Lockdown Mooring 4 to Nantwich Embankment.

Our Saturday paper is getting thin. It must be half the weight it used to be, no travel section and sport is now in the main body of the paper. The blind date is now virtual with a take away, although the chap this week couldn’t make up his mind whether to eat with his date or flat mates afterwards, he then opted to get a takeaway! She’s better off without him.

In the food section was a Lockdown Larder special. I have a lot of the ingredients needed, but only one recipe really took my fancy, chocolate fudge tart. This requires Hobnob biscuits for the base, none in our larder, you can get gluten free ones, or you used to be able to get them pre lockdown! Too many calories though for not much exercise, I’d prefer a cheese scone anyway, or would I?

Mick logged on to Sainsburys this morning to see a load of Click and Collect slots available for tomorrow. Maybe this would do us till our delivery in ten days time. He secured the slot with the obligatory boxes of wine.

The route to Sainsburys from Hurleston has no pavement along the road, riding a bike is okay, but not pushing one. I’d looked into getting a greengrocer delivery, but there were no slots for the remainder of the month, so that wouldn’t help. Then a plan was formed.

We’d be needing water in the next day or two, so if we cruised into Nantwich to fill the tank then I could visit Holland and Barrett, hopefully stocking up on Brown Rice flour for my sourdough starter and Mick could ride to Sainsburys and push the bike back with a bigger shop along pavements. This would be further than going from our mooring, but safer and preferable to standing in line at Morrisons.

Much of the morning was spent working out menus for the next ten days and what was essential shopping for this period. I had to be careful as items seemed to vanish from our basket every now and again, so I really hope we won’t get two loaves of bread and three bags of parsnips!

With the shopping order done we decided that Tilly would decide when we left for Nantwich. She’d spent most of late morning/early afternoon asleep on the bed and just as we’d decided that we might head into town today she’d woken and headed out! Luckily she returned quite soon, so the doors were locked and we could set off.

She said I needed to stay inside whilst they moved the outside. This is nothing unusual, I prefer it that way. But She told me I had to give my paws a very good clean, She thinks they are filthy and is threatening me with a pedicure. Have to say I quite fancy one of those pedicures where tiny fish come and nibble between your toes. I think the experience would be really rather quite tasty!

As I’ve been sat at a computer for much of the last few days I decided to walk whilst Mick brought Oleanna along. The sun was out and everyone just around the bend at the flag bubble were being busy doing jobs.

It was a pleasant walk, most people kept their distance but there were some exceptions. I’m starting to wonder if children are taught about meters anymore, but then an old chap on a bike almost rubbed shoulders with a lady as they both passed a boat! I’m quite happy to find a wide place to wait for bikes and walkers to come past, but then some people insist on walking two abreast reducing the gap I’d left.

This stretch to Nantwich is becoming really quite familiar now. The green bus looks like there is a drum kit set up on the upper deck and the tractors looked a touch more spread out than before.

I crossed over the bridge to the services which was free and waited for Oleanna to catch up. We disposed of rubbish and refilled the water tank.

Then we pootled across the aqueduct, soon passed another boat who were excited to be heading to the water point for their weekly fill. On down to Marsh Lane Bridge and the winding hole.

Here two swans were enjoying tucking into the extra long grass on the towpath. We turned and headed back across the aqueduct to moor close to the ramp down into town.

Marvelous, time for a couple of hours before curfew! Sorry Tilly, this is Nantwich and Tilly cats don’t go out here! How dull!

After our dinner we sat down to watch Phantom of the Opera. Mick has never seen it and I wanted to have a trip down memory lane and spot the props that I’d made in the past. But it wasn’t to be. For some copyright reason in England it was only available to view for free for 24 hrs! Oh well, I bet the table cloth wasn’t as good as mine! And the candles not as expertly dribbled!

Instead we watched The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. It was an old concert, but with some familiar favourites. We’ve been lucky enough to see them live a couple of times. I suspect we enjoyed them more than we would have enjoyed Phantom.

0 locks, 3.42 miles, 1.8 miles walked, 1 thin newspaper, 11am slot, 4 boxes, 1 veg box enquiry, 1 full water tank, 0 rubbish, 1 embankment mooring for the night, 1 bored energy filled cat, 24hr Phantom, 8 Ukuleles, 1 Anarchy in the Uk