Bit of a standstill day today

Map Reference SP 72540 87911

Distance travelled 0.0 Miles

Even less than a slow day today! The weather chose to remain rainy so we chose to stay where we were at Union Wharf at Market Harborough. Chance to do one or two jobs on the boat (screwing on plates etc.) and in the evening when the rain cleared even managed a bit of geocaching finding a local one and logging it.

Forecast for tomorrow is a lot better, in fact it is supposed to be hot and sunny, well we’ll see!

From Foxton to Market Harborough

Map Reference SP 72540 87911

Distance travelled 5.6 miles

Again another fairly slow day covering only a handful of miles but then we did pass through Foxton Locks which is 10 in immediate succession. All I had to do was steer, Julia did the hard work of opening and closing the lock gates and paddles. Fortunately the weather held up (totally different from the forecast!) and she didn’t get wet at all whilst working the locks.

It seems that the power consumption problem isn’t just as a result of me leaving a light on since we again awoke to the ‘low battery’ light on the inverter brightly lit. Have checked locally and it seems that Debdale Wharf marina seem to have some expertise in this sort of thing so will travel to there tomorrow to try to resolve the problem. We will be unable to make it to Leicester before Friday as the CRT are closing one of the locks between here and Leicester to repair the gate so we will have an even slower Thursday with only a few miles and a tunnel under our belt (assuming that we are not tied down at Debdale Wharf for more than a day.

To Foxton Locks

Map Reference SP 68951 89046

Distance travelled 9 Miles

A day which began with a concern over our power consumption as when we rose this morning the electric inverter had switched itself off and was displaying a ‘low battery’ light. This was hopefully caused by my leaving the foredeck light on overnight coupled with using a computer on the boat batteries last night. I hope that this was the cause anyway otherwise it might mean that we have some rather dodgy batteries on the boat.

Didn’t travel as far today as I would have hoped but this was as a result of a significant thunderstorm at about 1.15pm for which we moored up for a couple of hours to let it pass. Unfortunately there is similar weather forecast for tomorrow so we will have to see how we get on, hoping to get to Market Harborough to moor and get some shopping in. 

The only significant highlight of today was passing through Husbands Bosworth tunnel during which I felt a bit like a salmon swimming upstream, no boat travelling in the same direction as us and three coming from the opposite direction.  The inside of the tunnel wavers about a bit and when passing the oncoming boats we tended to scrape the side of the tunnel a bit causing a rear fender rope to break but other than that no great dramas.

Another gentle days cruising

Map Reference SP 64400 80936
Distance Travelled 1.5 Miles

Another day of gentle cruising taking us only about 1.5 miles into the village of Welford. Excellent Sunday lunch at The Wharf public house followed by a walk around the local reservoirs. One point of interest of these reservoirs is that,unlike most reservoirs they are not for local water supply but to feed  the canal, so without them we would grind to a halt.

Tomorrow we press on North towards Leicester hopefully passing through Husbands Bosworth tunnel and the famed Foxton Locks, looks like it might be a bit more of a challenge than today, all dependant upon the weather, which at the moment does not look too promising

Towards Welford

Map Reference SP 62590 82233

Distance Travelled 9 Miles

A gentle start to our tour of the waterways with just a 9 mile jaunt from Yelvertoft Marina to Bridge 41 (Sparford Bridge) near to the turning to the Welford Arm. Decided that we would not make it to Welford today so stopped short with the intention of getting there tomorrow for Sunday Lunch at the Wharf Inn (if possible). Despite a poor weather forecast it didn’t start raining until we had moored for the night, then it came down in spades! Thunder, lightning and a leaky roof but all is well now. Rain due to clear tomorrow for us to continue to Welford.

First night aboard

Well we are now into our first ‘proper’ night on board Rune in preparation to leaving the Marina tomorrow morning and heading North towards Julia’s sister in Leicester. It actually feels quite strange that something that has been so many years in the planning has now come to fruition and we are now going to experience what life on the ‘Cut’ is actually like. Hopefully the very good weather that we have recently experienced will continue for the start of our travels around the system.

At the moment we are in Yelvertoft Marina and, if all goes according to plan, by tomorrow night we should be along the Welford Arm and in the village of Welford about 10 miles north of here. There don’t seem to be many challenges between here and there, only the single lock on the Welford arm to get us back into the mindframe of ‘locking’. That will be in preparation for the Foxton Locks as we make our way towards Leicester (2 Staircase locks in rapid succession). Will try to collect some photos on the way to attach to the blog.

Finally moving onto Rune

I would have to accept criticism that it has been a bit of a slow start on this blog however I have been rushing around so much since I created it that I’ve hardly had time to actually put anything on it!

Now it seems that things are hopefully going to slow down a bit and the planned move onto the narrow boat should take place next week with us moving out of the Marina on Saturday to begin cruising the network.

When we leave the Marina the initial plan is to head north towards Leicester via the Welford  and Market Harborough arm as we already have the boat display plates for both of these but don’t feel that we can fairly put them onto the boat until we have actually travelled along them. After the visit to the relatives in Leicester we then plan to head south in the general direction of Bath/Bristol but the route is still subject to discussion, either down the Oxford Canal and then down the Thames of down the Grand Union to London and up the Thames.

Once we are on the cut and I have canal linked things to photograph I’ll post a few photos onto the blog just as proof of where we are.