Kahloo kullay...after 11 days marooned in Oxford, running perilously close to running out of water and diesel, we are finally cruising again!
The current is still fairly strong...but no crazy stuff like the day we came down the Sheepwash Channel. So we're making fairly good time. Huzzah! (Dave had seen a duck paddling for all it was worth while staying in the same spot...so today the current is slower than a duck ).

Oxford is pretty as a picture from the water...Christchurch meadows and Folly Bridge...just lovely.
A glorious stretch of canal....urban and quite magnificent. Dave did well to avoid the rowers below the City. Gorgeous Iffley lock, balustrated bridge and white pub...like a postcard. After this the canal keeps its distance from the town and is gradually surrounded by field and farmland.

The only place where we could get water and diesel was Abingdon. Now Abingdon is gorgeous, postcard pretty. However I was more excited about getting water...3 days without a shower makes me very cranky. There's a wee shop at the services there...time for a very cold drink...Aussie mates will be astounded, 27 degrees and blue skies...just the ticket.

Down the Thames we go, passing mute swans, gray geese, and teal ducks, through culhams cut to the next lock. A word about Thames locks...wide and deep...equipped with lock keepers! No more windlass for me! Even when they are unattended these locks are push button operated. We stay onboard and gossip with the lock keepers...(yes we did sing "well met again lock keepers"), find out what the river is like further down, and talk about the weather...this is England chaps.

We cruised gently through the countryside and saw our first real manors on the water. Large homes with enormous backyards that gently slope down to the river. Boathouse and manicured lawn party for the course. My my my...how the wealthy people live. PFTT! Richer are we, each other and Augusta and the whole world is our oyster.

However speaking of wealth...our 8 days cruise is now into it's third week, and the money is leaking out of our pockets at an alarming rate. Between generator and petrol, a rental car for one day, paying for bike hire, and the only supermarket close enough to ride to, was a Waitrose...people go to Waitrose for the experience, darling...well most things are quite expensive, yummy, but expensive. Oxford is not cheap. Sigh. Budget wise, Dave was going to be a week without pay...now...he has worked 2 or 3 days each week that we have been stranded...but oh dear, "poverty knock ". Beans on toast for us for a week or so. Just lucky we have a well stocked pantry.

We had started early in the morning today, so a reasonably early stop. Very pretty spot at Shillingford, outside a pub. Happy we are, mooring on the Thames can be a tricky thing. Lots of private moorings, lots of nowhere to put a pin in the bank, and lots of...that'll be 10 pounds for the night. Shillingford pub makes us pay for the mooring, however if you spend 20 pounds in the pub the mooring is free....oh and it has mains electricity! Woohoo! So dinner and a drink for us tonight.

Names that make me giggle...Little Wittington...New Hinksey....imagine Rowan Atkinson saying that 😂

Boat name today was...Shippish...with a few bashful sheep illustrations.

Cheers lovely people.