National Wear a Tea Cosy on Your Head Day!

Friday 28th September, 2012 at Theale.
Actually "National Wear your Tea Cosy on your Head Day" was yesterday but, with everything else going on, we decided that it was better to celebrate it today.

We started the day by going back to the K&A Trust Tea Shop for a pair of "Full English" breakfasts. While we were there, we asked them to photograph us wearing our tea cosies.

The railway bridges at Aldermaston are being re-built and there was a group of construction workers from the site having breakfast next to us. They were very amused to hear of the "Wear a Tea Cosy" idea and, to our surprise and delight, joyfully entered into the spirit of the occasion.

By the time that we left, they must all have been convinced that narrowboaters really are barking mad!
Walking back to MM, we met up with Julie and Graham on nb "Aramanda." As you no doubt know, Aramanda was the daughter of Queen Boadicea and the original owner of "Aramanda" had built her to replace her previous boat that had been called "Queen Boadicea", so it had seemed appropriate to name the successor after the daughter.  Graham and Julie keep "Aramanda" at Farncombe on the Wey and Arun, so we talked a while about our various travels. They were interested to see MM, so we invited them to walk down with us and have a look around her.
Soon after, we left to continue our travels in an easterly direction towards Reading - we WILL eventually get there one day......!
One of the locks was very fierce as it filled. The water power was scary - it just shows how careful you have to be in locks.

M also made friends with a cow next to the lock. M said that the cow wanted to know if she could wear a tea cosy too!!

We continued on to Theale, where we moored up and walked into the town.  We were glad we had made the effort, as it has some lovely old buildings.
Today: 3 miles, 4 locks and 4.2 hours.
Trip: 282 miles, 294 locks and 250.3 hours (403.0 total).