Early up to beat the rain... and Prince Edward

Two posts today to make sense of the time disparity and get us close to real time blogging.  

We've been watching the weather forecast as you do when you are on a boat. All week the forecasters have been advising of a wet Friday with some winds, not great for boating. So we made plans for an early start for us on this holiday.

Last evening we didn't light the fire as Rachel made a Bahraini and a fruit crumble so the oven was on and that's enough to warm the boat.  This morning the alarm went off at 7am and we were moving at 8.05am with about 4 hours planned to get us about an hour away from the Atherstone locks for tomorrow. 

It was a cold moody morning with a heavy mist on the canal when we set off. Back doors closed behind which makes the steering position very cosy. 

There were no boats moving and the canal at the bottom end is refreshingly deeper  - just a few spots that you can tell need some dredging. I was slightly concerned about meeting a boat near the mobile home park as it is shallow there with rocks and a good distance where two boats can't easily pass. As I  approached it thankfully there was the first boat of the day exiting the narrows - I think we were both quite pleased on our timings.

About an hour and we were approaching Marston Junction. Rachel checked and no boats and we were just heading out when we saw a boat approaching from the south under the bridge. I stopped and checked they wanted to turn onto the Ashby so we carried on out, again both pleased where we had met (albeit briefly) 

Then it was a nice cruise through Nuneaton to our mooring past bridge 32 at just before 12. The sun briefly fooled us by making it look like the weather forecasters were fibbing again but by 1.30pm the wind was up and the rain driving down. The fire is lit and the coal cage doing its normal excellent regulated burn job. The back boiler and 32mm pipes are warming up nicely. 

A few poor boaters still moving some at speed, we can't really blame them as its quite horrible out there. We chose the mooring to be on a straight with the wind pushing us onto the armco  - wet windows one side and dry windows the other - quite surreal. 

Chalk and cheese day tomorrow hopefully as we progress down the Athersone flight  - might make it a longer day as Sunday morning is giving wet again.....

Re  Prince Edward, I dreamt about him last night, I was helping him in some way or another can't recall, he was sad which is to be expected. No idea where that dream came from  !!