THE BIG SUMMER CRUISE--June 30th--July 6th
Monday, June 30th
We stayed at Pershore for a second night.
I have to say that we didn't find it a very exciting town.
There is some lovely architecture, and an ancient Abbey,
but it has a rather depressed air about it.
There seems to be quite a number of young people driving round
in the inevitable red souped up Ford cars, making as much noise as possible!
May be I'm becoming old......

We went in to the Town council offices, and whilst we were there,
the woman behind the counter, when she found out we were on the river,
asked if we'd had "any trouble".
She'd just received a letter that morning from some people
who had moored there previously,
and who had had a bundle of trouble from the local youths.
Trev later told me that the people on the boat behind us at Evesham had told him
that they had had problems at Pershore too.
But he wasn't intending to tell me until we had left!
We were lucky, we had no problems.


A LOCK ON THE AVON, SHOWING THE ADJACENT WEIR
(Sorry, this doesn't show it very well--weir on the left, lock on the right.)

Tuesday, July 1st, Wednesday, July 2nd & Thursday, July 3rd.
We've been living on our boat for three months now.
The time has flown, although it seems ages
since we were moving all of our things on board.
Today we went on down The Avon to Tewkesbury.
The weather is cooler, but not cold.
It was a pretty journey for most of the way,
though the last few miles are not as interesting.
The river grows wider, the banks higher, and it's not easy to see anything.
I phoned ahead to the lockkeeper, to see if we could get a mooring,
and he said he would reserve one for us.
Sure enough, when we arrived, there was our mooring all ready for us!
We did feel important.

Tewkesbury is a pretty town, with some delightful old buildings.
There is an Abbey, though I'm ashamed to say we never got to see it.
Whilst we were in Tewkesbury, I took advantage of the free internet facility at the library.
One can have up to two hours for nothing. What a bargain.
That's about my ration for the whole month using a mobile phone to connect.

On Wednesday, evening, we went to the theatre.
The local school had a show on--Songs from the Shows.
It was good entertainment.

On Thursday, our friends, Jane & Pete came to see us.
(That's Jane of the bounteous basket fame, who came to see us before!)
And she didn't disappoint today, bless her!
Today there were all sorts of goodies for lunch, and taped stories for us to borrow.
Only trouble is, we don't have a tape player!
We wanted to take our friends for a cruise.
The Avon meets the Severn at Tewkesbury, and there is a lock between them.
We couldn't really ask the lock keeper to let us down in to the Severn
only to come back two hours later,
so we decided to retrace our steps back up the Avon.
It was all new to Jane & Pete any way.

Friday, 4th July, Saturday 5th July
We left the Avon behind today.
We went down through the lock and on to the Severn.


COMING OUT OF THE AVON LOCK AT TEWKESBURY ON TO THE SEVERN

This is much wider than the Avon, and there are some BIG boats on it!



We went north on the Severn, in the direction of Worcester.
We had been considering going down to Gloucester
and doing the Gloucester and Sharpness Canal.
But eventually we decided to go north.
There wasn't much traffic, the banks are high and there's not much to see.



But we could really open up the throttle and do some motoring!
We never get the chance to really use the engine on the canal,
as we have to keep the speed down so that the wash doesn't erode the banks.
We moored at Upton-on-Severn for two nights.

It's a lovely town, some interesting shops and a lot of eating places.
People were friendly, and we enjoyed our stay.
The visitor moorings were pretty hopeless,
we were lucky and arrived just as someone was leaving.
Otherwise we would have had to "breast up" as we boating people say.

But I shall be glad to get back to the canals again.
I really enjoyed the Avon, but I'm not so keen on the Severn.
It's tedious, and I don't feel quite safe on it.
It's just a gut feeling I have. Trev doesn't feel the same.
I think part of it is the fact that we can't moor where we like,
and moorings are few and far between.

One bonus at Upton was that we met our neighbours on the next boat.
They were good fun and we spent the evening together,
drinking and putting the world to rights!

Sunday 6th July
We left Upton after buying diesel at the marina.
There are some seriously expensive boats in there!
The views from the river were the same as before. Just high banks
Then we arrived at Worcester, our mooring spot for the next two nights.
There was a huge lock to go through,
electronically operated for us by a lock keeper.
We moored by the racecourse. I am edgy,
as I have heard that there can be 'trouble' for boaters at Worcester.
However, all seems well. A boat with a jazz band playing floats gently by,



small motor boats potter about, as do canoeists and other vessels.
A warden comes along to collect our mooring fee--GBP2.50 per night.
Usually it's free, the only other place we had to pay was at Tewkesbury,
where it was GBP2.00 per night.
I asked the warden if this is a safe place to moor.
The answer is slightly evasive, and she tells me it's usually OK,
"It's only when the lads come along and cut the ropes......"

Not surprisingly, I have one of those nights when I can't get off to sleep,
and eventually I give up and get up
when I hear people about on the towpath after midnight.
Surreptitious peeking shows that there is a couple of hire boats
about eighty yards away,
and it looks as though the party is just about to start.........
However, they didn't disturb us.

From time to time, boaters do experience problems on the canal or rivers.
It depends on where you're moored.
Ropes being untied or cut isn't much fun, but at least if you're on a canal you don't go very far.
But on a river, it's not so funny with a current and weirs.
We're going to buy a chain and a padlock,
so that we can fix it to either the bow or stern
to moor up with when we feel uneasy about the place we're in.
At least it will make it more difficult if anyone tries to undo it.

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