Many Meetings: A "Many Meetings" Weekend.

Saturday 26th and Sunday 27th September around Braunston.

A beautiful morning as we made an early start before 7:00am back towards Braunston.

Once more, we were fortunate to find a good mooring in Braunston within a stone's throw of the Gongoozler's narrowboat café. By then it was breakfast time (good planning!) and R walked the few yards to the café to pick up two take-away breakfasts, which came with a personal message from the owner, Avril, who always remembers us.

Nearby Daventry has a Waitrose, where M used to work. M had a discount voucher, so we walked up to Braunston village to wait for the bus which leaves every two hours. This is Braunston in rush hour!

Sixty years ago, Daventry was a sleepy market town, then Birmingham City Council took over and built three huge housing estates as "overspill". Since then, the building hasn't stopped and every time we come back there are more and more houses and even more being built. The bus loops through one estate after another, going round and round in circles so that the 2.5 mile journey took 32 minutes.

M went off to photograph some old memories, starting with Sheaf Street, one of the town centre's original streets.

This is St James' Infant School, where both Adrian and Elle went to school.

Adrian grew up here, before M moved back to Reigate. Scott was Adrian's best friend and M's "second son" and he still lives in Daventry with his family. When he knew that we were in Waitrose, he very kindly picked us up with the shopping and drove us back to Braunston. He and his lovely daughter Amelia stayed on MM for a cuppa and a welcome catch-up.

Later, just as M was about to serve dinner, we ran out of gas on MM. "Not to worry," said R and quickly changed to the second gas bottle. But it turned out that the second bottle was empty too! We think that, having been away from MM for the best part of a year, we had just forgotten to replace the spare bottle. Still, great timing because the supper was just ready. Not so good, of course for M, who couldn't have her first cup of tea in the morning and had to wait until the Gongoozler's Rest opened at 9:00am Sunday morning for a cup of coffee, which, she said, was REALLY welcome by then! But it was a LONG wait, said M.

Scott had very thoughtfully booked Sunday lunch at the nearby, and very well known, canalside pub, the Admiral Nelson. We walked the half mile up the towpath and Scott arrived soon after with his wife Paula and daughter Amelia.

Unfortunately, their son Lachlan was recovering from a cold (he tested negative for Covid 19) and so couldn't make it. It was wonderful to see them again and to have a proper catch up.