Set off Tuesday afternoon rather late due to swmbo making me stay up till the early hours drinking bacardi and watching the Sweeny on DVD.

First problem was starting the engine. Key in ignition. turn and click!!! try again and....click!

In all my eagerness to replace the domestic Batts id completely forgot about the engine battery. Fool that i am. So started her up using the emergency switch which kicks in the domestic batts to give that extra vummph. and remembered to turn off the emer switch so the domestic batts dont get screwed by the duff engine batt. Any way, upto the winding hole and back to top up with diesel coal and boots from the car then chugged off towards Cowley Peachey junction. I had forgotten how shallow the Slough arm is and within minutes we had picked something up round the prop. Plodded on at minus 1 mile an hour and finally we stopped at the last Aquaduct before the junction to dive into the weedhatch hole and sure enough removed the perverbial blue polythene liner thingy. It was after 5 as we negotiated the sharp left turn from the arm onto the main line north and plodded along at tickover due to all the moored boats. Finally tied up just below Cowley Lock at half 6.

Walked upto the lock with Nora and gave her a brief intro to lock working then repaired to the Malt shovel for a couple of ales and a steak supper. Good meal but the staff were struggling as a sudden atteck of customers arrived just after we had ordered. It was chucking it down as we returned to Lady Elgar. did a quick walk round inside to make sure all was dry and found a couple of drips under the Paloma water heater. Not sure if this was from the rain or internally. will monitor the situation.

Tuesday morning found me wide awake at 8 am and sitting reading Trevor Pavitt's book 'Living the Dream' Very good book so far but he is turning me into an engine hypochondriac. I have found myself today listening out for those bumps and knocks coming from below that he describes.

Stopped at Uxbridge boat centre aladins cave for a new engine battery and coolie hat which Nora, much to her horror flicked off the chimney with the mooring line when we departed from Iver.

Had a full days trip in excellent weather with Nora working all the locks. I had to rate her out of ten for each one and heres the results so far

1. Cowley Lock 10/10

2. Uxbridge lock 8/10 because she began to lower the paddles before opening the gates.

3.Denham Deep 8/10 because she had help form a very nice chap and she forgot to use the gate paddles

4. Widewater lock 10/10

5. Black Jacks lock 8/10 for asking repetative questions

6. Coppermill lock 10/10

7. Springwell lock 10/10

8. Stockers lock 8/10 she didnt realise the lock was already set for us and made glaring schoolgirl errors

9. Batchworth Lock 9/10 because she went to open the gate paddle while i was too close instead of the ground paddle

She did bloody well for her first ever canal trip

As for sterring.....i was perfect

untill it came to making supper.....we tied up just after Batchworth and decided it was BBQ time so with it being almost dark it set up by the galley windows so they would shed some light on the proceedings. While watching the flames form the side hatch i hit upon the brilliant idea of moving the BBQ to the side hatch so that i didnt have to go outside and could put me slippers on while cooking from the comfort of ones own home....First burger that hit the griddle set billowing smoke into the boat through the hatch. Result, smokey boat and burnt food and streaming eyes..

mmmmmm steak

heres a couple of pics to remind us of the day