Tuesday 31st July in Bradford-upon-Avon
Overnight showers gave way to a fresh, bright morning as we let go and started off towards Bradford-upon-Avon.
Farewell to the lovely City of Bath. As often seems to be the case, we leave a place wishing we had another day or two to spend there.
At Bathampton, we topped up with water and had hoped to visit the café boat in which we had sheltered from a thunder storm and enjoyed greatly in 2012 - but sadly the lady was only just beginning to set up and wasn't going to open until later, so we moved on.
This really is a lovely stretch of canal, following the valley of the Avon river. Beautiful wooded surroundings high above the river valley.
The Dundas Aqueduct, which spans the River Avon, is much admired but its wonderful architecture is best viewed from below, being on the canal doesn't give its best aspect. What we did see as we crossed it was what appeared to be a double bass on legs walking the other way!
On the left of the picture above is the entrance to the old Somerset Coal Canal, now limited to a short stretch used for private moorings.
This Kingsground narrowboat lives here and we saw it when we passed this way before. It is one of Kingsground's earlier boats and it is still looking good.
It is moored outside the owner's house and M thinks that this would be quite an acceptable location to live, very secluded and with MM moored outside? The house isn't bad either.....
A little further on we both did a double take when we saw this "lady" lounging beside the canal under her umbrella.
The canal sides are quite high along this stretch but several "duckling staircases" are thoughtfully provided so that the smaller ducklings can get out of the water.
The second famous, and much admired, aqueduct on this stretch is Avoncliffe. Like Dundas, the canal view does not do it justice; it is best viewed from beneath.
Like Bath, Bradford-upon-Avon is always very popular for moorings. A situation that was not helped by the fact that there had been a waterborne trader fair at the weekend and all the traders were still moored up. However, we were very lucky to squeeze into a rather oddly shaped mooring just before the lock moorings.
Our reward was a visit to the Bridge Tea Room in the middle of the town. A very quaint Victorian tea room. In 2012, M had what she always said was the best sandwich EVER. Today, she tried it again and was not disappointed!
We dropped into the station to get M's ticket home tomorrow but the ticket office was closed. On the way out, we saw a very imaginative use for some old jeans and boots.
Bradford-upon-Avon has a beautifully preserved 14th century tithe barn with its original cruck roof and 100 tons of stone tiles.
Tomorrow, M has to go home and on Thursday R will put MM into the local marina and follow her as we will both be home at the weekend to celebrate Mick's 70th birthday. Back on Monday!
Today: 9 miles, 0 locks and 3.7 hours.
Trip: 185 miles, 78 locks and 110.3 hours.
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