Michael Tyler

Yah.

Moving now into places I’ve not really been before, certainly not without being passenger on the boat.

Somerton Meadows

This place is called. The towpath is indeed one large meadow spanning from the outskirts of Somerton to the River Cherwell.

It’s got a nice iron bridge across the main span of the river. There’s also a mill stream that runs down to North Aston Mill at the other side of the valley.

The field is home to some livestock cattle and the canal is lined with Poplars, Elms, Sycamore and Hawthorne. It’s a nice spot with views right down to the river.

No motorway

It’s the first place since Cropredy where you don’t have the sound of the motorway in the background.

Some places it’s worse. Like pig place or Twyford. Others it’s less present but still there, like Aynho or the last place I was at, Souldern.

Here’s there’s just natural sights and sounds. It’s so refreshing.

The weather

Is a total let-down.

Always windy, it’s been like that for a few years now, in the summer. An almost continuous wind. It was like that, not so much at the height of last summer. But over the summer months, it seems more than usual.

These days it’s almost continuously blustery. To add insult to injury, now it’s raining. Almost on a daily basis.

Cycle for water

I have to cycle to get water. The best place is from this natural spring.

At the top of two steep hills, it’s a good way to get a bit of cardio. I get 5 litres of water and put it in my bag.

It’s better to have fresh water for drinking and cooking.

The stuff out of the water-tank is drinkable. It doesn’t taste as good.

The more water you use. The more you have to move the boat to re-fill the tank, which is an additional side effect.

A lot of people buy bottled water. I don’t really like the plastic waste. Plus it’s a waste of money.

This is spring water which is a nice touch. There’s an inscription on the fountain.

It was built in around 1803 and restored in the millennium.

Yum!

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Yeah?

On salad.

Besides that, I’m trying to move during the prescribed time-frames for continuous cruisers.

That’s meant two weeks only, then on to the next one.

This year, I have to travel further, right the way down 22 miles from where I started in March.

Pig turn

It’s usually around this area that I think about turning around and heading back up. Not so this time, I’m thinking more about what lies beyond my terminal stop, Aynho Wharf, the next stop down.

Summer is escalating nicely and the weather here at the Pig Place is something that you can enjoy on the wide towpath outside your own boat, (if you so desire).

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Heading in that direction. Stopped over in Spiceball Park for 1 night.

Noisey Park

One of the silo’s in Fine Lady’s bakery operations has started making a strange whistling noise.

This has had the effect of creating an overpowering and continous noise nuisance.

I noticed this immediately, having staying in the park a number of times and being aware that the factory can be a bit noisey.

Other boaters came and went. I noticed on my nightly walk around the park. Usually they may stick around for a week, or 2 weeks. Now, they don’t stay for 2.

The sound is persistent, high pitched invasive whistling noise. If you lived in a house close near to it, you would complain to the council. Boaters don’t have that option, but it made the park a short but worthy stay over. I visited the pub and took back a pint glass I’d stolen from the Waterside at Christmas and not brought back.

Being on the 24 hour moorings, it wasn’t possible to hang around too long, not that I wanted to. It was nice to be able to walk into town and enjoy a few drinks, then be on my way in the morning.

Twyford

So here I am in the next viable stop on the way down south. Twyford.

There is a possible stop in between called, Tramway. Lot’s of the ‘true boaters’ like it there. I don’t bother with it due to the overhanging trees and non-existant mobile signal.

This is what some people are after and bully for them.

Tywford has a wide towpath and is a walk from Kings Sutton amongst other

With salmonella. Picked the car up. Looks like someone has run into it. Greg, the owner of forge farm, where I moored th boat whilst I was away left a note on my car before I left. Aparently one of his workers has some information about it. I’ll be following that u when I don’t feel so ill.

It has a small dent on the offside rear wheel arch.

The boat

Is fine. A little more condensation on the windows, otherwise exactly the same as when I left it.

I spent a couple of nights at forge farm before moving down off onto the network.

Easter blues

Or so it seems on the canal network. It’s Saturday of the long weekend and they’re having to restrict the locks by the afternoon. This is due to lack of water. I had to move the boat down for the same reason, it was sideways and the water wouldn’t empty out of the bath and draws were falling open.

I’m not much of a fussy boater, but this is one of the things that really fucks me off. Probably one of the reasons I didn’t stick around on the Kennet and Avon. Having your whole world view rotated by 30°, used to piss me off. Now it’s something I can really do without.

Anyways, come 8am Saturday morning, the boat was sideways, even though I’d pushed it off a ledge further out into the channel the night before.

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