Monday, August 10, 2009

The water goes down and we head south again.

But not until today. The Soar was still up on Saturday morning, but, rather than stay on Sawley Cut, we decided to move downstream on the Trent to Cranfleet Cut. The towpath is a lot more Meg-friendly here, with a strip of grass between the river and the path.

Down Through Sawley Locks

The Erewash Canal, Trent Lock just visible.
I was able to make a start on cutting the new woodwork for the rear step, and to have a couple of good walks with Meg along the Trent Valley Way.

We had a bit of excitement on Saturday evening, with the local constabulary chasing a couple of youths down the towpath. They’d been causing a ruck at the Steamboat Inn, and when the law arrived decided to do a runner. The reason they ran became obvious when one of them threw 6 packets of a suspicious white powder in the canal.

Police “eye in the sky”
Both miscreants were apprehended with the help of a police dog on the ground and a helicopter in the air, and the drugs were retrieved from the deck of a passing narrowboat.

The Soar had dropped to a navigable level by Sunday, but the traffic became intense as everyone with a boat decided to take advantage of the hot sunny weather. So we thought we’d leave them to it and stay where we were.

Ratcliffe Power Station by moonlight.
The bright spot above the cooling towers is Jupiter

This morning the weather took a downhill plunge after a gorgeous weekend. Got up to rain, but this cleared to leave us with drizzly showers on and off through the day.

We left about 11, reversing to the junction, turning around then heading across the huge Plumpton Weir and upstream onto the Soar.

MV Actief and NB Gainsborough at Redhill.
We caught up with a couple on NB Fresh Start at Ratcliffe Lock, and shared this and Kegworth Deep with them. They left us behind when we pulled in about half a mile above Kegworth.

Moored near Kegworth

It’s OK here, with a nice wide grassy towpath, not much “passing trade”, and a wide reach of the river meaning that we’re completely unaffected by wash from passing boats.

The only annoyance is the aircraft heading in to land at East Midlands Airport. They’re passing directly overhead.

How was the holiday?
Locks 3, miles 4½

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