Another soaking

Robin Hood

As planned, we headed up to Nottingham castle this morning, and spent a couple of hours exploring the museum and art gallery housed in the castle. Well worth the visit and the views from the castle over the city and surrounding countryside are brilliant. We also explored the neighboring museum (included in the price - 'cheapskates' I hear you cry!), which covered the Victorian to WWII period. We felt particularly ancient at this point because many of the exhibits looked all too familiar from our childhoods!

 The entrance to the castle museum

 View from the castle

Returning to the boat via Sainsburys, we bought two pots of basil and placed them in the containers we bought yesterday - from the Pound Shop - a theme is emerging here!

Tonight's view

We left Nottingham in late afternoon, in bright sunshine and headed for the Trent. The forecast said that it would be dry until light rain would arrive in the evening. Well, the forecast was wrong, and just as we set off on the Trent, the heavens opened and we had a deluge of rain and then hail. It poured all the way to Holme Pierrpoint and ended with a thunder storm. We moored up against a concrete quay which overhung the side of the boat, necessitating fenders at roof level! We are now weighing up whether our wee boat (and us) are up to the navigational and mechanical challenges that lie ahead, or whether we should turn round and head up the calmer Trent&Mersey canal - watch this space....

The river is wide and the river is deep....!

Sawley, where we awoke this morning

Scouting the entrance to the Trent
Sawley proved to be really quiet - we only saw 2 boats while moored. We turned Banjo round and after filling with water etc., re-entered the lock and headed out onto the River Trent.

The Trent

The River Trent is very much wider than the canals we have become used to, even this far from its mouth. It feels completely different to have about 100 feet of water each side of the boat, and you are allowed to travel at up to 8mph!

Geese swimming in formation

We saw loads of geese in large groups, but strangely very few boats - what do all these people know that we don't? The weather stayed bright and mainly sunny and we enjoyed the trip through the outskirts on Nottingham and into the centre, mooring up just below the castle.

Nottingham centre with a tram in the distance

We walked in to the centre of Nottingham and plan to return in the morning to visit the castle and caves. As usual we had a look around the shops (many) and a Baskin Robbins ice cream- another great diet day on top of the Mars Bar!

Faster Streams

Normanton on Soar

We set off in a chilly wind behind Lutra. As we approached the first lock another boat split us up but Ann and Richard waited for us to come through. We travelled the journey to the junction with the Trent, in a heavy downpour, with Lutra. The day was contrasting with bright sunshine and dark heavy showers.

Zouch

There were very pretty places on route as the Soar meandered through the countryside

Erewash ahead, Trent right and Trent&Mersey left, with the Soar behind

At this huge junction we waved goodbye to Ann and Richard as they turned left into the Trent&Mersey Canal and we crossed to the Erewash Canal, We went through the prettily situated lock and moored just after it just before the next downpour.

And then the rains came!

Bearings established we walked a mile or so to the shops in Sawley. The heavens opened again and we sat in a bus shelter eating mars bars until it abated a little. Another pretty spot to spend the night with good satellite reception for The Apprentice!

Best wishes to Dan for the completion of his final assignment in his music technology course.

Sunshine and showers

This morning's view from the bedroom

The day started sunny but with a chilly breeze. The first lock we came to was being repaired by the BWB, and the men considerately operated the lock for us. Not long into our journey we came across James and Doug on Chance at Thurmaston (MGM Boats) as their beautiful boat was having some snagging issues resolved. We stopped for a chat and a little further along, with our propeller tangled with weed and plastic bags we stopped to remove them and came accross Rosemary on Autumn Glory - also had a chat.

The stretch of the canal flips backwards and forwards with the River Soar with a number of wiers. The locks were mainly against us and a couple on Lutra (Latin for Otter) offered to wait at the next lock. Alas we missed because another boat got between us - we caught up with them at Barrow Deep Lock. One quirk of fate took us to Barrow Mill Basin to fill with water etc. We had to wait for another boat and as we waited a party of people gathered. As we went about our business G recognised a man he used to work with in the early 90's. Ajay was there for a sad family occasion but G and he were very pleased to meet up again - what a co-incidence!

A cute shire horse foal

Angela modelling this season's look

During the course of the day the heavens opened and we were forced to wear our elegant waterproofs. It remained unpredicatable until mid afternoon when it stayed sunny.

Loughborough Wharf tonight

We arrived at the wharf late pm and moored next to Lutra. The view is not a patch on last night but there is a Tescos in sight!

Town and Country

Leicester city centre

We awoke after a quiet night, to the sound of road sweepers -a bit of a change from the usual sounds of ducks and songbirds! After saying goodbye to Rosemary and Jim on Autumn Glory we decided to spend a bit of time exploring Leicester and so we walked across the castle gardens and into the centre. Angela discovered that Leicester has most of her favourite clothes shops, and we explored them all! We returned to Banjo with some new jeans, and fruit from the large market.

National Space Centre

We toyed with the idea of staying n Leicester for another night, but in the end, cast off and headed north at about 3pm. We passed through some dreary industrial areas but generally the scenary was lovely and included distant views of the space centre.

Where's our bread?

We moored up in Birstall, and became aquanted with the local wildlife. Really nice moorings with several other boats and views across the river to a nature reserve.

Some beautiful birds

We met up with Lorraine and Stuart and their very well behaved dog, who live nearby, and went for a walk around the nature reserve. Huge numbers of swans, geese, ducks and a mammoth greeted us.

The mammoth!

The mammoth was actually a monument - a mammoth was apparently found here. We rounded off the day with a drink at the nearby pub and then fish and chips from the local chippy, on the boat.

A change of scene

Sharing a lock with 'Rosie and Jim'

We awoke after a really quiet night to some sunshine and a lot of wind again. We hadn't seen another boat since mooring up, and then 5 came along, all heading in the wrong direction, setting the locks against us! This section of canal has an abundance of locks which are hard to operate and seem to funnnel the wind to make steering very tricky.

 Leicester City's ground

Just before a lock here there is an enormous wier- fortunately the river Soar was very calm today!

There be dragons here!

After an arduous 12 locks - the latter few gratefully shared with Rosemary and Jim on their shiny new boat, we arrived in Leicester at the end of a festival which had culminated in Dragon Boat racing. The Dragon boats were moored in the gated moorings so we turned round and hovered for about an hour until they cleared the pontoon and then got a good spot for us and Rosemary and Jim's boat.



City centre moorings

BW lock the gates at 7pm but boaters use the BWB keys to come and go. After dinner G went in search of Sunday papers and successfully returned after quite a hike - the above photo was taken en route.