Sells Green

We cast off just after 9.00 and moored at 11.00 so this wasn’t our longest day of travel! There are seven locks in the Foxhangers Flight and they were all set in our favour by a hire boat that passed us just as we were about to set off. I worked the locks and Alan had his turn at steering. Some of the gates are exceptionally heavy – maybe I am just out of practice.

We wanted to top up our water so pulled in at Sells Green. There was a very pleasant mooring in front of a massive BW barge so we decided to stay put. We are complete suckers when we see moorings with rings and NO MUD! After all, we are quite close to Semington where the boat is to be blacked. We were a little low on diesel and the fire wasn’t performing so we went off to Hilperton with the jerry can, stopping at Semington Dock on the way. (We wondered if they had diesel but they don’t). The boat currently being blacked was still in the dry dock and we have postponed our arrival a day to Friday to give them longer for their blacking to set. There isn’t a boat booked to follow us in and hopefully our departure can be similarly relaxed. It seems a very pleasant place, with chickens and pigs in an enclosure. The Somerset Arms nearby is apparently very good for food so we might have a meal out and enjoy our stay.

When we filled up our jerry can at the Boatyard at Hilperton he offered us the loan of another jerry can if we wanted. We took him up on it but it was rather leaky and the car has a pong of diesel now, not very pleasant. Forty litres of diesel and the boat lying very flat in the water with the full water tank did the trick and the fire is now blazing beautifully. The temperature seems to be dropping enough to put a chill on the air after some very mild days so the warmth is very welcome.

Today we did 1.85 Miles and 7 Locks

Statistics so far:-

3054.74 Miles, 2045 Locks, 192 Swing Bridges, 118 Lift Bridges, 58 Tunnels