Rowkin Rovings Blog

Ooops, we really have got into this swing of rising late and hence being the last boat to leave the moorings. Fraser went into the little town of Milton this morning to order a new battery for his computer as his current one is dead. Milton is a tiny village with a second hand book shop, grocery store, butcher and computer shop that doubles as a hardware store. You do not often see second hand book shops any more let alone butcher shops. We did our best to support these local businesses by purchasing three Bill Bryson books and a jigsaw puzzle from the bookstore, some fresh ham and oatcake from the butchers and the battery pack from the hardware store.

We leisurely cruised along the Caldon Canal which is extremely narrow but picturesque for four hours today. Very little other boat traffic around which surprised us considering it is mid term break. We did a ½ walk today where the canal splits in two and one arm goes over the top of the other arm. It is more or less like a figure 8 with locks thrown in to get the necessary height for the canals to cross. Pretty clever engineering considering this was done in the 1840’s with none of the high tech gizmos that they use today.

The weather continued to hold though the wind picked up and with it a bit of chillness in the air. We arrived at the end of the canal to a little place called Leek where we moored up and settled in for the night.

There has now been a change in the weather with showers commencing this evening and a distinct drop in temperature. Oh well, as we have been saying, it couldn’t last.