Crofton to Great Bedwyn or How Anne Helps John To Get His Leg Over !!

Firstly..... the title was John's idea

Crofton Pumping station taken from surrounding hills

Crofton to Great Bedwyn is a very pleasant run with the locks evenly spaced. We were starting to get into a routine. I tried to arrive first to set the locks, Vinnie would join me either cycling the towpath or getting a lift on John's boat. I was managing to overcome my fears of vertical ladders and heights and climbing off and on the boat in the locks.

 Some more interesting boats on the way.

We stopped at the wharf in Great Bedwyn for water and John had discovered that he had a problem with his onboard generator again. On the way down we had heard that lock 84 at Newbury would be closed for 5 days so there seemed to be little rush. We were getting used to delays by now. John spent some time diagnosing the problem and found that the system needed to be reset. So with that fixed it was too late to set off for the next good mooring so we decided to stay in Great Bedwyn. Another lovely village with 2 good pubs!

Great Bedwyn is a village with a long history. There is evidence of Neolithic settlement nearby: the Celts, Romans and Saxons were here; and the village is mentioned in the Domesday Book. Great Bedwyn became an important mediaeval market town for the Savernake area, and once had two members of parliament - a real rotten borough. This importance of the status of Great Bedwyn was reflected in the buildings of the village, e.g. the large church, the former Town Hall, the school – and Great Bedwyn continues to thrive as a working and residential large village.  The Stonemason's Museum.   Lloyd's stonemason's yard was established in 1790, and (among many other activities) was involved in the construction of the canal. It closed down in 2009 and all the carved stones were auctioned off. People from the village bought them to preserve the memory and apparently they can be found in gardens throughout the village. There are several on the front of the post office     An impressive church but sadly not enough bellringers to ring the next morning  ( Sunday) But we did have a good meal in the Cross Keys Pub where we met a lovely couple away for the weekend on their working boat  There were many lovely houses in this village but this one intrigued me. Castle Cottage is one of Great Bedwyn's oldest buildings. It has a Norman chimney (and fireplace within), but its origins remain a mystery. A blue plaque shows that In 1621 Castle Cottage was the birthplace of the celebrated physician Thomas Willis, known as 'the father of neurology'.     This boat also was fascinating with its lawn on the roof ! Next day we set off for Kintbury via Hungerford. It was a very picturesque part of the canal but with work being done on it by the CRT (apparently to upgrade it to a cruising canal) most of the mooring spots were occupied by working boats. Being Sunday, they weren't working but making it difficult for Vinnie to get on and off  John's boat. We were being followed by Steve, travelling alone on his widebeam. Despite access problems for Vinnie our lock routine was going well. At lock 73, I had set the lock with Vinnie and I was walking back to my boat with Tara, John was entering the lock on his boat. As I approached my boat, I saw Steve waving at me as he approached the lock. Sensing something was amiss I turned to see John in the water, hanging onto the port-side stern of his boat, which was now going backwards ! I dropped Tara's lead and ran back to the lock. I could see that if I didn't get onto John's boat quickly I would miss the chance to do so from the side of the lock. Fortunately he was closest to my bank and I was able to grab his top rail and jump on. Once I was on the boat, John said to grab his leg and he would pull himself back on. Meanwhile his boat had reversed into mine and another man was able to assist by jumping from the front of my boat onto John's Hence the title of this post as I had to help John to get his leg over.... the back of the boat of course!!! And despite having my camera on my person I missed a wonderful photo opportunity - sorry. And he refused a repeat performance, which I guess is fair enough. So 2 locks later and in Hungerford, John was able to shower, change and grab a well deserved whiskey ( I had one too ) He is now fully recovered and back to his old (dry)self.  There were an awful lot of 'what if's' that we have discussed since, that could have meant a different outcome to this incident. But fortunately all is well.