Friday 3rd July

We took the opportunity to make the best of another summer weekend and left the marina in the late afternoon. The predicted showers didn’t materialise until after we had tied up at eight o’clock. Our trip to Springwood Haven left us about an hour and a half away from Atherstone.

Saturday 4th July

The day dawned bright and sunny and we timed our run to Atherstone in such a way that we were able to get a mooring above the top lock. We were wandering around the shops on the main street by eleven o’clock when we decided to have lunch in the central glass covered area in the Red Lion Hotel. A couple of hours later and we made our way back to the boat, ready for the next leg of the journey. We had to turn round of course and we saw just how busy the locks were, with a queue of craft waiting to descend through the flight. We hadn’t made any hard and fast plans but we had an idea that we would head back to Hartshill and then visit Nuneaton on Sunday. In the event we carried on to Nuneaton anyway and moored near the site of the old football ground. Unlike Atherstone, the canal is not that close to the town centre, which is a bit of a shame but we made the fifteen minute walk in the late afternoon sunshine anyway. We did no more than have a look around before returning to the boat and soon we were underway again, pleased that we had stopped and promising to visit again. For the record, we have now driven to Nuneaton (10 minutes), walked to Nuneaton (1 hour) and travelled by boat (3 hours). By the time we reached Marston junction we had decided to head for home and use Sunday to catch up on some work around the house and garden. We made it home for eight o’clock, amazed at how much we had packed in to twenty eight hours.