Our 48 hours here are complete, and even though Mr. Met Office said it would be raining today, it’s quite a nice day – so were using today to get back to Fobney – and in case the predictions come true, we have until Saturday to let the rain pass and the river flows to settle before pulling back onto the Thames once more.
We were thinking of going back to the water point again to top the tank off – but I decided against it. The flow of this canal is quite a bit – considering that it’s a canal, but this is the River Kennet section after all! So due to the winding hole being behind us, I didn’t fancy the reverse and turn against the flow – so decided not to even attempt it. Plus – the diesel levels are getting a bit low, so I don’t want to burn fuel we may be desperate for in the coming days. Chances are that we will be on the Thames on Saturday – so we should have enough water till then.
Set off and got through the electric swing bridge – it was well past 9am – so not a lot of traffic. There is a sign asking boaters not to open the bridge between 8am and 9am – for obvious reasons.. and were joined in Sheffield lock by another boat.
Got through there easy enough, and on through Garston Lock (The turf sided one). There was another boat coming up with them operating the lock. We let the other boat go first, warning them that this section they would be going downstream, and that there are some tight turns coming up so take it easy as an unknown sharp turn + river flow = boat in the tree’s!
We got to the end of the twisty bit OK – no issues and the flow was less than it was a few days ago when we came up this stretch, so it was a nice run – at 4mph on tick-over!
And thankfully.. no sign of a sunken hire boat, so I can only presume (after re-arranging the overgrowth) they managed to get through the correct arch.. 😀
I cant think of a better location for a line of duck’s.. fenced off and waiting for when they need to cool down in the water!
And 
onto our mooring for the next few days. It’s quite a way back from the lock – so sorry Dawson, looks like an extra 5 minutes on the shop walk – but there are reasons for being back here.. A) I don’t know if there is room for us closer to the lock and.. B) there are gaps in the tree’s here both sides, so the solar panels can be used from 6am through to 9pm (which may be a must as were low on diesel) and that could mean we don’t need to run the engine for a few days to conserve fuel! But – there is always washing to do.. so we will still need to run it at some stage to power the washing machine.
