12th September
After mooring in Sonning for Thursday night and having lunch at The Bull (another favourite pub), on Friday morning we left the Thames behind and started along the Kennet and Avon canal from its start in Reading. Through the Oracle shopping centre, where suited young men were playing crazy golf in their lunch hour in a dinosaur park! There is a traffic light system along this stretch, something we had never encountered before. You have to pull in to press a button which turns the light green if nothing is coming the other way. Not particularly boater friendly though as the approach to the switch has no landing pontoon! Most peculiar arrangement.
Here there are double locks with hefty gates so I am back to driving while Pete manoeuvres them. No more helpful lock keepers to rely on. We moored well past the built up areas of Reading through Fobney Lock which is mighty deep and has a nasty weir stream flow before it which shoves you sideways. I had to rev considerably to get beyond it and to keep the boat from scraping along the lock wall. The canal after this is suitably rural and quiet running alongside old gravel pits on one side and Fobney Meadow the other. We had thought we might venture back to the shopping centre on foot, but the sun came out, Pete went canoeing and we decided the mall was not sufficiently appealing.
Despite the daily sunshine and good temperatures, the atmosphere is getting more autumnal - spiders and daddy-long-legs inhabit the boat, there are blackberries in the hedgerows, owls hooting, and we lit the fire for a short time again last night.
After mooring in Sonning for Thursday night and having lunch at The Bull (another favourite pub), on Friday morning we left the Thames behind and started along the Kennet and Avon canal from its start in Reading. Through the Oracle shopping centre, where suited young men were playing crazy golf in their lunch hour in a dinosaur park! There is a traffic light system along this stretch, something we had never encountered before. You have to pull in to press a button which turns the light green if nothing is coming the other way. Not particularly boater friendly though as the approach to the switch has no landing pontoon! Most peculiar arrangement.
Here there are double locks with hefty gates so I am back to driving while Pete manoeuvres them. No more helpful lock keepers to rely on. We moored well past the built up areas of Reading through Fobney Lock which is mighty deep and has a nasty weir stream flow before it which shoves you sideways. I had to rev considerably to get beyond it and to keep the boat from scraping along the lock wall. The canal after this is suitably rural and quiet running alongside old gravel pits on one side and Fobney Meadow the other. We had thought we might venture back to the shopping centre on foot, but the sun came out, Pete went canoeing and we decided the mall was not sufficiently appealing.
Despite the daily sunshine and good temperatures, the atmosphere is getting more autumnal - spiders and daddy-long-legs inhabit the boat, there are blackberries in the hedgerows, owls hooting, and we lit the fire for a short time again last night.
Location:Reading
Sounds idyllic! We are just a tad envious! We will keep all your observations in our heads for use next year, hopefully! You just never know what's waiting round the corner! Look forward to hearing more of your travels and our love goes with you. Take care and keep up your strength for the Caen Flight! When might that be?
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