Fun at Foxton

Having topped up with water, we set off from Kilby Bridge with another boat “Iris” owned by a lovely couple called Rob and Sue.  We arranged to go through the next 11 locks with them as they were double locks and it made it so much easier with the two ladies operating the locks.

After a busy day both boats moored up for the day just outside the village of Fleckney and David walked across the fields to the local Co-op to get some provisions.

We set off the next day, having said our goodbyes to Rob and Sue (they were heading towards Market Harborough) and navigated through the Saddington Tunnel and were surprised to see another boat coming the other way.  Having realised we could both travel through the tunnel we relaxed a little.  It is a little  eerie heading towards another boat in whilst travelling underground, but we managed it with relative ease

in this photo you can just about see the light of the other boat in the tunnel.

We reached our next obstacle a couple of hours later – Foxton Locks, and what a fantastic afternoon we spent travelling up the 10 staircase locks in the lovely British sunshiine.

While Rachel did her usual job of operating the locks, with the assistance of some Canal and River Trust Volunteers, David had a great time talking to a number of tourists on his way up. He enjoyed it so much he invited some of them onto the boat to go up a couple of locks  and also allowed them to look inside the boat.  Rachel was slightly alarmed as she had recently done a load of washing and various under garments were hanging on the radiators!!!  An Indian family particularly enjoyed the experience and kept returning to ask questions and have another ride.

 

Here is a little more information about Foxton Locks….a great day out if you ever get chance.

http://www.goleicestershire.com/outdoors/foxton.aspx

We moored up for the evening just at the top of the locks.

The next day we travelled through another tunnel – Husbands Bosworths tunnel.  There were no locks, much to Rachel’s relief ! but lots of bridges and we moored up just outside the village of Yelvertoft.

The next day was very grey so no photos taken I’m afraid, but we enjoyed travelling through Crick Tunnel passing 4 boats in the tunnel.  One guy moaned about our light being too bright!!  Then, in the rain we queued up to go through Watford Locks which would have been lovely on a sunny day.  We did manage to get some shelter for a while under the M1 bridge and through the weather was not too pleasant we managed well, again with the assistance of a friendly lock keeper.

Here is some info and photo is you want a read

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watford_Locks

We moored up for the evening near Norton Junction ready for our onward trip to Braunston the next day.

We had a fairly easy day travelling to Braunston.  We first navigated through the longest tunnel so far, Braunston Tunnel which is 2042 yards long and took about 30 minutes to travel through.

There were then 6 locks before we arrived at Braunston.  A very busy hub for the canal boat industry with the Grand Union Canal joining the North Oxford Canal.  We found Braunston a very interesting place, though quite busy and moored up for the night just outside the marina.

Here are some views of the Marina which we had a stroll around

 

We made the decision to have a week’s stopover at Wigram’s  Turn Marina. One, because we needed to clean and maintain Black Velvet – she also needed to be assessed for her Boat Safety Certificate which we decided to have done while we were moored up in the marina and two, because we thought it would be nice to have a rest and chill out for a week, especially as it was our 30th Wedding Anniversary during the week.

We travelled down to Wigram’s Turn through some pretty countryside having booked in at the marina for a week.

 

We will update you on our stay at Wigram’s Turn Marina on our next blog.  Needless to say, we had a lovely week there exploring the area and celebrating our anniversary!