Bikes and bras

After a great time with the family over the new year break we are finally back on our travels.  Catherine was driving back to Nottingham university on Monday so dropped us off on the way up.  Although we had most of our stuff on the boat already we still had quite a bit to take with us; this, coupled with Catherine’s gear, meant her little car was rather full!

It was mid afternoon by the time we were unpacked and had said goodbye to Catherine so we went for a walk to Stoke Golding.  We needed to go back there as a local guy had serviced the engine for us over the break and we had to pick up the key.

The next stage of our journey will take us to Nottingham.  This entails going back down the Ashby canal to Coventry then north up the Coventry canal to Tamworth where we will join the Birmingham & Fazely canal.  This will take us up to Fradely where we will join the Trent & Mersey canal and head north east to Nottingham.  We have to travel 71 miles and go through 34 locks to get to Nottingham.  By road it is 40 miles and takes less than an hour whereas it will take us about 35 hours. 

When we woke on Tuesday it was damp and mild and it was good to get ‘on the road again’.

We stopped for water south of Hinckley just after passing under the A5.  Buddy guarded the hose pipe as usual.

We went past the Triumph motorbike factory at Hinckley – I must admit that at first I thought it was the Triumph underwear factor.

At noon the clouds cleared and the sun came out so we had a pleasant cruise to the end of the Ashby, although Karen walked most of the eight miles with Buddy

Karen spotted this boat and it reminded her of my handiwork which I demonstrated yet again when installing the new fridge freezer.  When we went to bed on Monday evening we were concerned that the freezer wasn’t working although the fridge was working really well.  I checked it out in the morning and found I had not connected two wires but all is OK now.  It fully supported our maxim of “If a job’s worth doing – do it twice”.

Here is a shot looking back at the start of the Ashby where it leaves the Coventry canal.

Karen had put the bread maker on before we started cruising so we had fresh ciabatta for lunch:

We realised that Nuneaton was going to be the last place we could do a big shop before Nottingham so Karen planned out the meals for the next week or so.  We then walked to the Nuneaton Asda leaving Buddy on the boat as it wouldn’t be much fun for him walking along busy roads.  By the time we got back it was pitch black and the last ¼ mile was a bit treacherous as we had cut across fields to get to the local main road and had forgotten to take a torch.

We moored overnight at a pleasant spot considering we were in a town.