Home on the water

Some blue sky!

Banbury, Thursday evening

Still on the Oxford Canal, moored by Tom Rolt bridge in Banbury tonight. Thanks to him this part of the system was kept from being filled in many years ago. The canal goes through centre of Banbury and shopping centre development around it is very sympathetic. Lots of people obviously enjoy and use the area and it is very lively.

We have boat envy which we rarely get - this gorgeous boat moored in front of us. Immaculate in every detail, helped by devoted owners of course. No dull brass on their boat.

No locks today

Travelled all of about 3 miles today, still loading stuff on - storage boxes, outdoor chairs and tables all to make our life afloat extra comfortable.
Managed to finally connect the satelite dish for tv and actually get a picture - we now have all sorts of channels we dont need; German, French - could be interesting?!

Now on a windy mooring just outside Cropredy, where the Fairport festival is held - we've missed it. Certain of our friends jeer at this oldies and family friendly festival, but we have been once and it was impressive, best beer tent ever and no queues, all the food varieties you could wish for and some of them very good and even clean toilets that you don't have to queue for! Some good music as well! All made even better when you can stagger back to a comfy bed on board. We fear it has veered from the gentle folk style by having acts like Status Quo now though (oh dear).

The field next to me is being harvested, the swifts are scooping insects off the top of the water and boats slide past and say hello. ( well, their owners do!) .......and Pete's cleaning the windows, hurrah! Don't think he'll have much joy scraping the sprayed paint off though, oops.

Still on our mooring

Arrived on Friday, boat in boatyard having canoe bars fitted and water pump valve replaced. Stayed there overnight and spent evening with Jenny and Sid who were in the marina on their boat. Jolly evening talking boating and people.
Returned to our mooring in the morning to continue painting. Thank goodness some reasonable weather to do it now. Sad to find our mooring chain which was padlocked to bank had been stolen in only 2 days absence. Depressing to think someone can be so small minded and it can only be a fellow boater which is even more depressing.
Sunday evening now and our friends have left, Ani has coach lines finished and we have experimented with our camping washing machine, actually quite efficient but resulted in us running out of water! Travelled the short distance to the water point to fill up at about 5pm to absolute summertime chaos. Everyone deciding to fill at same time.
The new exciting Cobb BBQ is now busy cooking a whole joint of beef - Pete in seventh heaven as are all the passing dogs on the towpath.
We now don't think we will set sail until Tuesday, because we need to recover a little from all this work. It's a tough life on the cut.

Boating

We are off on a boating trip end of next week. Out of the Oxford canal up to Lechlade on the Thames then down to central London. Hope to see lots of friends on the way! Look out for the new look bright blue Animishkaa.".....