The final countdown

Hi, I hope you're enjoying the Bank Holiday.

This morning we finally bid farewell to our cruising companion.  David has been with us for over 5 months and it's been an absolute pleasure. But all good things must come to an end and as we were turning right at the junction towards Watford, he carried straight on towards Braunston.

We just mis-timed our arrival at Watford bottom lock and had a wait of an hour and a quarter before we could start our ascent.  This is our final lock flight (unless we divert and pop up to Welford that is) and I was counting them down.

7 to go

6

5 was the staircase bottom chamber

Can you see the red painted lock paddle gear?

These are used on all the staircase locks and there are also white painted ones. It's important to open the paddles in the correct order and the first time we did this flight back in 2001 we were taught a little rhyme by Crystal the lock keeper which I've never forgotten - Crystal was a real character and didn't suffer fools gladly so you had to get it the right way round.  "Red before white and you'll be alright.  White before red and you'll be dead"  - simples........

4 - in the second chamber

3 - third chamber

2 - top chamber

and finally, our last lock in this boat

So that's it lock-wise.  I'm going to tally up how many we've done and how many miles we've travelled and I'll let you know on our last day.

For the next few days we're just going to be pottering up and down the pound between Watford and Fozton until it's time to hand Fizzi over to her new owners.  Now that we've finished locking, Roger can also start tarting up the paintwork on the gunwales etc so please keep your fingers crossed that the fine weather continues for a bit longer.

Bye for now, see you soon