More bloggers, water points and pubs

Ten Bob Note with Ernie and Archie aboard were just behind us at Newbold. More bloggers. We spoke on Saturday morning and again in the evening. I'd never seen a picture of Ernie as he does all the photography for his blog but Archie takes no part in this activity. There's always lots of pictures of Archie though.

Ernie mentions on this blog the new water point at Newbold but misses out the most important aspect of it's location. It is adjacent to one of those stile type things that are supposed to keep motorbikes off the towpath. The use of this tap ensures that there is a constant puddle around this stile because of the way the stile funnels pedestrians through. This area will perpetually be muddy as there is also no drainage. The usual muddy thinking at BW. It looks like the location has been changed before as there is another channel dug through the Barley Mow property (I'd be having words with BW if they did the filling in of the trench to that standard on my property) through the hedge that was in an even worse location just after the bridge 'ole. I vaguely remember reading on another blog about this work. The box is made of plastic and one good kick will have it smashed.

We were in The Boat pub on Thursday night. The Boat is the little known pub beside the popular Barley Mow at Newbold. We decided to give it a try as it's newly opened and the Barley Mow tends to be much busier than we normally enjoy. Anyway it's always good to try a new pub. Someone I was talking to had a bad experience with the Barley Mow on the Friday night as it was full of drunken local yobs. Maybe it's become a victim of it's own success. Anyway, The Boat was a very pleasant experience and they're currently being inspected in order to do food in the future. One to watch.

Talking of pubs, we visited the Raglan Arms in Rugby which is local CAMRA's Pub of the Year. Brilliant pint and good atmosphere only slightly spoiled by the large video screen and the rugby match (in Rugby). It's just a shame it's not by the canal.

Today I moved the boat down to Ansty when Lisa went to work. A pleasant day that started very cold. As I was approaching Bricklow Marina (more later) I eyed a boat that I recognised. It was Ralph who I know from our time on the Ashby Canal who plays the accordian. His winter mooring was up over the weekend and he was heading up to Market Harborough for a jolly. By the time we get on the Ashby he'll be back there again (maybe). Ralph's got a life and doesn't blog nor even use the interweb from his boat so he'll never read this.

We had visited Brinkl0w Marina over the weekend with a view to mooring there when we have to put Pickles into a marina over the summer. It's very different to Hinckley where we were last summer (and Lisa wasn't altogether happy) but Lisa says that she would be quite content at Brinklow and liked the feel of the place so we'll find out if we can get a mooring. We walked passed Andy Edwards' (from nbKhayamanzi) model train trailer which seemed like the centre of all activity at the marina. You know what these train spotters are like, so we didn't poke our nose in.

I also passed Brian and Diana (I'm writing this as if I know them. I've never met them before) on nbHansar who are also bloggers. Well I presume it was them. It could just as easily have been another couple who had stolen their boat since Hansar's last blog entry. I shouted that I think I read their blog and they said that they read mine. Who'd have thought it. Narrowboat bloggers reading each others blogs and feeding each others egos.