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squiz Member Member#: 6644 Location: Registered: 27-05-2007 Diary Entries: 3688 |
30th May 2018 Mt. Biking: Claydon Middle Lock to Banbury Wind Direction: Wind Stength: Surf / Sea State: Air Temperature: Sea Temperature: Weather: cloudy and wet :( Max Speed: 10.86 (knots - unless stated otherwise) Distance Covered: 17 miles (Nautical Miles - unless stated otherwise) Friday 25th May Down at Rob’s to enjoy Arlo’s first birthday weekend. Rob at work and on swimming training today so Hannah went to Tesco and Mag was thrilled to look after Arlo and I started the decking – amazingly getting the whole frame done today! The rest of the family – Marilyn, Elaine, Martin, Mick, Pauline and Dan and Jay arrived throughout the day and Dan said that he thought I wouldn’t settle until I had finished it so we went into Horsham and got all the decking wood from Travis Perkins and screws from Homebase ready for tomorrow. Glorious weather. Everyone including Rob, Hannah and Arlo set up home in Bramley dorm for the weekend. We are staying in the van but joining in everything else. Pauline brought Spag bol for tea. Dan drove back to Felixstowe ready to go to Comicon with Ben in London tomorrow Saturday 26th May (39th Wedding Anniversary) I continued the project by starting the decking after breakfast and then when it got to a good place to stop went and joined the others including Emma (who arrived earlier and went straight to sleep as up at 4 with the horses), on the new high ropes course for some great fun!! It was a real laugh and some of it is really tough!! Rob supervised and Mag, Pauline and Hannah watched. Mag and Jay took me to see the bird hide (where Rob had put some food out to encourage the birds and squirrels!) and to an old hollow tree with a woodpecker nest in it. Then it was the birthday BBQ out on the field where the round house is. Great BBQ and chocolate rocky road cake as Arlo is allergic to egg so can’t have a normal cake until his allergy test next month. Sunday 27th May The decking is finished!! I got on with it first thing before it got too hot (very hot and humid all weekend!) Rob came and helped do the screwing down. We put 4 more wheelbarrows of wood chip down to finish the job and it looks amazing :) Emma had to leave as she has work at 4 tomorrow morning! Had a doze and went for another walk to the hide and woodpecker tree. Dan and Ben arrived at around 5.30 they went for a long walk with Jay and took the bat boxes out later too. We had a picky tea and Eton mess. Arlo opened his duck pond present from Dan and Jay – very exciting! Monday 28th May Helped to clear the dorms as everyone but us left today then after lunch we all watched Arlo play with his duck pond in the intense heat of the very sunny back garden!! He also opened our presents this morning. Dan Jay and Ben went home and we took Arlo for a long walk around the Sayers Croft site, the nature reserve and back through the village. We kept him for the afternoon in the van and he had great fun and wasn’t a minute’s bother :) What a great little fella he is. We went into the house and had some tea, bathed Arlo and put him to bed. I even did the washing up!! Then we left them after saying our goodbyes so that they can enjoy his real birthday tomorrow on their own :) We stayed in the van in the car park again Tuesday 29th May We left Sayers croft and went to Horsham to take the spare box of screws back to Homebase and visit Tesco for a top up then stopped at Box hill for our lunch on a pretty miserable day!! Then the dreaded M25 in torrential rain with lots of hold ups. Made our way up the M40 to Claydon, a small village on the Oxford Canal just outside Banbury where we were able to park for the night with the intention of biking tomorrow:) Was dry but now raining. Birthday boy spent the day at the beach :) Wednesday 30th May – Bike **** Claydon Middle Lock to Banbury – cloudy and wet :( Good night by the Oxford Canal in a small carpark used by the narrow boat owners near the Claydon Middle Lock. It rained a lot in the night but it was supposed to clear by midday so we were hoping to bike along the canal tow path to Banbury. The rain was slow to clear so had a relaxing lay-in and breakfast as the rained eased, Mag packed a picnic and rang our old friend Mary in Felixstowe while I got the bikes ready. We set off at 11.30 along the narrow tow path which was alarmingly close to the water but only really muddy in patches. It was very overgrown and you had to concentrate otherwise you would end up in the drink! We were soon very wet – mainly from the soaking wet cow parsley - but enjoying it non the less despite the fine rain. There was lots of lock action as there are a lot of holiday rental boats out with it being half term. Some were friendly while others wouldn’t even look at you! There are a lot of ‘River Gypsies’ moored along this stretch who seem to let both themselves and their boats go to seed, its never pleasing to see rusty, grubby old narrow boats covered in junk, it is the same all over the canal system! We soon came to the large marina and pretty village of Cropredy. Passing the odd fisherman, walker and cyclist and with lots of ducks with young - including a mother with nine ducklings in a ball fast asleep on the bank. The geese were not so friendly grumpily hissing as we passed! We passed under the noisy M40 and the canal meandered into Banbury. Once again, we were totally underwhelmed by our final destination:( Passing the usual business areas, a nice park and then the centre which was just an ugly modern Castle Quay shopping centre:( We continued through but things didn’t improve so we took to the roads in search of the Banbury Cross of nursery rhyme fame! There is a pedestrian only centre with the odd old building but nothing special and then we spotted a sign to the cross which is oddly a stone tower in the middle of a busy round-about. We risked life and limb crossing to have a look! The best thing was a large statue of the ‘Fine Lady on a White Horse’ (well dark metal actually) and yes, she did have rings on her fingers and bells on her toes! I had a quick look in St Mary’s church, seen better! That was enough culture for one day so we headed back to the canal past the usual numerous betting, phone, second-hand and coffee shops. It was too tacky to stop in the centre by the canal with its sad roundabout so went and had our picnic in the park with four Magpies:) Then all we had to do was bike the 7 miles back along the slippery towpath, Mag was nervous (especially as she had had a dream that she ended up in the canal after our last canal cycle ride!) so went slow and it was me that nearly went in - twice! It was still a great, fun, adventure even if the weather was foul and the turning point average! We arrived back at the van soaked to the skin and covered in mud after being out 3 hours 50 minutes covering 17 wet miles! Bikes were soon tied on, legs cleaned of mud and the kettle on. Who knows what tomorrow will bring with Stratford-upon-Avon and Warwick just up the road:) Let’s hope the weather improves too! Photo Gallery Here |
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