Tuesday 31st
December 2019
Brenda cleaned the boat through to have her looking nice for seeing in
the New Year. I baled out water that had entered the engine room. Unsure as to
how this had got in other than overflowing the guttering during the recent
rains although the new rubber matting stops a lot of this. There was also blue
coloured water, engine coolant, laying under the engine bed that was probably expansion
from overfilling the header tank. All had to be cleaned up, a messy job but it
seemed quicker to finish this time.
We then sat in the front cratch pinching ourselves over being at Bramble
for New Year. There were two other boats moored behind us and the couple off
one joined us for a few drinks before dinner and we met with them later to see
in the New Year. The occupants of the other boat were battened down long before
midnight, although it transpired that the wife is disabled with MS.
We could hear the fireworks at Holmes Chapel and Middlewich and could see
the rockets bursting in the sky from Winsford, Moulton, Davenham and Northwich.
It was a beautiful clear night, cold but not too cold for January and we stood
outside talking until 1:30.
Bridge Street at Midnight, New Year, at Bramble Cutting
A Happy New Year to one and all. And for us the anticipation of another
year’s cruising ahead when we plan to head through Birmingham for London.
Over the past 12 months, the engine has run for 555.4 hours and used 757.14
litres of fuel. We have travelled 833 miles, passed through 535 locks and 23
tunnels and operated 56 swing bridges and 17 lift bridges.
We have travelled the length of the Birmingham & Fazeley Canal and
parts of the Birmingham Canal Navigations, the entirety of the
Stratford-on-Avon Canal, the River Avon, the River Severn and the Gloucester
& Sharpness Canal. After negotiating the Severn Estuary Crossing, we travelled
the entirety of the Kennet & Avon Canal and the River Thames from Reading
to Oxford. We then travelled the entirety of the Oxford and Coventry Canals and
onto the Trent & Mersey Canal, with a diversion, exploring the entirety of
the Caldon Canal. While spending the winter in and around Middlewich, we have
had trips out to Anderton and Chester.
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