Saturday 7 July 2012

Last night was a very disturbed night with the passing traffic and we didn’t sleep at all well. The Fox hire boat that had been moored on the outside of us left a little after 8 as they were due to lock out at 11 on a 3 day hire. Day 1 leave march to Outwell for the night, day 2 cross to Denver and upstream to Ely for the night, day 3 back to the Middle Level and return to March.

We set off at about ten in  reasonable weather heading back to our moorings. We rang Maureen from Upwell to tell her we were on our way. The village has now planted up the flower boxes and hanging baskets by the church moorings.

When we arrived at Marmont Priory lock Maureen had it all ready for us and was out waiting, we locked down and there was another Narrowboat waiting to lock up, but Maureen had them wait for another boat she was expecting. Apparently an octaterian who was heavily involved with the restoration of well creek was having a party in Upwell and they were going by boat.
As we passed the wind farm we met Paul and Christine of Waterway Routes http://www.waterwayroutes.co.uk/ he is heading for the Ouse to map and video all the connected waterways.

Also at the wind farm a Cormorant was sitting on the top of a pole making the best of the sunshine.

As we approached March not only did it start to rain but we also encounter heavy blanket weed, when you get this on your prop it just forms a big ball and you lose all drive. There is an elderly boat moored in March and every time we pass I am surprised to see it still floating as there are holes in the bow just above the waterline due to rusting.

One of the owners of a mooring along here have gone to a lot of trouble fixing Go-kart tyres to his quay heading to act as a fender, but we have never seen a boat moored there. It continued to rain on and off for the next hour as we travelled back to our mooring. When we arrived we were surprised to see so many empty spaces with so many people out cruising all at one time.
We packed up the boat and headed off home. It wasn’t until we unpacked the car that we realised that I had left a plastic box on the front deck that contained all the boat paperwork, Diana’s camera and the boat keys. It was  to late to do anything now so it would be a job for Sunday.