A very pleasant surprise

But first the bad news……. Sometime during the last 30 hours the chandlery was broken into and the till stolen.  It appears the thieves used a small rock to smash a window which set off the audible alarm.  They then hid on site waiting to see if there was any response.  I’m rather deaf and didn’t hear the alarm whilst Jan thought she might have heard something.  They then returned and used an even larger rock to break all the glass in the window before entering and stealing the till.  It was all rather pointless as no money is left in it!  Accordingly to Andy it’s not the first time there has been a burglary.  A youth was caught last time and received 20 hours of periodic detention. 

Jan wandered over to the office and asked if there was any mail.  She returned with a small package.  To our surprise and delight it was a dvd from Paul of Waterways Routes.  Apparently Paul supplements his small pension by producing canal maps and dvd’s.  We first met Paul and Christine on their aptly named narrowboat “Waterways Routes” when we were going down the Tardebigge flight of locks whilst they were going up.  Somehow Paul found out my name was Tom Jones and we rated a mention on their blog. 

The dvd contained a copy of the maps of the Kennet & Avon and Drotwich Canals along with a brief note telling us it should get us started on our canal boating adventure.  What a lovely gesture!  Thank you Paul. 

I’ve placed a link to Waterways Routes website on the left of our blog template.  Now I’m looking forward to being able to compare the map data on Paul’s maps with my own on my Google Earth trace.  I anticipate his maps will be more detailed and accurate as he has physically “covered the ground” whilst mine was completed in Australia by looking at Google Earth and “guestimating”.

Another piece of good news is our Garmin Oregon gps was received today after being repaired.  I’ve already reinstalled the modified UK Open Street Map from Talkie Toastie and have planned Sunday’s walk.  When the gps batteries are recharged the route can be downloaded to the gps.