Warm sunshine and freezing wind on the way to Marbury Country Park

Sunday 26th April

Some hardy souls were in shorts as they went by this morning, but most were well wrapped up.  We weren’t going to be going far today so I went out and washed the starboard side and the roof (mainly to remove Dave’s footprints from the trip down the locks) as the sun peeped through the trees. 

Dave replaced the seal between the hob and the working top.  It had been beginning to break down for a while and then tore on our last trip.  The manufacturer couldn’t help – naturally the hob is obsolete (and do get in touch if you would like to upgrade your hob) – but luckily the chandlery at Stone had one.  Not quite the right colour but very much better than the old one (which was too disgusting to admit to, so no ‘before’ photo!)

  

We left at 11 in glorious sunshine but the wind was freezing, especially across the flashes where it was very exposed.  New leaves and flowers glowed on the trees

and the wind howled across the flashes as we listened to the commentary on the London Marathon. There weren’t white horses on the water but it was pretty close.  I think it must have been the wind that caused my camera to tilt …..

We moored briefly at Rudheath to get the Sunday paper then continued past the chemical works, now owned by Tata.

The Lion Salt Works further north will be opening as a museum.  We stopped for the day at Marbury Country Park, where it was sheltered enough to sit outside, watch the passing boats and read the paper.

Dave took Meg for a stroll in the woods – not too far as he injured his foot last week playing football and it is still badly bruised.  Later I took her for a run round the park too, so lucky girl.

We had a couple of problems this evening.  First someone miscalculated the capacity of the cassette (it may have been me …) so a delicate removal and mopping-up operation ensued.  All sorted quite quickly.  Not so the second – somehow last night a wineglass threw itself across my laptop.  There wasn’t much wine in the glass and the computer seemed to work OK after wiping it up – or so we thought.  Tonight the keyboard failed, then the mousepad.  Oh dear.  At least I could download my photos onto Dave’s laptop and label them while I still remembered what they were of.

7 miles, no locks, not quite 3 hours.