Cheese

We both walked up the hill to the Napton village store and purchased some cheese made from the milk of the beasts we had seen in the fields earlier this week.

Nothing else to report apart from the weather has been a bit iffy ,we have both been fishing but caught nothing and we enjoyed the underdogs winning the FA Cup final.

Still here

Still very windy here this morning with the odd shower so we are staying put maybe for the weekend, there's no need for us to travel in inclement weather like the two week hire boaters.
By lunch time I decided I would cycle up the hill to Napton village stores, well not cycle exactly but push the thing most of the way up the hill. Supplies bought and tucked into my ruck sack I was looking forward to free wheeling all the way down the hill, Came out the store and straddled my steed "bugger" the front tyre has a puncture, so had to push the treader all the way home again.

Nice aroma when I got back to the boat as Sue has been baking scone's, will try and make these last the weekend.


The wildlife in the marina appear to know which boats are inhabited and turn up like clock work for morsels from the kitchen each day.

These little fella's are getting bigger every day.

The swan's are happy for me to feed them but if I get too near the signets with my camera they soon let me know about it. HisSssSSssssss

Dinner of jacket potatoes with beans was cooked in the Epping stoves oven which was lit this morning when we got up as the forecast was for a cool day. 

Back on board

Left the Isle of Man at 0835hrs and we were opening the cratch in Napton at 1105hrs, not bad going.

We used the plane to Birmingham  and train to Leamington Spa as planned but decided not to wait for the bus and hopped in a taxi instead, I was carrying two holdalls one quite heavy and a ruck sack is my excuse for this indulgence.

It's the first time I have been on a train for about 16 years and I was astonished at how smooth, quiet, clean and roomy they are now, gone are the old rolling stock I remember the clackerty clack clackerty clack, smelly, cramped, graffiti daubed and rubbish strewn carriages I used to get to Kingston or Richmond on.

Once aboard Sue wanted to do one  load in the washing machine and as we are still hooked up to the mains this shouldn't of been a problem, or so we thought.

The washing machine kept showing an error code every time we switched it on.

We tried it with the inverter in the on position "error".
In the charge batteries position "error".
With the inverter on and engine running "error".
Sue was using some not so lady like expletives by now.
We eventually got the machine to start by disconnecting the 240v supply from the hook up and with the engine running.

I still don't understand why the machine (it is an ordinary 240v domestic Indesit appliance) wouldn't run when connected to the 240v mains hook up. I'll have to ask a Pro when I find one.

It's blowing "a hooley" here at the moment.

Well camouflaged duck on nest.

Mother coot and offspring.

Home

Yesterday, stopped in Rugby and sorted out the phones and in the Trafford Centre in Manchester on the way to Liverpool ferry  for a Costa's coffee, all in  glorious sunshine.

Liverpool water front.

Today its peeing with rain !

So home for a day will take back a few more tools with me an orbital sander, a mouse sander,angle grinder, flat and round files and some paint brushes. That should help keep any rust spots at bay. 

Syla is growing fast he will be visiting the boat with Nikita in July.

We all took Syla for a walk down Port Sodrick and Nikita has done a good job with his obedience training  as he is a pleasure to take for a walk on and off the lead.

Tomorrow is and early start to get down to the airport for 0730am 

Buffalo

This morning I finished the polishing, hopefully it wont need to be done again till 2014. After lunch we went for a walk along the Napton flight of locks, they were very quiet for a bank holiday monday.

View from the locks to the village of Napton on the hill

Sue looking relaxed

Could be the African Plains

This one's keeping himself cool.

They are all Water Buffalo the farmer keeps them for their rich milk which is turned into mozzarella cheese.

We have decided the car is too much of a hassle to keep having to move around with us, so we are going to return it back to the IOM tomorrow and then get a flight to Birmingham a train to Leamington Spa and a bus back to Napton. 

On the way up to Liverpool we will pop into the 3 shop in Rugby as the sims we have wont dial a Manx cell phone. I did ring Igbol in Delhi again but he was no help at all.

Then the plan is to go down the canal to Banbury and Oxford and then decide what to do next.

Polishing

Didn't get out of bed till 10am today, must be all the fresh air around here.Plenty of cloud cover but still quite warm.
We decided to go to the Cropredy Marina open day to see what facility's they provided, 'bugger all' is the answer it is just a muddy hole in a field, why call it an open day! Did some shopping in Halfords and Sainsburys as we were ou


Back at the Wigrams, we turned Festina around and I spent the afternoon and evening t-cutting the boat. I used a different product on this side it was car plans tcut with dark blue pigment. This proved a lot better as I didn't have to polish over it and the blue pigment hides a lot of the scratches but I had to be careful over the white signwriting as scratches on this would turn blue also. So that is the predominantly dark blue panels done, tomorrow I will do the light blue surrounds and red borders in tcut original and polish over this.

Had a nice steak for out tea and have had the TV on to watch Peter Kay, funny back home we spent £60 a month on a Sky TV subscription and we haven't missed it a bit, yet.

First Visitors

Last night we did a bit of a pub crawl. Visited The Crown, The Bridge and The Kings Head to see if they were suitable establishments to take our friends Christine and Glyn to today. After sampling a beer in each and dinner in the last we decided although all very nice in their own way we wouldn't go to any of them.

We didn't get a fourth day of sunshine today, instead, it was showers and quite windy but the forecast is for sun tomorrow. Since we had the car we drove back to the butchers in Braunston for Mince, steaks and of cause one of their pork pies.


Glyn and Christine arrived at 1130am and brought us gifts of mugs, egg cups and homemade marmalade and damson jam.

After a tour of the boat and a cup of tea we went to The Folly Inn for lunch and a couple of Hookys. and soft drinks for the girls. It's always a good laugh to catch up on what they have been up to. 

I Think Glyn posed for the painting on my mug.

The day went quickly and Christine and Glyn drove back down south at 5pm. 

Fun day over back to polishing the boat tomorrow.

Blacking

The Sun was shining again when we awoke thats 3 day's now . It's a mini heatwave or is this last years summer arriving late. Bacon sandwich with Sue's home made bread for breakfast before the first  job of the morning which was to black the stove, basically it's the same as polishing your boots, rub black stuff on then buff it off. With a lot more elbow grease though.

After the blacking .

(That's our daughter in the picture she's holding a Koala during a trip down under and she has kept smiling for the camera  even though the animal is peeing on her.)

After this we went to B&Q for some hinges and bits and pieces. I wanted to change one of the cupboard hinges from 90 degree angle to 180 to make access a little easier.

Our first visitors Glyn and Christine are driving up from Shepperton tomorrow so we will be in the pub at some stage for definite . 

Sues been catching fish again.

It's getting busy here in the marina with part time captain's arriving to take their boats out probably for the first time this year. The canals will be very busy over this Bank holiday weekend. We'll let them go and play, we have all year!

Sod

Woke up to another cloudless sky , that's two days' in a row can't remember the last time that happened.
I serviced the engine, on this type of  boat that means dismantling a complicated array of steps and deck boards for access(it's not just a case of lifting a bonnet) and then finding somewhere to store these while you work, the bedroom had to fill this temporary storage role.

Sue's been baking this morning a nice fruit cake and a beautiful bloomer loaf.

We decided we would go and pick the car up from Weedon and go to Tescos, after trying three cab firms the earliest  we could be picked up was 1730hrs  "sod that" we said, that's a 3 hour wait! ,we'll get the bus. The marina receptionist couldn't help us with a bus timetable but she said the bus did stop at the marina entrance.  Ok it's a nice day so we waited for an hour and no bloody bus "sod this" we'll book that 1730hrs taxi. As we walked back into the marina the bus went sailing by "Sod It"

While we waited Sue got her fishing rod out and caught a roach and a rather large bream that broke her line and I decided to brush the chimney flue which resulted in lots of soot over the freshly washed curtains. Sod's law.

The taxi came at 1730hrs and the driver politely robbed us of £32 for a 15 minute ride, spent £305 in Tesco and got 'sod all' for our tea!  So we stopped in a pub (can't remember the name)on the way home and had a Two for one meal deal of 8oz burgers, chips ,a pint of Banks ale and a J20 for £14  result!





 Above found on some storage sheds in Weedon.

Canal T Junction

Sue Fishing

Grafting

I started cutting and polishing after breakfast and stopped at 5pm and still only one side of the boat done! There hasn't been a cloud in the sky all day so as well as my arm aching I have got a red head. I will find a different job for tomorrow as I can't face another day polishing in ever decreasing circles (I could do with an electric buffer.)

Sue has been degreasing the cooker, washing and ironing curtains as well as giving the windows a good clean.

For some unknown reason we can connect to Three Internet through the MiFi unit but our Three phones  or a pay as you go Orange sim can't get a signal unless we walk up to the top of a nearby grassy bank. I suppose that is the small price we will pay for living in the middle of nowhere.

Hard at it 

One side shinny

Duck chicks 

Coot chicks

Napton

Had a bit of a lazy morning and then had a 2-mile walk along the towpath to the The Folly Inn at Napton on the Hill a gem of a place with its quirky bric-a-brac adorning shelves, and pictures from a bygone era on the walls. Here  I had a couple of pints of Old Hooky and Sue had J2o's. For a Tuesday lunchtime the place was heaving the food looked great but by the time we decided we were hungry enough to partake the kitchen had closed. We sat by the inglenook fire and in the with the kindling were various old newspapers and leaflets two of which I found quite amusing to be together, I tried to take a picture of them below.

Eye level  techno surgery.

Last night  I removed all the clutter from the roof of Festina to wash her down in readiness for t-cut and polish, this included the sausage bi-cycle which I padlocked to a nearby post. When we went out today the bike was gone new padlock as well but it turned out the marina groundsman (who apologised profusely)  had moved it still padlocked to a holding area as cycles aren't allowed to be scattered around the marina, it is now back on the roof. Won't be doing much polishing today, amazing what a drink at lunchtime does for you.

Sue said if I misbehave she is going to leave me here 

Yes please

Leaving Braunston

Saturday we set off for the  south Oxford canal but missed the turning and had to carry on North for another 6 miles to the next winding hole near Hillmorton which is at the end of the Barby Straight (negotiating this at 4mph in a  narrow boat strangely had me reminiscing of  taking the Cronk Y Voddy Straight on the Isle of Man at 140mph on  Honda Fireblade.)

Having turned we moored for the night just above Rowdykes Bride and had our Sunday lunch which had been roasting in the  Epping for a few hours.

Sunday we are now moored in  Wigrams Turn Marina  on the Oxford canal and will be here for a few days while we deep clean the boat. I want to t-cut and polish the exterior, and touch up some paint as well as service the engine, expect this to take a few days and it will be handy to be connected to the grid and water supply.

We came into the marina in a gale and moored on the nearest berth to the entrance, luckily when we booked in at reception this berth was available so we didn't need to move again or so we thought, we had to turn the boat around as our shore line hook up is at the stern and we were bow in. Turning in the wind  and reversing into the berth took 3 attempts but after about 20 mins we were safely tied up.

We had another scrummy meal (stew) from the Epping that had been cooking most of the day.

The Epping is a fantastic tool for a few lumps of coal it stays alight 24/7 keeping the boat warm and cooks dinner.

Phone coverage is non existent here but the 3 internet connection appears to work.

Staying put

Decided to stay for the weekend in Braunston , sunshine and showers today. After breakfast Sue walked into the village for the paper and had an altercation with the owner of a dog that was allowed to run amok in the park.

We had our lunch of the pork pie and it was delicious, may buy another before we go.

I had a problem with my Three Internet account and had to phone Delhi to get a password sent out ,the conversation went like this.

Me " I need a password to get into my account "

Igbol " you will need your mobile  phone handy have you got it ".

Me " Yes it's on the table,,, oh hang on it's gone missing"

After a few frantic moments looking for it and asking Igbol to hang on...

Me " Sue where's my bloody phone gone "

Sue " Against your bloody ear you fool"

Well that put us into fits of laughter  with tears rolling down our faces I  couldn't speak  any more and had to let Igbol go.

I walked up to the chandlers and bought an  Ecofan to help circulate the heat from the solid fuel stove , expensive but they work really well.

This afternoon I walked into the village to buy some spuds and popped into the 'The Old Plough' for a nice pint of Doombar Ale.. as you do and bumped into Aussie Mick .  Micks good lady is a fellow blogger so I knew of Mick but he didn't know me. "Gooday Mick"says I, a look of apprehension comes across his face. "You are Mick arn't you and married to Elle ". Penny drops "that bloody blog ..... this keeps happening to me!" Well we had a good laugh and  chat before walking back to the boats where we introduced our wives over a beer on PS.
Top couple

Sue only got to eat two of the scones she made .. they were that good. I made up for it by cooking our tea of  sausage leeks and spuds.

Sunday lunch opportunities