Leaving Wormleighton, it was back to normal with the steering heavy and anything above tickover producing a wash at all of the bends. I was pleased to reach Claydon top lock, as the depth is better usually until the outskirts of Banbury. Nothing was moving and it was peaceful and the air had that wonderful good early morning smell.
We stopped for the day above Slatt Mill lock and watched as the showers came and went.
We left the mooring at 7.30am heading for Banbury; an unusual hanging basket was at the Bourton lock cottage, some boaters have bought the cottage; it will be good to see it lived in once again. On the outskirts of Banbury, another cottage on a bend has a new weather vane in the shape of a tractor, since last year. Gerald, our neighbour has a similar one (the tractor, not the weather vane) so I thought that a picture was in order.
At Sovereign Boats, we filled the diesel tank, exchanged a gas bottle and bought some oil for the engine oil change. After the lift bridge and the lock, I filled the water tank and emptied the Portapotti. We are once again self sufficient for a few weeks.
Passing under the M40 motorway we arrived at Grants lock, which is fairly deep at 9'6". The last time that we went down this lock, there was a boat at the bottom which has nearly sunk. The lady steering it was waiting too close to the narrow bridge hole as her husband lifted the bottom gate paddles. The boat was drawn rapidly through the bridge hole toward the gates and the power of the water held it there whilst it flowed into the front well and through the open cabin doors. They were bailing it out with a dustpan. We stopped and rigged up our power drill driven pump. This will move 5 gallons per minute. Eventually, after two and a half hours, only a tiny amount remained and we could continue our journey.
Passing Twyford wharf we were pleased to see that the restoration of the buildings was almost complete, it has taken a few years and they do look good with some nice original architectural touches retained.
We moved away from our overnignt stop at Chisnell lift bridge, south of Aynho at 6.30am. A boat had passed us at 6am as we were having breakfast, we caught them up at
Heyford common lock. As they were travelling quite slowly, we decided to stop for a few hours above Dashwood lock.
By the time that they had left this lock, another boat approached, also heading south. They took even longer operating the lock, and by the time that they were leaving, there was a queue of five boats behind them. This queue eventually numbered eight boats.
By the time that they had all cleared the lock and the first boat approached with no queue, three hours had elapsed! We had lunch and moved off at 1.30pm, enjoying a clear run almost all of the way to our planned stopping place at Shipton weir lock; where the clouds were spectacular, very dark and at sufficient distance to cause us no problems.
