Day Forty-Two - Marston Doles to Napton on the Hill

This was our last full day on the boat and the BBC weather forecast was very accurate when it said it was going to be “a filthy day“. It rained most of the day with blustery winds. We had our last nine locks to do and decided to get them out of the way early, moor the boat and bunker down near the Wigram Marina for the remainder of the day.
All the locks needed filling as we went down them to Napton on Hill. On the third lock we could see the gate paddles were up and the lock was full ready for us to enter. We then passed a moored boat which was about to leave and they had set up the locks for themselves. Unfortunately, we had to take their set lock. He did not look happy! We made amends as over the seven locks comprising the Napton Locks I was able to set up at least four of the locks for them as they came down behind us. They waved to us so we guess they were happy with the outcome. We would hate to be branded as pushy Aussies!
We arrived at a mooring near the pub called “The Folly” about eleven o’clock and I was looking forward to a pub lunch. When we ventured out in dry clothes and brollies at noon we found that the pub was no longer operating which turned out to be our folly! We bought some lunch supplies from the nearby canal shop and had lunch on the boat instead. We then had a restful afternoon listening to BBC classical radio and reading.
At six o’clock we set out to walk twenty minutes along the tow path to The Bridge Inn for dinner. The rain had eased to a slight drizzle and the path was muddy and slippery, The Bridge Inn was a great pub to go to for our last night on the canal boat. We had a lovely meal of slow roasted rolled pork with apples. When we ventured out of the pub at eight o’clock it was getting dark and we decided to try a different route back along a road using Henk’s GPS. Unfortunately, when we got to the end of the road there was a fence across it and we couldn’t get through. We had to retrace our route and ended back at the hotel some twenty-five minutes later. There was no way around it. We had to walk on the tow path in the dark. Henk had his wind-up torch but it was a slow process. We were pleased to finally make it back to the boat.
Photos: No photos - the weather was too bad.