Out on the boat

Saturday

Now we are finaly certified and have a BW licence and are both well, we took the boat on a jaunt.
Only a short one from Anderton, North to Dutton, about 6 miles. Engine ran well and it was a pleasure to be cruising again.
Last weekend, the first since getting our licence was ruined as i came down on the
friday night with a bug and spent the weekend feeling unwell, so we didnt take the boat out as planned, Mrs B also caught it off me, feeling unwell sunday and monday.

This weekend was different though and the weather held off meaning an easy exit from our jetty and out of the basin onto the main line, a quick clear out of ply, waste timber and rubbish at the waterpoint and we were off, it really opened my eyes to what I had been missing the last year.
Rolled over a lump under the road bridge, the bottom still too close to the top.
Managed to make the times a Saltersford tunnel, there were 3 boats waiting at the other end, including J-Peg, which i think has a blog.
Saw Harry on his boat Wilson at Bartington where he has made the offside mooring nice, Margret at the Acton Bridge Black Prince base gave us a wave as we slipped by.

Cassiedog and Mrs B jumped off at bridge 210, just by our old mooring to go and gab the remains of Acton Impulse cache which had been left under a bit of ply for us, and she walked with cassie further round beyond the moorings to where I could pick her up, on the way Cassie jumped into the cut and hed a swim, rather her than me!.
We stopped at our Dutton View cache to have a look for it but couldnt find it, so we have temporarily disabled it. I walked the last mile with cassiedog and on the way past Lodge lane nurseries bumped into CRVman, who had just found the Dutton corner cache. We finished the day by tying up on the rings near Dutton corner cache, which Cath went off to find, bringing it back to the boat and on returning it we left a belgium geocoin.


Sunday

After a lie in (what lie in? asks MrsB) we decided to get out before having breakfast and grab 3 caches, 1, George Bushell by John Stead;
2, Weaving through Dutton by John Stead; 3, Cache for kids - I-Spy by Qpootle5, a great walk it was and we found all 3 caches easily,
the downside was that as we walked past Dutton locks on the weaver the heavens opened and we got soaked, the weather reminding us it is still February, by the time we had climbed up the bridle path to the canal we were feeling very cold as the wind as bitingly cold at our wet legs, but after sheltering under the bridge for a few minutes the wind dropped and the rain eased.
the walk back was uncomfortable in wet trousers, but once back on board and getting the stove going we soon warmed up. about 2.8 miles walk Returning to Anderton later on we had to go up to the winding hole at Dutton, on the way past we spied some cachers hunting for Dutton Garlic, after turning the boat we pased them agin and as they hadn't found the cache I leapt off dashed down the hill and helped them look. Know you would think i knew where it was hidden but no i couldn't find it. the cachers were the Bilberry 3.

getting back to Saltersford tunnel we just missed the times so tied up to wait 40mins, as expected nobody came the other way so we would have been ok sneaking through, the time came round and it was our turn to enter, I gave a long blast on the horn and to my surprise it was answered, someone had jumped the times and was coming through, I had to reverse out and clouted the chimney on the roof of the tunnel as I tried to go backwards, the miscreant was an Alvechurch hire boat and I don't think the hirer had a clue what he had done, gave him the benefit of the doubt and didn't give him a piece of my mind.
Back to the mooring and a great weekend over.