Look at those flocking parakeets

Tuesday 15th April (please note correct date! I was told off by my brother ;^)

An un-eventful day after a very quiet night. Although we were in sight of a railway line when we moored up last night, it was only the Chiltern line and so we were not disturbed at all as the trains are both small and quite quiet.

The most exciting thing to happen today was the ‘words’ we had when I almost took on of Jannock’s windows out whilst exiting a lock. At Denham Deep lock a working boat was moored with it’s bows well into the lock throat. Graham opened the offside gate to let me exit but it would not open fully due to an un-seen obstacle below water level. He had to then partially open the gate on the same side as the moored boat and that caused a window pane to lightly kiss the bows of a working boat – luckily without the glass breaking. Good thing I hadn’t rushed at it, I claim it wasn’t my fault – a good boaters tactic.

We then managed to team up with another southbound boat to share both Uxbridge and Cowley locks with. G. spotted nb Progress, resplendent in a fresh coat of paint, outside Uxbridge boats. Cowley lock was manned by very friendly volunteers and so was the easiest lock passage through a lock so far this trip.

We stopped at Bulls Bridge Tescos for more provisions that we couldn’t get a Ricky yesterday and then turned into the Paddington arm to continue on towards central London. We moored for the night at the park, just beyond Packet Boat marina, in the sunshine. Far to cold a wind to sit out for a cup of tea for more than ten minutes, but long enough to watch the flocks of Parakeets coming in to roost.

Brenda