We pushed off just after 10am on a bright sunny morning, again better than forecasted and made our way passed the CRT gang doing the piling. The still had two boats abreast but as there had moved along the canal a bit the water was deeper passing them. As the morning progressed the clouds started to gather. Rugby was busier and needless to say we met a boat on the bend by the bridge, just where they start mooring on both sides of the canal, but no one touched anyone else so all was good. Passing Armada cruisers at Newbold they were hard at work cleaning under the base plate of a boar ready for blacking.Not the nicest job in the world.
At Hillmorton locks the offside chamber was empty and as I lined up two Volockies opened the bottom gates and worked us up, Diana hopped off and walked up to the middle lock ahead where again the offside was empty with a boat coming down the near side. Up to the top lock and into the nearside lock, it was the empty one as you will read later. As it was filling I went to photograph the level gauge at the spill weir. 
The lock was taking a long while to make level and we found one of the bottom paddles slightly up. These are the locks where the square tab you put on the end of the square winding shaft to keep them up.. That sorted we were on our way, we debated whether to moor above the locks or continue to the much quieter moorings further on. The quieter moorings won. It now looks as if all the pub moorings are now long term with the same boats always there, even though the banner says customer moorings only.
Passing the winding hole the sky had darkened quite a bit and we just moored up before the rain started.
Today’s Journey
9¼ miles with 3 locks in 3¾ hours
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