Banjo gains 8 extra legs

Today, after several weeks of hard work, Banjo was ready to sail for foreign climes. (Well, ready to leave Harlow anyway...)

Banjo sitting in her new mooring at the Moorhen Marina

We have scraped, painted, varnished, added new stuff and removed old stuff and re-stocked with food and drink (although as we discovered, no beer, chocolate or crisps!), and Banjo now looks much more loved.

Over the next 4 weeks we plan to head down to London, onto the tidal Thames at Limehouse up to Teddington and then down the River Wey to Guildford and Godalming where we hope to meet up Sam, Jamie and Josh and Graham's sister Sue. Also hope Philip can join us for the trip through London. We then plan to go down part of the Basingstoke canal to the point near Woking where Graham grew up in a house which backs onto the canal. It will be interesting to see the canal from a narrowboat rather than a raft made of oil cans and string!

Depending on the how much time we have, we hope to head further up the Thames to Windsor and beyond before retuning to pass through London via Brentford and onto the Regents Canal through Little Venice and Camden  and back onto the Rivers Lee and Stort back to Harlow. During this bit of the trip we hope to meet up with a few friends and hopefully Dan and Tamlyn along the way.

So, today we left Harlow, but this time, with two additional passengers - Anushka(Nush) and Lola....


Pensive dogs behind newly added gate

Initially the dogs were a bit wary of their new, unstable environment, but after a few locks and a couple of suicidal lunges for the water by Nush, they seem to have settled happily now, although Nush has a strong aversion to passing through the bathroom??


Today's cute creatures - two hot dogs

 An uneventful journey down the Stort led us past Roydon (where the huge newish marina now looks to have at least 100 boats moored) and on through the beautiful Essex countyside. It has been a while since we headed out on Banjo, and getting used to where everything goes and how to deal with locks soon came back to us.
 

Angela reunited with her windlass

 We left the River Stort and turned south down the River Lee, and into the first of the large heavy locks which populate this river. Heading on, we decided to stop at around 7pm, and are tonight moored at Dobbs Weir - a lovely spot with a nearby lake which the dogs enjoyed looking at whilst on a constitutional.

Tomorrow we head on towards Tottenham and the fairly gloomy section of river weaving into north London.