9th May. Day 7. Leicester Ring. Castle Green Moorings to near Loughborough

Castle Green Moorings ducklings

Daisy fell in.

Sileby lock and Weir.

Quite an exciting day in canal terms. We awoke to no rain and a lovely morning. The weather forcast was light then heavy rain later so we decided to get an early and stop if we got too wet.

We left the Castle Green Mooring at 8.00. The canal follows a winding path with several weirs for the unwary. The first lock (42) was very slow to empty and a single handed boater (David) caught us up. We'd asked his advise in Kilby Bridge and he was on the moorings with us last night. We did the locks until Birstall (45) with him.

At Limekiln Lock (43) Daisy dog possibly tried to follow Rachel across the lock gate. Whatever she did she rapidly ended up in the mouth of lock swimming round in circles until Rachel pulled her out. After that she didn't want to jump on or off the boat unless the gap was less than 6 inches.

Once you get to Birstall its remarkably rural again. We overtook and were then followed by a group of teenage girls with an instructor in canadian canoes. The wind was getting up and I managed to run aground on one corner and needed a little help from Rachel with a pole to get us off. 

As we approached Cossington Lock (48) the wind really got up and I was heading straight into it. Rachel's bike lifted up on the matting we are using to protect the roof and only avoided blowing into the canal because its padlocked to the rail. We managed to get it temporarily sorted but as soon as we were moored up before the lock I strapped both bikes down with straps I'd brought but not used.

At the bottom of Sileby lock (49) a weir runs in on the right and there is a boatyard with moored boats after this on the right. My attempt to moor up on the left was messed up by the wind blowing  my bow off and I very nearly managed to get the boat stuck with the bow in a moored boat and my stern across the canal in the bank. I gave Rachel a stern rope and I jumped onto the bank with the middle rope and pulled it in and got control. We stopped for lunch once we'd moored were it was at 13.00.

Set off again at 14.00. The rest of the afternoon was far less eventful, the wind dropped a bit and never did rain properly. It drizzled a bit for a few minutes while we filled the tank with water between 15.00 and 15.30 just before bridge 28 at Barrow upon Sour. 

We moored for the night just after bridge 34 within walking distance of Loughborough but still rural feeling at 17.00

13.5 miles and 10 locks = 23.5 lock miles