The Ring completed

Well, here we are back in Fenny Marina where we started just 30 days ago. It has been an interesting, challenging, eyeopening and sometimes disappointing trip.  The changes we noticed along stretches of the Grand Union and Oxford Canals were definitely not for the better.  Too many deserted, sunk, abandoned and generally neglected boats beginning to clog up the waterways.  The biggest problem on the Oxford Canal is too many narrowboats travelling both up and down the canal bringing about low levels of water on some lock flights.  There is also the problem of leaky locks draining pounds.  We were held up for 24 hours due to a pound emptying and CRT having to let water down from the summit so boats can continue on their way.  The consequence of that , of course, is that the summit becomes a problem to navigate due to low water.

What we really need is some meaningful rain otherwise the summer may be difficult for boaters as well as the farmers!!

However, we had a great trip.  We met some lovely people, enjoyed travelling through our beautiful country side and were lucky enough to have fantastic weather.  There were  lots of very cold evenings and nights which meant we lit the fire on many occasions  but daytime temperature rose to the mid 20's in the early weeks of our time on board. The wind was the thorn in the side.  A nagging northerly airflow hung around us for the entire time, which pegged temperatures BUT we had no rain, which is bizzarre because we treated ourselves to new waterproofs in the sales in January and they are still hanging, complete with tags, unused!!

To bore you with a few statistics, we travelled 245 miles, passed through 176 locks, 141 of these being manual (the Thames locks are all automatic even when they are self service) and clocked up 132 engine hours.  We drank plenty of wine, enjoyed some tasty meals on board and some most enjoyable meals and beers in cosy pubs and even managed a couple of bbq's.

All in all the 30 days that we were travelling was great fun but it is unlikely we will attempt the Thames ring again.  Water permitting we will travel northward later in the year and explore the Ashby Canal again.

Hunters Moon coming out of the last lock on her cruise

Phew!