Bartimaeus

When Bryn first proposed joining us for this short stay, we had to plan around a visit to Edinburgh before he arrived, and another at the end of his visit.  The ongoing issue with water shortages had already severely restricted our choices, and it was hard to know when things might worsen again.

By exploring the Ashby Canal in detail, we were able to enjoy our time and make the rendezvous in Rugby work as planned, but we still had the contingency of a short train ride if more locks had closed in the meantime.

On his first full day, we were able to get through the locks at Hillmorton as planned.  We stopped for lunch immediately after, despite it being very early, because we know there are not many mooring spots for some while.

The water level on this very long pound was clearly a foot or more below its usual level.  It was still navigable, but it was hard to avoid grounding when meeting other boats.  More than once we bounced over something on the canal bed - it felt just like going over a speed bump.

It was mildly stressful, but the countryside here is still very attractive and we found an excellent mooring spot which turned out to have an excellent pub a short walk away.

In the afternoon, an update from the Canal and River Trust (CRT) added further restrictions to the use of the locks.  They also announced that unless conditions improve by next week (extremely unlikely) they will be forced to completely close more lock flights.  The shortage of water in England has now been declared a “nationally significant incident.”

We are continuing with our original plan to head west along the Grand Union Canal.  Immediately after the first lock, we also heeded the CRT advice and stopped to get our diesel tank filled and our waste tank emptied.  The pump out machine wasn't working when we arrived, but after a while they "tested" it on our boat - successfully - and we got that service for free.

It was a relief to be on a pound with a better water level, but we dawdled along in the hot sun.  There were many boats coming towards us, but nothing seemed to be going our way.

The afternoon was spent working our way through the Stockton Lock Flight.  We'd done the first two when a woman appeared and asked if they could join us.  They had arrived at the top of the flight a little behind us, but it made a lot of sense for us to wait and work the locks together.

By the time they had caught us up, we'd also been joined by two volunteer lock keepers, so now we had a full locking crew.  The other driver suggested my preferred method of going between the locks - in parallel.  Each driver simply heads for their side of the next lock at the same speed.  It's a lot less effort than the serial method: holding the first boat to the side of the lock while the second one arrives.

We made short work of the flight, but locking is hard work and the afternoon was very hot, so by the time we stopped, Clare and Bryn were both keen to have a shower.  As the afternoon cooled, we went for a short walk in to Long Itchington.  We found a pub for a drink.  Other pubs were available, but ours turned out to also house an Indian restaurant, so we checked the menu.  We couldn't resist a carry out curry - which turned out to be excellent.

Today's (and tomorrow's) locks are also on the list to be closed before the end of the month.  We will try to get Bartimaeus out of the areas where closures have already been announced, but with no significant rain forecast, it is far from clear if we can continue to be lucky enough to avoid them.