The answer for easier cruising

I today found the answer to an easier life while cruising on the canals, find a boat full of  scouts, cubs and beavers and travel with them.

We met up with a party of youngsters with their leaders aboard 'Grebe' out of Willow Wren at Rugby at the top of Braunston locks. they happily did virtually all the work of winding paddles and opening gates all the way down the flight leaving me with virtually nothing to do. Once again my thanks to them all!

As I am sure some of you will have noticed Google Latitude is being very silly, for some reason it keeps sending me back to Hemel Hempstead, I've tried reloading it but it doesn't seem to make any difference. I'm sure it will sort itself out eventually, if not I'll have to try an alternative.

We had quite a good day today, largely thanks to the help through the locks. Once we were on the Oxford Canal after Braunston turn the amount of traffic was incredible, probably because of the bank holiday weekend. Luckily there are only three locks on the 23ish miles of the Oxford between Braunston and Hawkesbury Junction so even with a lot of traffic we shouldn't experience too many holdups.

As I had a Sunday roast planned we stopped fairly early, just before Hillmorton locks. the plan for tomorrow is to stop at Rugby for some shopping then probably carry on a bit further afterwards.

Today's journey 9.2 miles, 6 locks and 1 tunnel

So far this year we have travelled 95.4 miles, 102 locks, 3 swing bridges and 2 tunnels

In 2011 we travelled 461.4 miles, 444 locks, 3 swing bridges, 34 lift bridges and 15 tunnels

During 2010 we travelled 740.3 miles, 642 locks, 53 swing bridges, 4 lift bridges and 25 tunnels.

Since Ray retired we have travelled 1297.1 miles, 1188 locks, 59 swing bridges, 38 lift bridges and 42 tunnels