Oxford Canal:Bridge 123

I reckoned about 40 minutes to the bottom of the Napton flight.  It turned out to be 50 minutes.  So we were there just before 9:00 am.  I wasn’t expecting a lock keeper to be there and there wasn’t one.  The lock was half full which suggested that I was the first up this morning.  All went as planned so on to the next.   This was empty, so less work!   Generally, on these single locks going up I try to swing one of the gates closed behind me, from the boat.  Usually it works with a little prop wash into the angle to help.  Then chuck a rope up and get up onto the bollard side. The ladder is always that side I find.   Close the remaining mitre gate and tie the boat back to avoid a run for the top gate when opening the top paddles.   (if at the helm I would have nudged the boat up to the top gate and held it there on tickover to avoid this, so no rope needed.)   The next lock was prepared for me by an opposite direction boater and then following on there always seemed to be some opposite direction fortune.   I would now, being at the top of the flight, have wanted to moor-up for lunch, however there are no convenient moorings there and for some distance further on it seems.  The first attempt further on failed because it was on a curve and shallow.  Finally I found a straight bit just past Bridge 123 with enough water at one end.  Normally we reckon to cruise 6 hours before looking for a mooring and have lunch on the fly, but with no active first mate mooring for lunch becomes the norm.   Then we are loathe to move.   Might need to break this custom if we are to get to Banbury with time to linger there and get back home again.   I am not accustomed to organising the catering, so things don’t seem to go as they should.  So I forgot to bring the eggs and also our usual dinner dessert standby, yoghurts.   However we have a food storage cupboard full of “stuff”, mostly in tins, and Pat has a baking cupboard with everything you could possibly need.   So it is possible to find something.   We used a tin of soup about 12 years old, a tin of peaches, a bit younger and some custard.  All this with a ready main meal thrown in.   Worked well.  (We used the Fray Bentos tinned meat pie on the last trip, so need to get another to put in store).