Thursday.  If that goes OK we can declare Herbie fir for service for another year.

20 years - 6 marinas. All with pros and cons. Which is best?

Herbie has moved home a few times in 20 years.  Which did we like most?

Let's list them first:

1 Stanstead Abbots Lee navigation just south of Ware (Where? Ware). This is where we bought Herbie and we had to stay for about 6 weeks waiting for British Waterways (as it was then) to finish a lock stoppage before we could escape.  We used those weeks to potter up and down to Hertford - quite a peasant run actually.  Here I am pouring soem cheap bubbly over Herbie's bow on takeover day.

2 High Line Yachting on the Slough Arm. 2006-2011. Our first 'permanent' mooring and only 35 minutes for home in the car.

 We're down there somewhere, breasted up outside our friendly neighbour Geoff..A s you can see it can get cold and icy down there. 

3 Crick marina.  2011 -2016

Home of the annual Crick Boat Show, and as moorers we got free passes to it.

It was bit of a culture shock after High Line Yachting - there were a lot of posh boats.

A nice spot to sit out by the boat

4. Cropredy Marina - 2016 -2020  and 2024 - date    South Oxford canal

Yes we came and stayed, then went away, then came back. The Marina was failry new when we first came but it's well established now.  We're currently in our fourth spot in the marina, albeit al those spots are within 25 yards of each other.

Cropredy is well known for its sunset views

Here's how it looks nowadays

5. Wigrams Turn Marina 2020-2021

We ended up at Wigrams by misfortune. We were in the process of moving up to a mooring booked at Kings Langley Bromley marina in March 2020 when the first Covid Lockdowns were imposed. We abandoned that trip and made a bolt for the nearest marina which was Wigrams Turn.

Here we are on one of their long multi boat pontoons - a swine to get in and out of, and a long trolley push from the car park when loading up.  Abit like being in the middle of a big car park.

6. Ventnor marina 2021 - 2024

Less than a mile from Wigrams turn but a world away.  It could hardly feel more different.

I mean just look at these picures. What's not to like.

Well that's all of them. Which is best?  Well it all depends. The loveliest and best kept is definately Ventnor. The on site access roads, the car parking, the lush surrounding, the good facilities, the friendly staff. It has it all. and it is very peaceful, almost too quiet sometimes. The nearby village of Stockton has a good pub and it's only ten minutes or so by car to Southam which has the shops you need.  So why did we move back to Cropredy?

Well the problem with Ventnor is where it is.  Turn left when you exit and there are the (to my mind) unpleasant Calcutt locks, then you go to Wigrams and either Braunston or Napton
which we have done so many times that we were getting bored with it.  Turn right out of Ventnor and you have Stockton locks which are hard work and then the run down to Leamington which is not the most inspiring canal town, and then onto Warwick and Hatton locks which are hard going for those of us approaching 80 years old.

So Cropredy is our current choice being nearer to home, having good facilities and friendly and helpful staff. As a place to sit about without going out it's fine.  The canal outside has  good cruising right down to Oxford and the Thames with plenty of quiet rural spots to stop for the night, and Banbury is handy for shorter cruises or popping to the shops in the car. The only real complaint is the state of the internal access roads which can get potholey and mucky in winter.

The wooden spoon goes easily to Wigrams Turn of which I have very little good to say apart from the fact that it gives three ways to cruise.  The place is run OK but we didn't like the pontoons or the surroundings and you can't get your car anywhere near the boat for unloading. Sorry Wigrams.

As for the others - we have a soft spot for the much maligned Slough Arm and the community is good, but the clambering over other boats and the huge distance from car to boat is not enjoyable, nor is the summertime weed making cruising up the arm very onerous.

Crick is absolutely fine. We enjoyed it very much and found it friendly and well run.  Having free passes for the show was good too.  The cruising routes from there are not that inspiring though. Maybe in our old age and not so keen to go far or do so many locks we'd like it more. Tootling along to Welford, Foxton and Market Harborough would be easy work. Food for thought I suppose.

Lastly the place at Stanstead Abbots was unobjectionable but had no real merits, except for tootling up to Ware and Hertford, both pleasant towns. Facilities on site were very limited.