A Meandering Mann

What a rich adventure I have had, not least because of all the lovely people that have joined me, for an hour or a month!

February 2019

March 2019

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My sister Mary who joined me for March. We navigated the first stretch of the Thames together, along with the heavy and stiff locks on the Kennet and Avon canal.

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My first cousin, once removed, Wendy, and her friend Dan. They joined Mary and I for a couple of hours in Reading.

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Suzie and David’s son Jamie and his wife Helen with their son Robin stepped onto the boat for very short visits in Bath. I visited them at their home in Frome, pronounced Froom!

April 2019

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Jane was on board for the return trip along the Kennet and Avon and the second stretch on the Thames.

May 2019

Then came cousins, from the Oakden branch of the family, Mums sister’s children.

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Karen broke her leg while skiing in January and lost her walking stick in the canal. We could not recover it. Here she is holding her temporary walking aid, a glove and apron over a stick.

We had a mini family reunion in Banbury, the Manns and Oakdens.

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From left to right, Jim with Mary, Ann and brother Charlie, and Cathy.

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Next were my Hastings neighbours, Martin and Daniel, and my cousin John from Dad’s side of the family.

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Julia and Carla

June 2019

Derek and Wendy, friends of Sally’s came for a few days, along with Sally, then Derek came back by himself to get more of a taste of narrowboating.

Yep, it is raining, and it has been for quite a while. Oh for the days in February when we had a picnic beside the Droitwich Canal, or similar days in March and April, and May. It has been a very dry winter and spring, and I have been the glad recipient of wonderful unseasonable weather along my canal journey, but the tables are turned, and it is wet, in June. The month that I anticipated summer clothes and sandals is actually rain gear and the heat on in the evening to dry it out for the next day. I sincerely hope it is better for my last crew member, she is one of my very first clients from the early 80’s, who is joining me this weekend.

Who could resist a boat named after them? If I was to do this again, perhaps it would have to be a Maggie boat, but I have enjoyed Little Star. Such a lovely name. She reminds me of The Little Engine That Could. She just chugs along and gets on with it, at her own speed. But what about a boat named after a country:

I caught this on the fly, between rain drops and picking up garbage, rubbish in English English, from the canal.

This is two days worth from the Coventry Canal and the Birmingham and Fazely Canal. That is only the stuff that I grabbed while I am also steering the boat. Such a sense of achievement when I grab it, such sorry when I miss, or can’t reach it, or it is on the other side of the boat. So, there is an organization from Australia that is promoting plasticfreejuly.org. And on the BBC on Monday was War on Plastic with Hugh and Anita (that is Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Anita Rani) who are exploring reducing our use of single use plastics. It has got me thinking and thinking as I drive along, grabbing plastic, mainly plastic, out of the canal about how I can re-train myself about single use plastic. And it really does come down to re-training ourselves. So watch this space for future workshops on making your own re-usable vegetable bags when I am home in Owen Sound.

Which brings me to magnet fishing. This really is a thing. My friend Sue sent me links to YouTube about it which were amazing, but I saw one today on the canal. He had found mainly big stuff.

Just in case you are feeling too sorry for me I had a break in single handing for a few days. Derek really wanted to do more narrowboating so while his wife was away in sunny Spain with my sister Sally for a preliminary 60th birthday celebration he came back to the boat. He took the helm, and it rained and rained and rained. On his second night the wind was so strong, gusting from every direction, and the rain was so heavy that I could not sleep. It was the worst night storm of my whole adventure and I am glad he was aboard. So every day we heard about how wonderful and sunny it was in Spain and we got soaked. Him more than me. But in my defense I cooked breakfast, lunch and dinner, and got a lot of paper work done. The detritus of our lives that collects and collects until we have to do something about it. Not surprisingly a tree came down over the canal as a result of that storm and we had to halt at about 3 pm. We booked dinner in a local pub and walked there at 5.30 pm and by the time we came home, about 8 pm it was done. Well done, sub-contractors of the Canal and River Trust.

It has been an amazing experience to have traveled through the seasons as well as travel the canals. I began in darkest winter, literally dark by about 4 pm, but I could see right into the distance during the day – there were no leaves on the trees. And hardly any boats moving on the canal. As we moved into spring the birds began to mate, and build nests. And the flowers came and then the leaves on the trees. So many daffodils! A personal favourite. And then the lambs and chicks came. It is almost impossible not to count how chicks or cygnets there are in a family group, and it is quite a challenge. They skitter all over the place, it is as if they hydrofoil, they paddle with their feet so quickly that they rise up out of the water and wizz along the surface. They almost seem drawn to passing in front of the boat even though Mom is on the opposite side. Then they chirp like crazy trying to find her after they are on the wrong side. I have had to abandon coming in to a mooring because one was between the canal side and the boat. Finally it scampered away, if you can scamper in water.

Now the grass is even greener, the fields are filled with crops including rape, which we call canola, and the trees are in full leaf so my view is limited unless there is a break.

The lambs are growing up, it is amazing how fast they grow, and their moms have been sheared. Who knew sheep have such long legs. Sadly, the wool is not used commercially, it is too coarse. In this age where we are trying to reduce our use of synthetics it is sad that we can not find more use for this natural fibre. Sheep that give good wool for weaving and knitting are from sheep specially bred for that and are not usually used for meat.

Each year this group of men get together to travel the Thames, virtually from the source, but I am not sure where they end. They have all made their boats by hand, although some were not using them this year. One used his feet, like a paddle boat. He could read while he traveled!

I am in the middle of a stretch of single-handing and it never ceases to amaze me how much help has been to hand every day. Lucky lucky me. When you have crew and someone helps you out at a lock it is a bonus, when you are single-handing it is invaluable and you really appreciate canal etiquette. What is canal etiquette you may ask? Well, it is a lovely thing. If you arrive at a lock that is already in use you take over closing it and the people in the lock move on. This works whether you are going in the same direction, or opposite direction. I have been single-handing for three days, and every day I have had help at the locks. Today is a perfect example. I was just pulling Little star out of a lock with ropes when a boat showed up behind me. It was the first lock of 9. They took over the lock and I drove to the next lock. I set up the lock, e.g. fill it with water, as all of them were empty on arrival, open it and drive my boat in and close the lock. By which time the boat following would have arrived behind me. The top paddles would be opened, and the lock emptied, and they would open the gates and I would drive to the next lock and repeat the whole process. In the pouring rain. Yes, it is June 7th and it feels like March or April, not early summer. Now, I got to the last two locks, and low and behold, there were volunteers. No fair weather volunteers either. They were all wrapped up in rain slickers and they helped me through to the end. The Napton locks were in the bag, now for a long stretch with no locks.

After a hot shower, and several hours figuring out the route back to my home base, Overwater Marina, I went to the local pub, The Folly Inn, to back up all my devices, and hopefully all the pictures that I was having trouble with would be sorted out by icloud, and, of course, to have a drink. And in the pub were the three people on the boat behind that were helping me.

All from Perth, Australia, doing a couple of weeks on the canals. So of course a round of drinks were bought for them and we had a lovely chat after I got my devices sorted out and a bit of this blog written.

I sat down at a table that has an electrical outlet, necessary for all that backing up, and at the same table were a couple with a greyhound. Turns out they are fostering him, his name is Alan. He dislocated his hip and after a while was given up by the dog racing people. There was no treatment for the dislocation so his body has done the best it can to stabilize the joint and he is under weight. They are re-habbing him for adoption. Turns out they are both trainers for guide dogs for the blind. Talk about pulling on my heartstrings. Zoey was a failed hearing dog, and she dislocated her hip. I think Alan will land on his four paws with a good family.

It is getting busy here in the pub, I am at a table that has been booked for 7.30 and they have arrived so it is musical chairs at the moment as we all get sorted out, the couple with Alan have moved tables and I need to evacuate. So more later.

Something I keep meaning to write about is the number of houses that have pv (photo-voltaic) panels on their roofs. Now I know that it takes good government subsidies to get a huge uptake in innovative technology that is quite expensive but I am still impressed. Sometimes a whole flock of houses situated together are covered with panels. It warms my heart to see all of these mini power stations generating power. I wonder how many panels it takes to put one coal burning power station out of work, and how many more for a nuclear power station. And wind turbines are common here, but it seems more in the north than the south. I haven’t seen too many from canal, but I have seen lots of high tension wires with their massive pylons appearing to march over the countryside and I know I would prefer to see elegant windmills. Apparently traditional windmills were seen as an eyesore when they were first built and now we treat them as tourist attractions.

I love organizing things, so when I had the idea of renting a narrowboat for 5 months (it began as three and expanded) of course I put out the idea to friends and family that they could join me on my adventure. Anyone who wanted to could. Steadily my weeks were booked up. Little did I realize what a rich experience I was creating for myself, and I hope for those that have joined me on Little Star.

What an amazing experience it is being! Presently my cousin John, one of two cousins from my dad’s side of the family, and Daniel and Martin are on board. Daniel and Martin are friends from Hastings Avenue. We got to know each other while organizing the Hastings Avenue Street Party. We had a lot of fun at those planning meetings, and given that Martin and Daniel are a sophisticated gay couple we did not do things by halves. From the very beginning we rented tables and chairs for the potluck, and bought tablecloths that matched not only each other, but the canopies we bought and the street party colour, a delightful green. We did call upon neighbours for their BBQs, and we had one for meat and chicken, one for fish, and one vegetarian. Karyn organized the kids entertainment which is always phenomenal, and we have added kids movies under the stars with popcorn, live bands for the adults, and a badminton tournament. I will be returning to the street for future parties.

We ask the Firefighters, Police, the Canine Unit of the police, and Paramedics to come and entertain the kids. The adults enjoy it too.

I am not sure how we landed on Oxford as the place we would visit, but once we did it was obvious that John had to join us. He went to university there in the 70’s when you could get into the university on merit, not by the size of your parent’s bank account. And I thought we would all get along. I was right, we have had a blast, and we have all found our niches in terms of the running of the boat.

In my opinion Martin and Daniel live a pretty sophisticated lifestyle, and they love to try new recipes, which is right up my street. We spent the first day reviewing what we wanted to see in Oxford and the towns nearby, and then planned meals for the nights we would be home. Then we had to do a shopping marathon in Waitrose in 20 minutes before it closed. We were set. John avoided all these preparations by having appointments in London.

It has been a wonderful two weeks, great food, great company and lots of experiences, in Oxford, Blenheim, along the Thames to Lechlade and Kelmscott, and today, Stratford on Avon where we did two days of exploration of Shakespeare’s life in 3.5 hours.

Talking about Lechlade, I did not intend to travel virtually the whole length of the Thames, it wasn’t an aim of my time on Little Star, but I just about have. My sister Mary and I were on the Thames between Oxford and Reading. It was early spring and was raining, which made the Thames rise, and it was very windy. After being held up at Abdingdon for a day we fairly flew down the Thames. It becomes instantly wider and fast flowing as soon as you leave Oxford, and the wind added extra excitement, especially when we were trying to moor. It was a relief to get off the Thames at Reading and begin the journey west along to Kennet and Avon canal.

My sister Jane was on Little Star when we returned to the Thames at Reading and we enjoyed pretty wonderful weather as we tootled our way past Henley, of regatta fame, Windsor Castle, Eaton, of old school tie fame, The Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew, and many many really expensive homes.

Three men and a Mann made their way up the Thames from Oxford to close to the source of the Thames. We ended our journey at Lechlade but the river is navigable for a few more miles. And goes on for a few more miles after that. So I only missed the very beginning, and the very end. I was not about to travel on the tidal Thames under any circumstances. I have walked along the embankment in London, and seen a narrowboat. It looked minuscule in comparison to the other boats and ships.

Another highlight of my time on the water was that journey to Lechlade and Kelmscott, and it did not fail to entertain. The river quickly becomes quite narrow and very very windy. We were constantly turning in almost 360 degrees, and the water was almost pristine. We could see the plants growing in the water beneath the boat. Luckier birds than those we saw living in the plastic debris in the canals of London. I didn’t use my garbage grabber once. Kelmscott Manor was a huge draw for me. It was the summer home of Arts and Crafts designer William Morris, he of elaborate, repeating floral designs. But his company also produced all kinds of household goods including furniture, carpets, tapestry, stained glass and metal work. Later he turned his attention to promoting his socialist beliefs, leaving the running of the company partly to his daughter May, who had a lifelong companion called Mary. They died within months of each other.

So it has been a time rich in friendships and family, and all have been very special, whether they were for an afternoon or much longer. Who could ask for more? I am having the worst time trying to upload my pictures of all the wonderful people and places I have enjoyed. Now they are saying that I can not upload an .HEIC picture and I have no idea what that means or how to convert it to a .JPEG. Argh. And I can’t load a lovely video of my neighbours children, Connor and Sophie performing at the street party. I may have to edit later, but really want to post this. So here goes…..

Blenheim Palace, the only non-royal palace, was a gift from Queen Anne to John Churchill for successfully winning the Battle of Blenheim. The gift was in the form of money, initially 300,000 pounds, reduced to 240,000 pounds when John’s wife Sarah fell out with Queen Anne and she withheld the rest. Now that is a pretty generous gift for one battle. Sarah, later the first Duchess of Marlborough, had to build the place. It is said that she did not want something quite this fancy, and would liked to have built something a little less expensive. She was not above getting a cut rate price for a painting job that she thought was quoted too high by one “contractor”. It was started in the first decade of the 1700’s but took several decades to complete, if it can ever be said to be completed.

Capability Brown was hired by the 4th Duke in the 1760’s. From ProLandscaper magazine “The landscape setting he devised in the 1760’s provided such a sublime form of beauty and harmony that every generation of the Marlborough family has endeavoured to preserve it.” Lancelot “Capability” Brown created landscapes that would only come into its own a hundred years after they were planted. An amazing gift to future generations.

Sarah Churchill was a woman to be reckoned with. She was a great friend of Queen Anne before their great falling out, caused by an impoverished relative of Sarah’s that she introduced to the Queen, Abigail Masham. Sarah had had huge influence over the queen which probably accounts for the extraordinary gift to John Churchill. Anne, poor woman, had countless miscarriages and live births, close to twenty births, but none of them survived to adulthood and she died childless, hence the Hanoverian Georges who followed her, and the whole Georgian era. The had to go up the family tree and down another branch to find them.

This painting, on the ceiling of a portico over the front door is quite extraordinary. Don’t know its reason for being there, early CCTV?

Blenheim is a big tourist business these days, after all, they have to pay for its upkeep which can’t be cheap. They employ over 450 people to run the place and all the attractions they offer which include a downstairs tour, and upstairs tour, a Capability Brown tour, a butterfly house, and more.

And there were Zebra Finches in the same place

We took the narrow gauge railway to visit the butterflies, and they have a bottling plant for Blenheim water which is apparently shipped to Dubai and Hong Kong. In glass bottles. Even though the estate is green conscious.

All in all it was a lovely day with Martin and Daniel, friends from my street in Toronto. I was 72, they live at 102.

We started the Hastings Avenue Street Party, from Dundas to Queen, therefore the DQHASP, eight years ago. The meetings were huge fun, and the day wasn’t bad either.

Back to Blenheim. I love the gift stores in such places, but I hunted and hunted for something to buy, but alas, nothing caught my eye. So no mementos from that day’s outing.

It has been a whirlwind of a week and a half. Two cousins from my Canadian Moms side, their spouses, and two of my siblings, and one spouse.

Mom was one of four children. Two girls, then twins, a girls and a boy. Each of those four children had five children between the late 40’s and early 60’s. Mom started last, 1950, and finished first, 1959. The rest spread them out a bit more, maybe some accidents along the way.

The oldest, Gwen, had three boys, two girls. Mom had four girls and one boy, stuck right slap dab in the middle. Shirley had five boys. Can you imagine that? Then Murray had three girls and two boys. Now if you have been counting that makes 11 boys and 9 girls. This is pretty much as you would expect. There are 103 boys born to every 100 girls. Y chromosome sperm, boy sperm, swim faster because they are less burdened with genetic material so they make it to the egg faster if the timing is right. Unfortunately that lack of genetic material also contributes to a shorter lifespan, on average. More boys when babies, more women when older.

All fifteen cousins lived in North America, spread between Canada and the US, so they were as alien to us as could be imagined because we lived in England. Except we look a bit like each other. But some of us have become friends, and this week two cousins from the Gwen branch visited. First was Jim and his wife Karen.

Jim took to it like a duck to water. They sail in their home town of Fernie, B.C., and although this is different he jumped right in, OK, I gave him a bit of a push to begin with. Within a day he was dipping into a space between two moored boats to let a boat pass on the left in a tight squeeze on the Oxford Canal. He steered us out without hitting anything. The moored boat on the right gave him the thumbs up, clearly impressed with his maneuvering. We made great headway, going from Fenny Stratford on the Grand Union Canal to Banbury on the Oxford Canal with lots of laughs and great camaraderie along the way, mainly in the rain. We had lots of rain with some dry spots between, and even a little bit of sunshine. Karen, the other half of this dynamic duo broke her leg skiing in January, so she was just out of a cast and walking with a cane. She was press-ganged into helming and became an expert at narrow locks on the Oxford in no time flat. Then she got a massage in the evening on her leg and kept it up whenever she could. As you can imagine we rewarded ourselves with visits to canal side pubs whenever we were near one in the evening.

On the second day Karen’s walking stick went overboard and we could not retrieve it! We tried, but to no avail. Now I had picked a length of 1×1 wood out of the lock as part of garbage picking, so we wrapped some gloves around one end, and tied an apron around the whole thing to make a soft knob. It did the job.

After a day of sharing locks on the Grand Union with an Australian couple, Lindsay and Beth we were in the Braunston Chandlery all together in our rain gear and good humour.

When asked if there was anything else that we needed Karen said, yes, a walking stick. And low and behold someone had left one six months ago. Instead of black it was flower power, but apart from that exactly the same. She was back in business. What a trooper.

In Banbury we met up with my brother Charlie, his wife Ann and my sister Mary. We ate dinner in the Ye Olde Reine Deer Inn which dates from 1570. Of course we had to go there.

We had the Globe dining room to ourselves, the paneling had been removed and sold in 1912, found in Islington, London in 1961 and restored in 1981. Now, how did they know it was from the Ye Olde Reine Deer Inn? One of life’s mysteries.

The next day Martin brought over Jim’s sister Cathy, and her husband Les. Jane stayed home as The Ruben was visiting for the weekend, and Martin did not hang around. Both love their time with him and I can’t blame them.

Cathy and I are almost twins, born just two weeks apart and we have become fast friends. As I only had to get to near Oxford we had a day in hand so did a “there and back” with everyone to Cropredy, for a pub lunch in The Red Lion.

Apparently The Red Lion is the most popular name for a pub in Britain, and I have been in a few on this trip, not counting that it is the name of my sister Sally’s local as well. The food was AMAZING, a proper roast lamb Sunday lunch. We rolled away, slowly, down the hill to Little Star.

All good things must come to an end and we parted on Sunday night. Then another good thing started. Cathy, Les and I cruised our way down towards Oxford. The weather had opened up and was sunny and warm. There were hardly any locks, and all the lift bridges were lifted open. It felt like an idle. Sauntering along the canal.

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There was a friendly war of the Captains. Les is an Air Canada Captain, just like Jim he took over the morning checks, just as he would when getting ready to fly. I really appreciated the short break. In fact, on Jim’s last full day he had got up early, done the morning checks and set off while I was still in bed. I had the luxury of watching the sky out of my bed (it had finally stopped raining) for a while before I too got up. What a treat.

While in Banbury we visited Tooley’s Boatyard. It is celebrating it’s 250th anniversary. We toured the smithy, or blacksmiths, where they were making the table decorations for the celebration the following night.

The boats used to be made of oak, so the symbolism is explained. An oak leaf and an acorn. It is a fascinating place, well worth a visit, and soon to be expanded. They have acquired an old wooden boat that they are restoring. It is great to see the history being preserved, not only here but in most places I have visited. A real improvement to our childhood visits to such places, except perhaps Stonehenge. When we were kids in the early 60’s we parked and then walked right up to them. Climbed on them and really explored. Now it is much more controlled.

I could go on and on with this post, but all good things have to end. It was a lovely, lovely time.

It was an amazing day yesterday, exploring Bletchley Park. During the war it hummed with activity. At the height of the work 10,000 people worked there. Three shifts, midnight to 8 am, 8 am to 4 pm, 4 pm to midnight. Non-stop work.

Women were strongly encouraged to do war work so that young men could go off and fight, which accounts for the high numbers of women at Bletchley. There was a great sense of camaraderie, but no one knew what was going on in any other hut than their own. This was a purposeful strategy of those in charge. Each person signed the Official Secrets Act as their first action upon arriving at Bletchley, even though they did not yet know what they were going to be doing.

These pictures are all from the introduction to Bletchley Park before you go and explore the huts and the grounds. I think they speak very well to the work that went on there, a very good overview. There is much more information about the machines they developed and Colossus that Turing had such a big part of. They were very clever, those women and men, solving the problem of high volumes of messages with machines, thinking creatively, putting messages into context by cross referencing with other intelligence. It was said several times that the work done at Bletchley shortened the war by 2 years, and after being there I can understand why. If you are planning a visit to Britain I would highly recommend this, just an hour from London by train, the train station is minutes from the park, and the Cabinet War Rooms. Together they give a very good history of the war from the British and Allies perspective.

We are cruising up the Grand Union Canal to Bletchley. We are presently in Leighton Buzzard. The railway, as usual, roughly parallels the canal, and that is bringing up memories for me. Do those memories ever end?

For about 15 years my parents lived in Bletchley, and when I visited them from Canada Dad and I would often have a day together in London, and we would take the train. Milton Keynes and Bletchley are within the commuter belt of London, and the trains are frequent and take about an hour.

I believe I have already written about one of the days outings when Dad and I walked along the south embankment and he told the me about his early life with Mom, how they survived financially while he was getting his education and having children. All still during rationing, which didn’t end until sometime in the 50’s. So it has been quite stirring to slowly pass the towns on the canal that the train would have stopped in on the way to London. Who could ever forget a town who’s name is Leighton Buzzard, and the next one is Fenny Statford. In many cases the names of places are a combination of Norman French, Anglo Saxon and goodness knows what else, maybe even Latin. Dad had a pretty good handle on their origins, but they are lost on me. If he was interested in something he found out about it, before the World Wide Web, or as Peter Gzowski called it, the information super highway.

Tomorrow we are going to Bletchley Park, the home of the codebreakers during the Second World War. While Dad was living in Bletchley he was part of the group that was trying to save Bletchley, it was going to be redeveloped. Now it is a major, and important, preserved part of our history. I am looking forward to it.

Bletchley is next to Milton Keynes. One of those towns that was consciously planned rather than grew up in bits and pieces. It was not well done. The set up many squares, and at each corner is a round about, and instead of having names they have letters and numbers and they all look alike. It is easy to get lost and disoriented, but I am sure it is better now with GPS and with SatNavs as they call them here. They also put pedestrian walk ways under the roads instead of bridges over them. Of course they were not used due to the risk of mugging and rape. I wouldn’t have used them.

Sadly, by the time Mom and Dad moved to Bletchley Mom had largely lost interest in her creative ability. Dad and I remained close, but I drifted from Mom. Growing up I had loved to sew with her mentorship, and knit. And I learned to cook partly by being in the kitchen with her. I loved it. We made pies on Saturday morning, meat, then apple pies, basically the only kind of pie Dad would eat, no cinnamon. And then Mom would use the heat of the oven to make a rice pudding. Dads other favourite. We didn’t like it, so Mom and I would make bread and butter pudding for us.

As the years went by it was harder and harder to connect with her, and I regret not trying harder. There are so many questions that I would like to ask, and she never spoke of the past, neither of them did. I miss them both, they were so different from each other, and gave us kids the benefits of each of their skills. I often have dreams with them in it which I very much enjoy. It is like a little visit with them.

My latest hobby. I was disgusted by the rubbish in the canals around London and Birmingham. The rural ones are less offensive, but still lots of garbage. I bought the grabber on Leyton High Street, 1.55 pounds, and have filled at least 5 bags with garbage. This is today’s take, including a kids soother. That rope would have loved to have wound itself around a propeller. Yesterday’s included a shoe, mens, large, and a huge thick plastic bag. I think this is going to be an ongoing habit. I read Junk Raft about microscopic plastic in the oceans filling fish so that they think they are full, but actually starving. Now I have read that cigarette buts are worse than straws. Owen Sound doesn’t know what will have hit it when I move there.

I was happily going along, single handed, on the Grand Union Canal going west out of London when I cruised around a corner to see a massive tree across the canal.

I moored up and stayed the night. There was no other choice and no other way round. I was meeting my friend Anne from Canada the next day, and very luckily it was very close to the place I had planned to meet her.

I called the CRT, Canal and River Trust, and they already knew about it, but a tree had fallen on a boat further up the canal and that was their priority. There were people trapped on board.

They said they would be there the next day, Sunday.

Sure enough, 8.30 am and a workman was on site. Over the next few hours they winched the trunk onto the bank and sawed off a bit, and winched some more.

I picked up Anne from the railway station, we did a bit of shopping and went back to the boat. We had lunch and by the time we were done the canal was cleared, and all the other boaters along the canal were coming by to pick up the wood for firewood.

We got underway, and somewhere along the line we met up with another boat going in the same direction as we were. That is a good thing because we can share the lock and lighten the lock load or opening the paddles and gates. We had done about three locks and were navigating another one. Their boat was in the lock and ours was entering it. A woman from the other boat misjudged the lay of the land, it fell away steeply, and she ended up having to try and run down it. Unfortunately there was a retaining wall at the bottom and she could not stop herself. She jumped and fell very badly. I watched it all from the boat, and Anne saw it from the bow. I could see immediately that her right ankle was badly injured. They were attending to her and I asked if they wanted me to call an ambulance. I called and gave them all the info and they arrived in about 10 minutes. Good old NHS, or what is left of it. When I spoke to Dr. Jane, my sister, about it and she said she hoped that it got quick attention because an ankle dislocation has to be reduced very quickly to have a good outcome. I certainly hope she got good care. She was in a lot of distress and discomfort and it was hard not being able to relieve any of it except to try and make her as comfortable as possible. As you can imagine that was a bit of an emotional event for all involved.

Shortly after that Anne and I moored up for the night. During the night, during my wakefulness times and going to the bathroom I felt that something wasn’t quite right, but I checked out the window and we were still moored. We had not begun to float down the canal. I checked several times. Our wake up was an almightly crash from the kitchen. All the boxes of food, pots and pans, salad bowls and casseroles were on the floor, along with a prize winning bottle of maple syrup which was a present from Anne. It was broken. What a mess. The maple syrup had won first prize at the Royal Winter Fair, a significant achievement to us Canadians.

We were grounded, not only that, we were on a tilt.

Anne was a trouper, and got right down to cleaning up while I called the CRT. Again, they had already heard about the fact that the water in the pound, the space between two locks, had gone down a foot overnight. After cleaning up and cleaning up, maple syrup is very sticky, we went out for breakfast. 1 mile up hill. By the time we had eaten a traditional English breakfast and got back to the boat we were afloat. Phew.

So Anne had the full meal deal in her first 36 hours. She has not jumped ship, but has embraced the life, anticipating many of the things that have to be done on board. I am very impressed. And is very proficient on the locks and has taken to helming with aplomb. I had coffee in bed this morning as I responded to my accountant about my tax return.

It has been smooth sailing, opps, cruising, since then. A good day today, we have made our targets and some. Hopefully we will get to Bletchley and be able to go to Bletchely Park where the decoders worked during the war.