Oct 30th

Normal 0 false false false st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} You will recall that in yesterday's blog I mentioned that Clive was going to suss out a Marina a little further down the canal from our mooring.  He came back with good news - we can moor up in the marina, on a pontoon, with a hook-up for electricity for about a week.  This is great news as we need to leave the boat again this weekend to go back up to Huddersfield.  Clive's mum is going into hospital and we wanted to go up and visit her whilst she is in.  So we have arranged for a hire car from Friday lunchtime to Monday lunchtime.  We are both far happier about leaving the boat safely in a marina rather than on the tow path and also the hook-up is a huge relief as we have the fridge and freezer running continuously and it is a bit dodgy leaving them running purely on the batteries without being able to recharge them.  We are very pleased indeed.   Therefore we will not be blogging for a few days until after we get back from Huddersfield.   However I must just tell you that we had the most wonderful surprise yesterday afternoon, just after I had finished doing the blog.  A Kingfisher actually came and landed on the bow post at the front of the boat!  We were both absolutely thrilled to bits - we have caught fleeting glimpses of these beautiful flying jewels on our travels, but they fly sooooooooo fast its nigh on impossible to photograph them, apart from the one I photographed in a bush a few days ago, but that was so far away that all you could see was the bush!  So to have one land on our boat was incredible.  Unfortunately he didn't stay long enough to have his photograph taken so you will just have to take my word for it - its true, honest! We decided to go on a shopping trip after we had got Lady Arwen settled in her berth.  So we got the shopping bags out and set off.  We were passing all the other boats moored in the marina, which are mainly non-residential, just a place where people moor their boats when they are not cruising, they are not live-aboards like ours.  However there was a guy on one of the boats, working on his engine.  I stopped to ask him how far it was to the nearest supermarket and which direction we should go - he didn't know himself so he popped inside to ask his wife.  She came out and started to give us directions then thought better of it - "give me the car keys" she said to her hubby and insisted on driving us to the nearest Morrison's!  We thanked her profusely and she said "we narrowboaters have to stick together you know"!  We were very grateful indeed for the lift, it was quite a step from the canal.  She actually gave us her name and mobile phone number and said we should call her if we bought too much to carry home or if we got lost!  We actually managed to make our way back to the boat on our own, thanks to Googlemaps on Clive's mobile! But thank you very much Deryn.  It is amazing how many kind people we have met on our travels, so many of them have been very helpful to us.   When we get back from Huddersfield we are intending to stay in the marina here in Market Drayton, probably until next Thursday or Friday, this will give us chance to catch up with Clive's relatives and he can get lots more names and dates for the family tree!    Bye for now - once again, don't go away - hasta la vista baby!  We'll be back......!