We’re never that bothered about “seeing the New Year in” and this year was no exception. We turned in at about 11pm last night and didn’t stir until 7am this morning. After a late breakfast, we got the walking boots on and took a walk along the towpath to inspect the state of the ice. I also sent a round robin email to other moorers at Bosworth marina to check on the ice there too. We had a good walk and used the time to make some “Happy New Year” calls since there was no mobile service on board Caxton. On returning to the boat, I read replies from Ned, Jane and Trevor who all reported that the marina was free from ice.
Well it was two o’clock and we had stayed 22 hours on a one hour mooring so with no excuse to overstay any longer, we untied and set off for Market Bosworth. We had seen a few boats on the move so despite the fact that there were still sheets of ice floating around, we were confident that our trip home would take less than ninety minutes. The journey was easy despite it being a blustery one. Our entry into the marina was difficult with the wind blowing left to right. We traversed the open space at full speed with Caxton leaning at about twenty degrees from normal but soon our home berth was visible. With a bit of judicious work of the throttle and bow thruster, we were soon at ninety degrees to the wind which nullified its effect, allowing us to glide alongside our pontoon and tie up.
So that was that, our Christmas cruise was over, although we intend to remain on board until Sunday before returning home prior to me going back to work on Monday.