Friday, 8th April
We moved on down to Wilmcote, where we moored for three nights. Friends came to see us in the evening and we had an excellent meal at the Mason's Arms in the village. I went back with our friends to fetch the car from Warwick. Now all this car fetching and taking might get a bit complicated, but never mind, it doesn't really matter! We know what we're doing, I think.......

Saturday, 9th April
All of these shenanigans with the car were to enable us to have it nearby, as we've put an ad in the local free newspaper to sell our camping trailer, which is currently taking up most of Cherry's garage. She really is a long suffering woman! So we wanted the car nearby so that we could go and show the tent to prospective buyers. However, the only drawback to this cunning plan was that the paper didn't actually print the ad---so we'd rather wasted our time.

Sunday, 10th April
As we had the car, and it was such a lovely day, we took advantage of being able to go out and went to Hidcote Gardens, a National Trust property, south of Stratford-on-Avon. The gardens were looking beautiful and it was a perfect day out. We sat in the courtyard in the sun to enjoy our lunch. As we sat there, an ex-colleague of Trev's came by, pushing a wheel barrow. We had a quick chat and it transpired that he was now doing supply teaching and working at Hidcote at the weekends in the summer. What a lovely job, I'd like to work there, it's so peaceful and what a privilege to work in such a magnificent environment. Nick said he might come and see us in the Stratford Basin, when we arrive there tomorrow.

Monday, 11th, Tuesday, 12th April,
We set off again today, for the final stage of the journey to Stratford. A friend, Shelagh came to join us, as she had never been through a canal lock on a boat. Well, she would certainly not be able to say that again, as there are seventeen locks between Wilmcote and Stratford! I steered through the locks, Trev cycled ahead and set the locks, Shelagh gave encouragement from the rear! She had brought a picnic, so we stopped at the water point and ate our lunch as we filled up with water. Sadly, the bike developed another puncture, so it had to come back on board, and Trev walked the rest of the way.

As we approached Stratford there were more people about watching the canal activity, and some of the children "helped" with the locks. At one lock, I saw Trev shaking hands with someone over the bridge, and then the same man came along and said hello to me. It was Geoff, a person Trev used to play snooker with before we moved on to the boat. So Geoff duly came aboard and came down the last couple of locks and in to the Stratford Basin with us. The last bridge in to the basin is VERY low. Fortunately, I'd already realigned the chimney further back along the Stratford Canal, when I was too busy looking at a pretty cottage and not noticing a low bridge, with the result that the chimney was now rather more parallel to the roof than at right angles to it....... This naturally was a great help as we came under the low bridge in to the basin. In fact, it was a jolly good job I'd sorted it out before we got there!

I wonder if you've noticed the one flaw in all of this? Where is the car? Well, Trev took it back to Cherry's drive this morning and Shelagh picked him up on her way to spend the day with us. It all takes a bit of organising, but it's possible--just!

We had planned to start back up the Stratford Canal on Tuesday, but decided to get the puncture fixed first. There was a cycle shop not far away, and the bike had to have a new inner tube. We enjoyed a walk around town and a chat with fellow boaters.

Wednesday, 13th April
We set off today to go back up towards Kingswood Junction to rejoin the Grand Union Canal and resume our trip to the bottom blackers! I did all of the locks today, in a desperate attempt to get fit and lose weight. What a pity it takes longer than a day! Trev saw a dead deer in the canal.

Just as we were passing through Wilmcote we had a 'phone call from the postmen to say they had friends with them and could they come out to see us, bring the mail and their friends, please?! We met them at the Bearley Aqueduct, and they all came aboard. It was a bit of a squash, and we took half of the group to the front of the boat to sit--and to distribute the weight a bit! They travelled with us for about a mile and then we moored up to have a cup of tea. We couldn't get in to the bank, as the water was too shallow, so we did some death defying leaps, and put the gangplank out. After they had all left to walk back to their car, we carried on and moored up at Preston Bagot. We had arranged to meet a friend here, who has some coal he doesn't need and so we're buying it from him. The only unfortunate thing about this is that we've more or less finished having fires, so it will sit on top of the boat all through the summer, and feature in every photograph I take!

Thursday, 14th March
We continued on to Kingswood Junction today, sharing the locks and the steering. We had an interesting experience at lock 26. I tried to shut the bottom gate, prior to filling the lock, but I couldn't. Trev tried, but he couldn't shut it either. So we opened it again and furtled about with the barge pole to try to dislodge whatever was stuck, but after about fifteen minutes we decided that we needed to call in the reinforcements. So I 'phoned British Waterways.

When you 'phone BW, you might think you're 'phoning the local office. There used to be an office at Kingswood Junction, staffed by real people who knew all about waterways, and could answer enquiries in a most encouraging way. However, one still phones the same number, but the call is rerouted to Fazeley, which is miles away. We had this experience when we came down the Stratford Canal last week and needed a card to use the pump out machine. I rang the BW office at Kingswood, as I thought, and the person at the other end asked where Kingswood junction was......... Though I must say that after we'd established its location, she was very efficient and arranged for a BW person to meet us there with a card.

Well, any way, I phoned Kingswood again, to be automatically transferred to Fazeley, and told them of our problem. Chantal, at Fazeley, said she would phone a lengthsman on his mobile 'phone. So we waited. In fact we thought we might as well have lunch. It was not the most scenic spot, at the bottom of a lock, with an outlook on to slimy walls, but we made the most of it, occasionally bobbing up in eager anticipation of seeing the lengthsman rushing to our aid. We didn't want him to miss us at the bottom of the lock!

We finished our lunch, and swopped life histories with some people waiting to come down the lock. Trev got on the bike and went to see if he could see anyone coming along, and Hooray, our saviour arrived on a quadbike with a very long handled thingie to sort us out. We opened the gate, he fished around and brought out a very large branch. We shut the gate, filled the lock, thanked the lengthsman, said goodbye to our new friends and were on our way again.

We turned right at Kingswood Junction and on to the Grand Union. We moored up at the top of the Hatton Flight, ready for our descent of the twenty-one locks tomorrow.