Two awkward patients!

Three grump old men?

We’re both a bit under the weather with a virus. John’s cold seems to have gone to his chest causing him to cough morning, noon & night. I suggested getting out the spare pillows & blankets to make him a nice support to sleep up right to help his cough, but no, he wanted to lie flat. And then there’s me, with such a high fever it caused me to shiver & feel very cold, John said I should remove some of my layers as my temperature was so high, I know I should’ve know better, but I just wrapped up even more until the paracetamol kicked in. However, once the medicine is working we’ve felt pretty good allowing us to move from Berkhamsted to Boxmoor on the outskirts of Hemel Hempstead yesterday. I wasn’t able to do the locks though, finding all the paddle gear much heavier than usual AND to cap it all the locks were set against us and the previous boat hadn’t lowered the bottom paddles or shut the gates!!

Beech roots eroded

 

Berkhamsted Castle

We had a lovely week in Berkhamsted even though there was lots of rain. The dried up River Bulbourne runs parallel to the canal and there used to be cress beds there. Well, the river wasn’t dried up by the time we left, it was flowing. We were just a bit disappointed with the monthly farmers market with just a handful of stalls and we’d braved the snow to go too. We walked up to Ashridge via Berkhamsted Common’s beech woods. We haven’t been to that side of the Ashridge Estate before and started out too late in the afternoon to go to the Duke of Bridgewater’s Monument which is on our usual side of the estate.

 

 

Damp and dismal day

Today we’ve travelled up the Marsworth flight of 9 locks and are moored at Cow Roast over night. It was quite foggy when we left The Red Lion last evening after knitting group, and today has been very damp and dismal, especially along Tring cutting. 

Misty Tring cutting

Last weekend we caught the train up to Heather’s for Nikita’s 8^th birthday, which was her first day back a school after the Christmas break. We took Lance to feed the ducks at Tarleton swing bridge, poor lad thought our boat was there & was very disappointed it wasn’t. Last winter we spent 4 months on that stretch of canal & didn’t see any ice, however, it’s pretty icey at the moment & the ducks were skidding on it.

Birthday fondue

Lance the chocolate face

Prezzies from aunty Sam

Tarleton swing bridge

Icey Tarleton

Last week while we were moored at Marsworth we saw the new lock gates for one of the Seabrook locks floating by on a work boat. Yesterday we strolled around the VERY MUDDY corner to Seabrook lock to watch the men at work down under in the lock chamber. We asked if we could nip through the safety fence to take some photos but sadly the site manager said no. However, we had a lovely chat with the heritage bricklaying expert on site who told us how deep & wide the abutments of the lock chamber are. 

Lock gates approaching

Seabrook lock repairs

Seabrook lock

We had an excellent new years day with lots of visitors. Jon from Leighton Buzzard Brewery, his wife & 3 lads popped in, it was wonderful to cuddle his youngest who was just 3 weeks old, plus Louise & Paul came too.

We have a very busy and exciting few weeks ahead of us now!!!

Lots of long tail tits on our feeder

Muntjack deer