I collected the pump spares and noticed that there were several wild plum tree by the station so we picked a load and made some plum jam ready for our fund raising craft fair for Kidney Research on the 5th Nov. First time round I failed on the pump as I discovered that I needed a 1/8 Allen key and I only had metric. A couple of days later we caught up with Sue and Clive again and he had one, so now the pump has been overhauled. That was on the 5th Sept and we were at Lowsonford. The next day we finally got our replacement cratch cover fitted by Wilson's and although I had to pay I kept the other one so now we have 3 including the really old one that had seen 12 years service. Once the cover was done we followed Lady G to our next stopping point which was to be Rowington and the pub called Tom 'o the Wood for our farewell dinner with them as we were parting company on Thursday morning.
The RST Stratford
Leaving Stratford Basin
A typical Stratford split bridge, a gap in the middle, to allow the tow rope to pass through
One of the many lock keepers houses with barrel roofs that are unique to the Stratford Canal
We did go through there! onto the Grand Union
On route we changed canals, at Kingswood Junction we left the Stratford and joined the Grand Union. It is on this canal at Harefield, about 20 miles NW of London, that we are going to leave Sammy Jo for the winter. Unfortunately the pub was closed for refurbishment and so we created plan B, which was to stop in Warwick and have meal there even though the town was a bit of a walk from the canal. Before that though we had the Shrewley Tunnel and the Hatton Flight to contend with. The tunnel is only 433 yds long but we had broken our headlight in a lock on the Avon and still had not managed to buy a new one so we intended to follow Lady G in the tunnel in case my temporary repair of a couple of 10w bulbs from the lounge failed. The flight consists of 21 locks taking the canal down into Warwick, and we decided to try a new (to us) technique and lashed the boats together so one of us...Clive, drove the boats leaving three of us to operate the locks, so while the boats were coming down in one lock the next one was being readied by the third person. It worked very well and we moored up at the bottom of the flight for lunch 2 hrs 40 mins later. After lunch and 2 more locks we were moored up in Warwick and ended up in Wetherspoons for our meal.
The first of the 21locks
Thursday morning we said farewell to the others and after walking Charlie we went to visit Warwick Castle. Friday I did another run of 4 miles and contrary to my other runs I came back absolutely crackered, and couldn't manage walking into Warwick leaving that to Margaret. I did however join her later and we visited Lord Leycester's Hospital, not a medical hospital but a hospitality establishment dating back to 14th century also housing the museum of the Queen's Own Hussars. Saturday 10th we moved on a bit further and had a look round Leamington Spa and the pump rooms and a large open air food festival, part of the Heritage Weekend which is a national event, and for lunch we chose a falafal wrap, tasty!
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