Date - 1 May 07 Day -Tuesday Start - 1000 just above Hurley Lock End - First 3 items from yesterday. 1 Last nights moorings cost us £5 a chap came round in his car at about 9 pm 2 Lunch time we stopped at the 24 hour moorings in Reading and went to Tesco where we had lunch 3 We passed a sunken narrowboat against one of the islands just above Reading.
We stopped to fill with water at Hurley lock which worked out well as there was a boat coming up in the lock, we then carried on to Marlow where we were held up for a bit as there was a man cleaning the lock gates with a pressure washer. Once clear we continued on to Maidenhead where at Boulter's Lock there was another narrowboat "Rolling Wave"waiting for the lock. The owner explained to me that he would be locking down alone as he did not wish to stop his engine, a Kelvin K twin cylinder with a hand start. Checking the time it was just approaching 1 o'clock which meant the locky would be gone for lunch before we got through, in the end this worked to our advantages as the locky said" I will open the top gates for you and then I'm off for lunch, you can sort out whether you share with your engine running" so thats what happened , we both locked down with engines running and then went on to Bray and worked through that as well. When I arrived at Boveney Lock I explained to the locky that there was a boat following and that I didn't mind waiting and locking with the other boats engine running if the locky didn't mind. His response was "If you think I'm locking him down alone you can think again" so we shared yet another lock. By the time we reached Windsor we were well ahead of him so I entered the lock alone thinking I would be well gone before he arrived, wrong. The locky closed the gates, cracked the bottom paddles and then wandered off somewhere, so it took ages for us to get down by which time the other boat had arrived and was waiting. When we finally left the lock we carried on to the National Trust land at Runnymede where we moored for the night at 4-30 pm. Mooring here is a fiver a night if anyone comes to collect it, I expect they will. -- Brian <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Visit this site and help save our waterways http://www.savethewaterways.org.uk/
