Weekend in Atherstone

Just in case anyone thinks it is summer....
Barneys early morning walk....3 layers of clothes for me!!

Another gentle day with no locks so plenty of time for me to sit up front in the cratch watching the world go by.....also reading my book.....have now wound down and managing to get through several books.

En route to Atherstone we passed this poor specimen.

Not only was it sunken but it's rear end had come adrift and careful navigation was required to get past!.  It had been tied up with BW's (sorry CRT's) normal thin bits of string.   BW obviously handed rolls of the stuff over to CRT!!

At Atherstone we managed to find room at the top of the locks in exactly the same place we had moored last year.   Reading my Blog from last year I see we were very wary here as this was where Pistonbroke had their lines cut.   However we did not have any trouble and so far (Sunday afternoon) we have been fine.
Geoff did his normal explore of the town to check out time of Church Services and also pubs for Sunday lunch.   Early evening we walked down to the Kings Head Pub at the bottom of the first 5 locks as we fancied a canalside hostelry.   However it was not our cup of tea!!  So we decided we would visit the Red Lion in town where we had eaten before.

The other canalside pub was a non starter!!

It was a chilly walk to church and it was even chillier inside the church although we had a friendly welcome.

By the time we came out the sun was trying to make it's presence felt.

Later it was back to town for a very reasonable Sunday Carvery in the red Lion Hotel.

It is an old Coaching Inn......

....as the sign opposite bears witness.

Total distance:8.11 miles 
Elapsed time:3h9m45s 
Locks:0
Bridges:33 
Average speed:2.57 mph (2.57 lock/mph)