I have been working very hard for my new employers, Skylark Creative who are based in London. The work is great and I am loving all the challenges that are coming my way. It’s all software development and I am using the latest stuff to get the job done – so what’s not to like. Anyway, we ran into a bit of a crunch project recently which meant a lot of late nights (well, early mornings really) – so it has been great timing that I have a holiday for a couple of weeks. And what could be better that sailing round the four counties on my boat – especially as the pubs are open.
Damara, my daughter is coming with us so that will add a new dynamic and definitely help with the locks! We will be setting off from Stone, where Arty is perminently moored and heading south towards Great Haywood. From there we will turn down the Staffy and stop the night in Tixall wide, which is one of our favourite spots.
From Tixall we plan to go to Penkridge, a lovely town right on the canal where we will pick up some provisions and probably visit one of it’s many pubs.
From Penkridge, we will head on down through the cutout, which is a very narrow cutting though some granite rock which was carved by the navies using nothing more than pick axes and shovels. Only one boat can go through at a time as there is nowhere to pass. Hopefully we won’t run into too much traffic coming in the opposite direction.
There is a lovely pub just before you get to the cutting where Wendy and I had a really good meal just as the last lockdown began to ease – so we plan to go there again.
Finally, once through the cutting we will turn off onto the Shroppy and start to head north west back up. There are lots of places along here we want to visit again as the last time we were here I had real problems walking with some very sore feet – hopefully they will be all right this time around.
Artful Dodger 