Star Struck

 

After spending the night at Shugborough hall at Great Haywood we headed towards Rugeley and luckily the fuel barge was open so we filled up with 113 litres of diesel at 79 pence per litre . It was then through the speed trap in Rugeley and into the town to do a food and drink shop.

 

Another good boat name we passed on the way.

 

After a night in Alrewas which is one of our favorite places on the canals we pulled pins at 07.45 and dropped down on the Trent river section and on towards Burton on Trent. The barrier on the right is to stop you going over the weir.

 

If they made Red wine I would have stopped and gone and done a bit  lot of sampling.

 

I am not a member so ,no comments please Nicolas..

 

After months of only doing single locks we are now back on doubles and some of them are so heavy …..Poor old  Carolyn.

 

On Saturday morning we decided to push the boat out (so to speak) and have breakfast at Mercia Marina in Willington. In front of the café is where they sell Wide beam boats and Carolyn suggested having a look on one. I then made the biggest mistake ever by agreeing to take a look. She immediately fell in love with it and wanted one there and then. It was the same length as Inca but double the width and fitted out to a very high standard. I had to explain the drawbacks like, you are very restricted to where you could go and I would get very stressed out steering it.     But the biggest drawback was the £138,000 they wanted for it…….Keep dreaming Carolyn !!!!

 

After leaving Willington we came across this loose work barge, The Dopey workers hadn't tied it up properly, so while Carolyn expertly maneuvered Inca in next to it I managed to jump aboard and secure it to the other barge. That is now 3 boats that we have come across in the last 3 days that we have had to rescue and re-tie .

 

We finally arrived at Shardlow lock and met up with our good friends Stewart and Fran. After a cup of tea and a walk with the dogs it wasn’t long before we hit the booze like we always do.

 

On Sunday evening we ended up at The Malt Shovel and we were introduced to a band called The Struts, and what a great bunch of lads they were. This is Carolyn with lead singer Luke who comes from the same neck of the woods that we do down in sunny Devon. The band have recently supported The Rolling Stones in front of 80,000 people in Paris and have just brought out a new album. Apparently they are on their way up and are destined to be big . Anyway Carolyn seemed to be star struck even though she was well hammered at the time……. Hit the link below to watch one of their videos.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pq_BaUrFnhk&noredirect=1

 

I have been told we had a brilliant night and what I can remember of it I really enjoyed it. A big thank you again to Stewart for carrying me home as I was totally wasted and would of ended up in the cut without his help. Monday just passed with out me knowing it happened as I had such a bad hangover from the night before. In the meantime Carolyn had some great retail therapy with Fran in Derby , while me and Stewart put the world to rights back at the boats…

As always we had a great time with Stewart and Fran and can’t wait until the next time we meet them. On Wednesday we intend to pull pins early and head out on to the Trent river and then turn right on to the river Soar and then south down towards Leicester.

 

                                                                                                                                                       Happy Days