Rain Stopped Play - Sunday 24th April

We moored overnight between the main Tame aqueduct and the flood relief aqueduct and had a very quiet and peaceful evening. In the morning I took Tiana for her walk down by the aqueduct and around the parkland bordering the river. On the lakes were hundreds of Terns safely nesting on the islands and making a terrific noise.

As we left Fazeley we had to stop as a fisherman was just trying to land a very large Chubb and we did not want to cause him any problems. Before I could take a picture he had placed it in his keep net and thanked us for waiting.

Travelling through Hopwas we passed this boat covered with tiny plants for sale, it even had small green houses on the roof to nurture them. We also met the man and his dog who was walking from Oxford to Wrexham who we met in Atherstone.

En route we passed some lovely scenery including this lovely weeping willow over hanging the canal and garden.

We stopped at Street Hay Wharf for Autumn Years to get some bits for their Squirrel stove from the extensive chandlery they have. They are well known for fixing all sorts of boat problems.

The stretch of canal from Brook Hay Bridge to Fradley is very shallow and we made slow progress to the junction. It really does need dredging. As we arrived at the junction it started to rain and so we moored up for lunch.

After lunch when the rain had stopped we walked up to Shadehouse Lock to check on the moorings and as there were 3 places available we decided to move up there. By the time we had negotiated the swing bridge, turned onto the Trent and Mersey, and negotiated  2 locks there was only one space left overlapping the final bit of armco. So we moored up there and Autumn Years breasted up against us whilst we waited for a hire boat to finish their lunch and move off. We were then able to moor securely for the night.

The Gongoozlers were out watching Autumn Years go through Middle Lock.