Problems never come one at a time……!

Some of the PIN numbers on the 3 top-up voucher purchased from the Morrison’s supermarket in Nantwich were illegible.  After various unsuccessful guesses and the use of a magnifying glass I gave up.  Jan didn’t want to lose the £15 so this morning we walked back into Market Drayton with Margaret and visited the local Morrison’s.  Jan headed to the Customer Service Desk leaving me free to race around the isles with a basket throwing in everything that’s expensive, tastes nice, but which is bad for you!  By the time she had the PIN sorted I’d filled the basket.
After walking back to Waiouru we ripped the pins from the ground and headed south.  There was a queue at the bottom of the Tyrley Flight of five locks with the lower gates refusing to shut.  Eventually the problem was rectified and we worked up the locks with Peter and I doing the technical stuff whilst Jan and Margaret provided the brawn! Shortly after the locks there is a long and very narrow straight through a granite cutting.  Not the place to met a boat coming in the opposite direction….. But of course we did!  I was accused of cheating by the opposing boater when I used the “girlie button” to extract myself from a difficult position.  He should see me play cards!

There are also a couple of very high bridges that span the cutting.

Peter & Margaret lead the way on Kelly-Louise

A runner was coming towards us along the very muddy and slippery towpath wearing his birthday suit and a pair of Tony Abbott’s “budgie smugglers”!  As he got closer we could also see he had writing on his torso.  Something about running 200 miles……?

Actually Jan thinks they a ‘Y’ fronts he’s wearing!
{Later..... Jan Swatridge of QISMA has sent me an email with the following link <here> to "Robin's Run which is a fund raising event based on running 200 miles in memory of Robin Gibbs of the Bee Gees}

We stopped on the 48 hour moorings at Goldstone Wharf for a late lunch before pressing on towards Anchor Bridge.  At Knighton we passed the old Cadbury’s Wharf where imported raw chocolate was delivered by narrowboat and processed to form chocolate crumble which was then taken to the factory at Bournville for final processing.

We both remembered the wharf from our Four Counties Ring trip in 2003.

Looking back as Kelly-Louise passes the wharf.
Travelling at speed past moored boats can result in missing the bend and running aground.  I wonder if this is what happened on this occasion?

There was quite a long line of long term linear moored boats around bridge 44 and 43.

However the scene was rather picturesque!
Oh, the second problem.  Despite me giving our address as NB Waiouru on the visa application form, along with a letter explaining we live on a boat and any contact must be by either phone or email, both the UKBA and Home Office have sent me letters but to the address of the sweet, elderly lady who so kindly let me use her post code to book my “Life in the UK Test”.  She lives near Heathrow and I now have 13 days to get the letters and arrange for the collection of my biometric data.  Damn, damn, damn!