Double 0 Life

 We left Worcester behind again after a close shave with Real Estate. Too easy to get tempted back into the Rat Race. We travelled upstream on the River Severn into new territory, passing Beverley Lock and on to Holt, where the clever Lock keeper welcomed us with the phrase ….”We’ve been expecting you, Mr Bond!”.  Oh the British humour; what a delight! We experienced our very first disturbed night here, thanks to some quiet fishermen who started up a conversation about every 45 minutes, enough to keep breaking us out of our reverie. At 2am I took control and politely asked them to stop nattering. They said it was such a lovely night, they couldn’t give it up.  They all disbanded except for this gentleman who obviously had nowhere else to be that night! Our engine is now behaving ok, but we have discovered that on Rivers water tends to leak into the bilge, probably because we’re going faster. Andy has got used to being completely anal about engine checks daily.  We ha...

We have had a lovely time on the River Avon. In fact it was so beautiful, we got to Stratford and decided to go back down the way we came. We had a spell of very warm weather, which sounds great, but on a narrow boat you don’t want to get too hot, so we found ourselves searching for shade.  We found an idyllic spot in Pershore, not before having a few dramas such as leaving my jacket in the lock. I had hung it up because it was so warm, forgot about it, and when we arrived in Pershore realised that it was still by the lock. I walked for miles backtracking, and across the Pershore bridge into the countryside, only to find that there was no way of getting back to the lock other than by water Fortunately, we had met some other boaters and we saw them coming through the lock from the shore. We shouted over to them and they picked up the jacket. Saved the day! We headed to Evesham after a couple of lovely days in Pershore. Everyone was out on the water on their water toys. It was deligh...

 So, how long has it been? A month? Yes, horrible! But we managed to fill the time in.    Fabulous weather, too hot at times. My brother came over from Majorca to get away from the heat there, and we had a heat wave here, which wasn’t great on the boat, so he got a hotel room 😓. He hasn’t been well and I was hoping to make him feel better, and hopefully it helped.  Meanwhile our Holding tank had filled up two weeks before, as we couldn’t motor to the Pump Out station, and the boat was slightly listing to the side. We were having to use the cassette Loo and Marina facilities. I was getting paranoid about the smell, which we fixed. ..  Too much information! Finally, a week ago the engineer turned up, replaced our gearbox and a seal within the engine itself. £2000! It seems that at some point, the previous owners would have bumped the propeller with something big under the water which caused both problems that we have had, the propeller shaft and the leaking gearb...

 So our plans are scuppered. We limped back to Worcester, stopping every hour to check the oil. An overnight again in Upton on Severn, and a welcome Real Ale.  We did, however, witness the working barges going up and down the quarry, just like in the Pearsons book!  The oil was leaking for sure. We had a drip tray and collected it to recycle each time we stopped. There is nowhere to stop on this stretch of the river so it was all very trying.  There were 4 barges all in operation.  Another welcome beer when we got back to Diglis basin. Now we’ve got to find an engineer to fix the gearbox. Could take a while    So I filled the time up for us by playing with my new band at a Jazz Jam in Malvern, which was jolly good fun. In laws and friends turned up. Never a dull moment.  However, we would love to get travelling again. 

Another busy week.  Andy stayed on the boat while I whizzed up to Manchester for a reunion with 6 of my old school pals.  We used to holiday and camp together 50 years ago!. .. some of them I hadn't seen for 48 years, and it was so beautiful; we were all fundamentally unchanged, and I discovered that I could pick up after 37 years in Australia.  Amazing. When I got back to Worcester, we prepared for another outing, down the river this time. We were headed for Tewkesbury.  This time through the locks out into the river, not a volunteer to be seen. Someone's got to open the very heavy lock gates. We turned left out of the canal onto the River Severn this time.  Another large lock awaited, with a paid lock keeper here. Big lock, large enough for oil barges and bulk carriers.  Very exciting.   We calmly moseyed down towards Tewkesbury. Along the way we saw buildings we had never noticed before. We are still not sure what this building is, but it is ne...