10-12 July St Ives to Huntingdon and on to below St Neots lock

Monday 10 July 2017 Back to Annie at St Ives

We have had an interesting long weekend with old friends: Liana has been in Leicester partly, with university friends Marise and Fran, staying with our daughters, while John's school friend David Holehouse and Joanie have stayed at our home while visiting old friends and old haunts on a retirement trip from Canada. This included Sam Howard, who welded yet another bracket for Annie, this time one that supports the (unused) bow thruster pump itself. It's such a heavy affair, the strain on thick steel causes fatigue fractures! Sam added an extra strengthening piece, so hopefully this should improve things. John collected 20L (the minimum amount!) of Morris Narrowboat Oil from E-Quip, our excellent local firm.

After lunch with Liana's mum, Flo, in Nottingham, we arrived via A52, A1 and A14 in St Ives precisely as predicted by Sat Nav. Huntingdon, St Ives and Cambridge are all close to the A14, and are linked by the guided bus. St Ives Marina has friendly staff and a good chandlers, and charged a reasonable £55 for a week's mooring.

Tuesday 11 July

St Ives bridge and Riverside

After settling up and checking the boat, we paused at lovely St Ives Riverside to shop and have good Fish and Chips at the welcoming Turkish owner's Local Fish Shop near the river. We then suffered pouring rain, so we moored the short distance away at beautiful Hemingford Grey.

Liana at Hemingford Lock in the rain

NB Scarpa Wash nound

At Hemingford Lock we met NB Scarpa, and were able to advise them about their proposed trip across the Wash and up the River Witham.

The rain really had settled in for the night, as forecast, so we watched Wimbledon: Johanna Konta just beat Miss Halep in a thrilling, hard fought match, the first Brit into the semi-finals since Virginia Wade in 1977 (won) and 1978 (lost).

Wednesday 12 July

friendly cows at Hemingford GOBA mooring

Liana at Houghton Lock

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Leaving cows and boats at Hemingford meadow, we soon passed Houghton Lock again, helped by a friendly family in their motorboat. The sun shone, increasingly. There is a busy asphalt path past the lock joining Houghton with the Hemingfords across Houghton Meadow, used by walkers and cyclists.

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Houghton Meadow with path across it

Daylock Marine Services

entrance to large Hartford Marina

Annie passed Daylock Marine Services and the more scenic Hartford Marina. Apparently, the poet William Cowper loved Hartford church.

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Hartford Church, loved by the poet William Cowper

Huntingdon mooring by bridge

Huntingdon Bridge

We moored below Huntingdon bridge and explored the town.

We moored below Huntingdon bridge and explored the pleasant small town. The small market had stalls we had seen in St Ives. We had tea in the church, where stalls were selling in aid of RNIB.

Passing through Godmanchester lock, we moved west to Brampton mill, where there are ok pasture GOBA moorings. A mile above Brampton Lock we passed poor rough GOBA moorings. EA and GOBA moorings below Offord Lock were non-existent! Brambles prevailed. We finsished up going another five miles past poor GOBA moorings at Little Paxton, and had to moor at the end of the lock landing at St Neots lock quite late, about 7 PM. So much for GOBA. A strimmer would work wonders at their moorings.