Braunston to Itchington Bottom Lock

OK, so I couldn't think of a witty/snappy title for this post.

Last night we were woken by a thunderstorm at 0315. Perhaps that explains why I'm feeling tired now (or it just might be that my strength has been sapped by working Jubilee down 13 big GU locks in blistering heat, having had to turn all but one and going down on our own).

But back to this morning. Andy gave me a guided tour of Montgomery, aka The Jam Butty. It didn't take long. I saw his ingenious method for raising the floor to any of three other heights, done so as to enable trading at eye-level with customers. Andy explains on his blog. He has every justification to be proud of the recent addition to the WildSide preserves business.

We left our mooring at about midday - Helen paused briefly from her seemingly continuous jam/marmalade preparation to watch from the side hatch.

We made the left turn at Braunston Turn behind a slow narrowboat. Thankfully he waved us past in a mile or so, and we made better progress.

At Wigram's Turn we turned right to stay on the GU. After the Calcutt Locks we called in on fellow BCFers Steve and Julie on their boat Heaven Sent.

It was good to see you both.

And then it was on to the Stockton flight. Just before untying ourselves from Heaven Sent two boats went past, one of them Cepheus, and so we followed them down. There was no boat we could share with, so the going was slow. Did I mention that I had to turn all but one of the locks?

Now I might persuade Jan to accompany me to the pub (in the interests of research, of course) - and then we'll see how much sleep we can get in this heat.

Tomorrow should see us to Warwick, where I'm intending to call in on Jo and Keith on Hadar, and Sunday looks like Hatton Locks day. I wonder if it will rain ...