Rain all day

 Wednesday 21^st October; Hawford top lock moorings

It was raining at 7 when we woke up, and it just carried on.  Mostly it was pretty light,  but with an occasional heavier burst.  A very good day for staying put and getting on with some jobs.  My first task was to walk Meg, and we left Dave fitting a new wall light to replace a broken one.  I had decided to explore the footpath going south from the bottom lock.  The Severn was shrouded in mist.

We walked up the steps to a private road serving a little group of rather nice-looking houses, then turned sharp right to follow a footpath sign towards the river.

We walked beside a field of turnips, but whether they were for human or animal consumption I couldn’t tell.  But the next field was full of leeks, so perhaps it was a market garden.  In the hedge alongside the footpath were the startlingly pink berries of the native Spindle tree.

When ripe, the pink seed-case splits to reveal orange seeds which are toxic to humans.  We followed a couple of people in hi-vis jackets along a broad stone track leading downhill, then they moved away up a set of steps while we crossed a stile in a new-looking fence and joined a wide muddy strip where vehicles had obviously been driving, though the surface had been levelled and was ready for re-seeding.  I could see the sign on the river for Bevere lock, and then the iron bridge crossing the weir stream came into view through the mist.

A length of new fencing ran inland along an inlet, and as we got closer it was obvious that this was the newly built fish pass.  Six are being built at Severn locks, and this is the first to be completed.  The one at Diglis, complete with a viewing window, should be ready by the end of the year. 

 The project is to allow salmon and the endangered twaite shad, eels and lamprey, to pass upstream to spawn.  We turned round at this point, unwilling to go through any more mud.  The yellow-jackets had gone, and so we went up the steps into the woods.  It looked as though they had been rebuilt when the original footpath was obliterated by the access road for the construction vehicles.

The path emerged into the leek field through a bank of nettles, and we retraced our steps.  I had been lucky with the weather and we didn’t get too wet.  Meanwhile Dave had been getting on with bits and pieces, and when I got back we emptied the well deck so he could finish painting the floor.  Apart from the anchor, everything came into the saloon – two wooden lockers, the hose reel, the matting and a bag of ‘Homecare Eco50’ which we will be trialling over the next few days.

Safely at anchor

Dave had to use a bit of filler where the areas we prepped on our last trip were a bit uneven.  We had lunch while it went off, then he applied a coat of red oxide paint.  Meg and I went off for short walk, this time to the upstream side of the junction along a footpath which has been completed since we were last here.

The mist had cleared and autumn colours glowed in the gloom. 

And a couple of cormorants surveyed their watery domain.  They took turns in showing me a good profile.

Because the weather was so damp Dave’s paint took quite a while to be ready for another coat, and he needed some fresh air, so Meg was delighted to have another walk.  I paid for my enjoyable relaxing morning by getting out the rubber gloves and old toothbrush and cleaning the top of the gaskets and the sliders of the empty cassettes.  Delightful!

The clutter from the well deck had to stay in the saloon overnight so the second coat of redox had time to dry properly.  The weather was so mild that we didn’t need a fire, though we did put the central heating on for an hour to get some hot water.  There was more heavy rain later on, but by then we had gone to bed.