Too light to open a lift bridge?

Not far south of Banbury this morning we found that some wag had repositioned a sign to indicate that the channel lay to the right. Er, no - that's just a winding hole. I wonder how many people have been caught out. (Sorry for the photo which doesn't really show much - I grabbed it a little too late.)

The next bit of interest was a lift bridge which is supposed normally to be open. Except it was closed and the bank was rather inaccessible. I got off at the bow and hung on the chain to open the bridge which, eventually, brought the balance beams down. It was a close run thing, though. Since adopting a low saturated fat diet I now weigh only a smidgen above 9 stone. For the lift bridges nearer Oxford I'm going to have to tie a dozen windlasses around me.

We stopped for lunch above King's Sutton (or Tarver's) Lock; we tied up for the night at Aynho Wharf. We were now, surprisingly, in Northamptonshire again, the last time having been Braunston. Low down along the towpath someone had fixed curious button-decorated doors with messages inside.

This one says "Be the best unicorn ever!"

We chose what felt like the busiest time of day for road traffic to walk along the B-road to Aynho. There is no pavement; we spent half the time stepping onto the rough verge to avoid being run over. I'm sure it was nothing like this busy the last time we were here. We wandered around the pretty streets and alleyways, then came back to the boat for tea via the Great Western Arms where I downed a swift half of Old Hooky.

After tea we walked in the other direction, crossing the border into Oxfordshire, to Clifton. Here I enjoyed a pint of porter in the Duke of Cumberland's Head. On the way we noticed the strange phenomenon of mist swirling above patches of water lying in the field.

Was it a hot spring? (No, an average summer ...)

The most likely explanation is that the water had been warmed by the sun during the day; now, as the air temperature dropped, the evaporating water became visible as vapour.

Quite a weird effect.