Thursday 26 March 09 Aynho to Thrupp

We have had a slight change of plan that has required us to put our visit to the K&A off until the summer, as we now need to be home early April, so this meant we could have a lie in this morning and not move off until 10 30 as there is no need to be on the Thames first thing tomorrow. We had a very good meal at The Great Western Arms last night, its a bit more expensive than most pubs but not as much as some restaurants and also as a plus they sell Hook Norton beer. Just after we set off the weather had a lot of problems making up its mind what it was going to do, we started in sun with quite a bit of wind and then very fine drizzle coming very fast and at one point some heavy rain. Our first bit of excitement was as we approached lift bridge No. 193. BW have put new mooring bollards on the towing path side to work this bridge, I was just admiring them and thinking what a waste of time for a bridge that is always open, when it started to shut and then open again. This bridge is one of the few on the Oxford that is normally left shut, today it was for some reason open, but only balanced open, not fixed and the wind was threatening to close it as we approached. I stopped with the bows just in the cheeks of the bridge and Diana was able to get off on the off side and go and sit on the bridge beam to ensure it didn't close as we passed through. The next point of interest was about half a mile north of Heyford Common Lock. Here the canal bank has been breached on the off side and the canal is happily flowing into a brook. I rang BW and got transferred to Milton Keynes, told them the problem only to be informed that they where aware of it. If they know why don't they do something like drop a couple of dozen sand bags to stem the flow and stop it getting worse. Just beyond Lower Heyford lift bridge one of the gardens on the off side has a wonderful show of daffodils in their garden. We continued on towards Thrupp and got waved down by a boat coming towards us, it turned out to be a couple that we had been on holiday in France with. We arrived at Thrupp at about 5 pm. Most of what are normally visitor moorings with rings are marked as "private" but there were three 48 hour moorings free near the pub, so we bashed a couple of stakes in and tied up for the night.