The Floating Farm Shop

We left Banbury at the usual hour and had the first half hour to ourselves.  However, from Grants Lock onwards we faced a steady stream of hire boats working uphill.  At each lock we seemed to be just out of synch. so we would arrive to find the lock just draining for the upcoming boat.  At Nell Bridge Lock there was even a queue of three boats waiting to come up.  All the time there was no boat ahead of us until Lower Heyford when one pulled out just in front.   That slowed us down of course.  At Kirtlington we stopped at and Pat fell in love with the waterbased farm shop abord the boat Pan.   There was no cream available as the proprietor was "waiting for it to settle".   We did get some home made mayonnaise, though, and cake.   The river section level indicator was just touching orange and we shot down that bit.  Just round the corner after Shipton Weir Lock we came to a lifting bridge.  Pat got off to lift it but wasn't heavy enough.  We swapped roles and I had to sort of haul myself up the chain to get it to lift.  How a single hander could cope with this I do not know.  At Thrupp (our intended overnight point) we came to the 1 1/4 mile long wall of moored boats, most on "permit only" moorings.  There is very little room for passing trade and none for us although Pat reckoned that the boat we were following after Lower Heyford was there.    We had to go on to Kidlington and have moored up on the piling just before Roundham Lock.  Quiet enough apart from the railway with its regular freight trains all night.