oh boy! – did it rain!

Brenda fell asleep at half eight last night and was still asleep when Graham set off in the pouring rain at nine this morning. Moored two boats in front of Jannock’s mooring was this little boat named ‘Spirit of Pheobe’ – Graham believes it used to be named ‘Sarnie’ and belonged to Orph Mabel.
The way through Woodseaves cutting is usually soggy but today it was a full blown bog – pedestrians would have a very hard time unless wearing waders. The ferns were magnificent however. We hope that our ‘land garden’ has had just a fraction of this rain.
Our old thermal mugs gave up after 15+ years service; the plastic just crumbled over time. We looked for replacements but the only half decent ones were over a tenner each and the thought of that going overboard in the breeze was a bit much. Morrisons had some at just over £3 each. Any good ? – Graham took out a hot cup of tea when he set off and then waited 30 minutes before drinking it. It was still very hot so we thoroughly recommend Morrisons thermal mugs.
A day boat passed us with the steerer wearing a tee-shirt and body warmer in the rain. He said that he’d expected better weather in July when they’d booked the boat. So, did he not check the weather forecast or even look out of the window before he set off today?
The Gnosal G-Fest is being held this weekend. Lots of traders and working boats were in evidence. I asked a moored boater what the ‘G’ in G-Fest stood for, he replied “Gnosal” -  Hmm, not so sure. Tried the Gnosal website, still no idea.
We spotted this magnificent garden opposite all the working boats gathered for the festival – what a exuberant whacky sight.
 
We had the pleasure of cruising slowly past two Kingfishers today, perched on branches in the offside bank, not more than a metre from us. Unfortunately attempts to photograph them were thwarted by needing our point and shoot camera on full zoom and so maximum shake.
We received two outage notices from CaRT about Wheaton Aston lock – it was out of use this morning and will be mended the first week in August. Therefore we continued on to pass through it before mooring for the night – just in case it breaks again and we’re stuck above it.
Once moored up Graham did an (overdue by 10 hours) engine oil and filter change before we had dinner. That should see us back to Brinklow before another is needed.