Petes Pix 2022

    Goodbye 2022 Better than the previous two...  Hello Jack Christopher Peter May - born 17 March 2022 to Emma and Toby  Covid Vaccinations: September - Covid Booster with Flu Vaccine  Travel: Criccieth - January Viking Tialfi - Rhine Getaway (Basel>Amsterdam) - April Criccieth - July Scenic Diamond - Beautiful Bordeaux - August Narrowboat Annabelle - English Canals - October  Cancelled by Covid: Starlight Players Snow White Pantomime - January

To Aylesbury for a light lunch with Toby, Emma and Jack. Toby poured a refreshing glass of Lanson Black Label Champagne. Jack was almost crawling, but hadn't worked out how not to trap his leg when he pushed himself up. He wasn't impressed with our present of a knitted Santa Claus figure, throwing it to the floor and playing with its wrapping paper.

Christmas lunch with  Peter & Sue and Peter’s sister Sarah so they did all the shopping and cooking and opened their cellar. We enjoyed a super meal, the best turkey I have had. Sarah said she knew nothing about wine but had been told they’d picked my favourite. When we arrived Peter was decanting a wine I recognised from the distinctive label as The McRae Wood, but we started - of course - with Champagne. With the roast a wine was poured from a decanter and it was so full bodied and packed with fruits. Sarah said it was the best wine she’d ever tasted and that it was ‘silky’. I concurred and was very pleasantly surprised to learn it was Ch Batailley 2013. I’d bought half-a-dozen EP but drank the last one in April 2021, I should have kept them longer. McRae Wood was great and the Cabernet Sauvignon ice-wine a succulent companion to Christmas pudding with custard. We went home with stomachs bursting and full of Christmas cheer.

I haven't made one of these in a while and this one turned out well. I used  Toby's batter recipe; 200g plain flour, 200ml milk and 4 eggs.

 A couple of the festive postboxes visited this year by the Yarnbombers

  Woke up this morning to snow and despite slight melting near house, it was much the same all day and it lasted for a week, hardly melting except on main roads. R ain during the following Sunday night cleared it away.

  Posted out my third Commonplace Book Cover shows our October holiday Narrowboat Annabelle at Gaskell’s Bridge,  River Trent, Alrewas, Staffordshire, England 16 October 2022. Back cover inserts:  Jack, Emma, Toby, Peter, Joan at Prae Wood Arms, St Albans, England 16 September 2022 and Dan, Krisie, Joan, Peter at Dylan’s, Criccieth, Wales 24 January 2022

Dan and Krisie were staying with us and we were invited by Toby and Emma to join them for an early Christmas dinner. There was a log fire crackling away on the TV but Jack was in his cot asleep when this photo was taken by Dan's self-timer camera. The marvellous roast chicken dinner that Toby cooked had been demolished. 

 

Birthday dinner at Prime with Peter and Sue, who brought a bottle of Lanson.

  Left Braunston at 07:00 because the boat had to be returned by 09:00. When we got to Napton Marina one of the staff boarded to manoeuvre us in. We then had 30 minutes to vacate the boat.  Then a team boarded to replace gas cannisters and clean the boat. After a few minutes in the office for Dan with the final paperwork we said farewells. Dan and Krisie headed home to North Wales with a stop for breakfast while we drove in the opposite direction. Two weeks on Midlands canals had gone by in a flash. We'd eaten better evening meals than I expected in convenient canal side pubs and - apart from the last Friday - we'd been blessed with sunny clear days. Passengers and crew of Annabelle in The Boathouse on the last night. Braunston to Napton - 5 miles - 0 locks - 2 hours.

 Our last full day. We left Newbold at 09:30 and it was dry and bright but at 11:15 it started to rain heavily. The supplied waterproofs proved not to be proof against heavy rain, but it didn't seem to worry Dan. Rain let up for a while as we approached Braunston but started again.  Several fields along the river showed signs of mediaeval strip farming, as shown by 'ripples' in the grass   We moored at 15:50, most of the places were taken and we couldn't tie-up close to the pub. Heavy rain had soaked the tow path which was mostly muddy puddles. We were back at The Boathouse which we'd dined in at the start of our cruise. Dan found a route back along the road to avoid the worst of the tow path. Newbold to Braunston - 10.5 miles - 3 locks - 5h20 plus an hour moored for lunch.

  We left our mooring at 09:55.   Hawkesbury Junction links Britain's two oldest canals, the Coventry and the Oxford. Both run close and parallel for a short distance, meaning we had to make a 360 degree turn in the pool in front of the Greyhound to join the Oxford Canal. It's a very tight turn in a 68-foot boat, and it started to rain. Coventry Canal's tow path is carried over the water on the 50ft cast-iron Junction Bridge. There is a seven-inch difference in water levels between the two canals, so we had to go through a lock to go on the Oxford Canal. A CRT volunteer was on hand to give advice, but Dan had to operate the windlass. Another cast-iron bridge carried the Oxford tow path. Leaving Hawkesbury Junction behind we had the canal to ourselves. Rain showers were frequent. Just before Newbold is the 250-yard Newbold Tunnel, the first I'd seen with a tow path. It was built in 1829 replacing an earlier tunnel as part of a project to shorten the route of the ...

We left Atherstone at 09:55 and soon came to Atherstone locks, which were staffed by cheery Canal & River Trust volunteers. CRT volunteers were easily recognised, not so much by their CRT jackets, but by the orange life-jackets they all wore and walkie-talkies that were clipped to them. Out of Atherstone there were sections where the canal passed fields of crops, and places where trees hung over the canal. We reached Hawkesbury Junction and moored on the other side of this footbridge (above) by the tow path at 16:05 and had time to explore before it got dark. The Engine House (above) was first used in 1821 by a Newcomen engine which pumped water from an underground stream to feed the canal. The stream had dried by 1913 when the Engine House fell into disuse. Dan had made our dinner booking at The Greyhound  a couple of minutes stroll from our mooring. I thought this might be a touristy place, but the bar was packed with locals and the restaurant area was busy and with well...

  We left Glascote at 10:00 on another gloriously clear sunny day and soon came to countryside. The countryside was lush. Leaves were dropping and every now and again Dan went into reverse to clear leaves from the propeller, but trees still had most of their leaves. Joan insisted on wielding Krissie's windlass and doing lock duties. Krisie was knocked out by the heavy-duty pain killers she'd be given by the hospital. We moored at 15:40 and, after our usual aperitif of fizz, Dan collected a Fish and Chip takeaway dinner. Glascote to Atherstone - 8 miles - 6 locks - 4h25 plus 1h15 moored for lunch.

We left The Tame Otter at 10:00 and headed towards Fazeley Junction where we stopped first for water then made a small diversion  past an old mill and  down the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal to Fazeley Mill Marina for a pump out, since we'd been unable to use the planned mooring at Barton Marina two nights before.  Then we turned back and made a sharp right under Bridge 77 (above) and we were back on our route along the Coventry Canal. We saw very few moving boats all day, and this stretch seemed very remote.  Aqueducts carried the canal over a couple of rivers, including the Tame (above) which we'd walked over in Hopwas the previous evening. Because of the time spent getting water and on the diversion and pump out, the planned route had to be changed and we moored early in Glascote in Tamworth at 15:45. Dan took advantage of an early finish to open the engine compartment to check the gubbins. Krisie slipped and fell onto the engine. She was in a lot of disco...

We stopped here at Alrewas for water and to get the Sunday newspapers. There are other canal users. We didn't see many canoes and, in this narrow stretch, the canoeists moved to the bank to let us pass. Trees were laden with red berries or iridescent  blue sloes. We turned left at Fradley Junction. Immediately there is a swing bridge that must be pulled open, but another narrow boat coming in the opposite direction had opened it and we could pass through. But Krisie closed it, and we moored and walked to the Laughing Duck Cafe at the junction for lunchtime sausage or/and bacon filled baps. We were now on the Coventry Canal and heading south back to our starting point. But this stretch of canal soon becomes the Birmingham and Fazely Canal which was built before the Coventry Canal who bought it. We moored alongside The Tame Otter at 15:50 and had a walk. We were in the Hopwas area of Tamworth. Just past the Tame Otter was a bridge over the River Tame and we realised the ...