Argey bargey

It had been a while since myself and Mike had been on a little jangle and with that in mind I busied myself with a way to rectify this massive oversight.

Not content with just a bike and a tent this time, I decided to slow the pace just a little and hire a narrow boat. On collection of our floating home for the week we discovered it was aptly named best mate. After loading our gear, food, beer, wine and rum ( I believe its the law to carry rum at all times on a boat ) we filled the diesel tank, said farewell to Steve ( boat owner ) and fled the marina at a sweltering pace of around 3MPH.
We had planned to potter down to the first lock which Steve had kindly offered to drive to so he could show us how to operate the locks.

successful navigation of our first lock.

Our plan didn't entail any desires of grandeur, just to potter along, turn round and be home for Friday lunch time. Due to commitments we both needed to be home on Friday and with this in mind and a map in hand we decided somewhere around the historic boating town of Shardlow would be our turn round point. the map was easy and clear to read showing all distances, locks, pubs, waterpoints and more importantly winding holes (turning points). We chose the entrance to Shardlow marina as our turning point and that was that......plan hatched. With nothing more to do but trundle along, put the world to rights, enjoy the scenery and sample a beer or two we soon settled into our new surroundings.

Mike looking mighty pleased with himself and doing a grand job of skippering

blessed with reasonable weather for October.

Tea and Tab break

can you guess who now became lock operator for the week!

Best Mate is 45" long and comprised of a front lounge area complete with wood burner, mid section was kitchen, i know....galley!, bathroom, with damn impressive shower, wasnt expecting that kind of pressure, and finally a made up small double bed.

Rum coffee after a hard days skippering

view from front to back.

daily maintenance, prop shaft greasing.

I could get used to this.

On Tuesday evening, our very good friend Neil paid us a visit but sternly (no pun intended) refused to join in with the nautical names, i have called Mike skipper for a number of years now due to owning a few types of boats, therefore i was to be called captain, Neil however was not happy with Roger. He was soon forgiven though because his arrival meant more supplies, 1 pepper (that i forgot) for the curry, a bag of coal and more importantly more beer.

After a few of the affore mentioned beers, Neil introduced us to a 2foot tall inflatable penguin, who from now on shall be known as Findus

Mr. Findus to you.

Findus was quite an ammenable chap and very happy to dress up in all maner of costumes, although our resourses were limited our minds were in overdrive, between us we amass opproximately 135 years, thats a lot of childishness in anyones book.

very childish indeed.

That just about sums up a great week with both Mike and Neil, my apologies for taking so long with a write up, but my new job in I.T.with microsoft has taken up so much time!

Cheers Skipper and Roger.

As Mike would say....."A very pleasent jangle"

Roll on the next one