NB Triskaideka: Making the most of the weather

Tuesday, 24 April 2012

Making the most of the weather

We left Springwood Haven at about 9am this morning as the weather forecast was for rain later after topping up the water. We were heading towards Atherstone when we came across NB Free Spirit we both realised at the same time that we were fellow bloggers so it was a quick hello, hopefully we will get chance to meet up properly at some point. The landscape is turning yellow as the oil seed rape fields are ripening. When we got to the top of Atherstone locks President and butty Kildare were moored, it was lovely to see them but unfortunately the steam wasn't up, they were telling John they had had a problem yesterday so were not planning on cruising far today. They are heading to Little Venice and will be part of the Queens Diamond Jubilee Flotilla.

We followed a boat down the locks so most of them were against us but we did pass a couple coming up about half way down. We made fairly good time just over two hours. Our plan was to stop in Atherstone and do some shopping but we decided to continue on through Tamworth as the weather was so much better, then sun had even come out. We saw lots of ducklings today a few moorhen chicks and our first bluebell wood. We stopped by Sutton Road bridge and did a quick trip to Sainsburys to stock up as I couldn't carry much yesterday when I walked into Nuneaton. We have continued to Hopwas tonight and as we have had a long day we went to the Tame Otter for a beer and some food.