Date - 09 08 09 Day - Sunday Start - 0930 bottom Atherstone flight End - 1600 Fazeley, Birmingham and Fazeley Canal
Last night a hire boat from Springwood Haven came down the flight in the dark and moored just in front of us, this morning they decided to start their engine at 7 am and not move until 9. We set off at 9 30 am. and stopped for water about half a mile below the locks, while we were there two more hire boats came down, obviously travelling together. There was a boat on the water point when we arrived so we moored just behind him and waited until he moved off before backing up and taking water. The first of the two hire boats after pulling into the long term moorings on the off side stopped opposite us and when we moved back he pushed across and took the spot we had vacated, his mate arrived and stopped opposite the water point. As soon as we had finished taking water we moved off, instead of the first boat moving back, the one on the other side seeing a boat coming down the cut just pushed off right in front of it, threw his stern line to his mate standing by the water point who pulled him in swinging the bow to the opposite bank, the boat was now 45 degrees across the canal about 100 feet in front of this pore chap coming down the cut. Not a word was said from ether side and the chap stopped his boat in the centre of the cut and waited until they sorted themselves out. All because they thought they miss their turn at the water point, they only left the boat yard yesterday afternoon. As we were in no hurry I waved several boats passed that caught up with us, it was obvious that they were travelling faster than I wanted to so I was quite happy to see them on their way. Why don't the boaters I catch up with do this? A short break for Diana to go to the Tesco Express just before Tamworth. A boater coming towards us said there was no point in hurrying as there was a good queue at Glascote locks and he was right. While Diana was shopping I went fishing with the magnet and caught yet another mooring spike to add to my collection. When we arrived at the Glascote Looks there were boats ahead of us but they were locking so slowly with boats coming up as well, it must have taken us the best part of 2 hours to do these, but the sun was shining and most people were cheerful. Once through the locks it was still quite congested as the Tamworth Cruising Club have been holding an event this weekend. We continued on to Fazeley Junction and turned hard left on to the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal, carried on for about half a mile and moored outside the new marina. You will find our latest position at http://tinyurl.com/Harnser-s-route -- Brian
