Last night we ate at The Anchor, it was very quiet but looking at the number of outside tables and the marque they must host some big events. The food and beer were both good and a reasonable price.
This morning we were away a little before half ten and only met a couple of boats. It wasn’t long before we passed the abandoned, sunken cruiser, just by bridge 30. CRT have affixed an overstay notice to it, but I don’t see it moving any time soon and at the end of the day CRT are going to have to remove it, it would be easier and cheaper to do it now than when it starts to fall to bits.
It wasn’t long before we were approaching Atherstone top lock. the site of the old hat factory has been fully cleared and new foundations put in.
I do wonder how they will tie it all into the old buildings at the back of the site that are presently held up with timbers.
There was a boat leaving the top lock as we arrived so we sailed straight in, there was also a Volocky. now the strange thing, the the rest of the locks, apart from the last two were against us and no sign of a boat ahead. Today was a volunteer work party day at the locks so we had some paddles drawn and gates closed for us, this helped us on our way greatly. Just below lock 5 there is a canal side house, at one time it had something painted on the gable end, anyone knows what it use to say.
So far water levels were good with a good flow coming over lock 1 by-wash but from here on they were getting a little lower. One of the moored boats in the pound had a nice wood carving in the bows.
Levels were low between 8 and 9 as usual but good enough for us to cross without letting any more water down. At lock 10 we met a boat so the last two were with us and at lock 11 the top gate was wide open. This is where we encounter a problem, we couldn’t fully close the top gate by about 50mm. I could just reach the cill with my cabin shaft and could feel something with give in it about half way along, maybe a fender or a tyre. Poking and turning the shaft it felt more like cloth, maybe a bad or sack but I couldn't hook it with the shaft so I slowly worked it along the cill to the offside of the lock, then slowly up the wall. What appeared at the surface was a deer’s head and I pulled a fully grown deer out that must have been under the gate. Once it was out the gate closed and we were on our way again. The flight had taken us just under 2 hours.
We carried on and at Grendon someone who paid more attention in their art class than they did biology.
We only did about another half mile before mooring for the night away from any trees.
Today’s Journey
6¼ miles with 11 locks in 3½ hours
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