Kennet and Avon: The Final Push to Bath

An extra day in Devizes and a couple of rescues as we continue our way west on the Kennet and Avon.

We planned to spend just one day in Devizes but with the first lock of 29 just 100 metres away, heavy rain was an extra challenge we didn’t need. We spent most of the day indoors and took a stroll to the pub in the late afternoon. Devizes is a lovely old town with a large market square.

Boaters who have cruised the length of the K & A, I am sure look back at the two miles of canal that is a combination of the Devizes, Caen Hill and Foxhanger locks with contentment. Well, we are half way there, having just completed all 29 locks for the first time. We will do it all again in a week or so! It is rather a strenuous way to fill in four and half hours for so little mileage gain. It's a daunting sight, looking down from the top of the Caen Hill Locks.

We continued on a short way, mooring at Sells Green. Not much at Sells Green, the moorings were reasonable but when the wind blew across the caravan park elsan you knew you were alive. We made sure there was a pub close by for dinner after a big day.

A water fill first thing in the morning and then we were off for the day heading for any spot about three hours outside Bath. A busy day for the cheaper version (free) of Canal and River Rescue. Waiting for two boats to come out of a lock, one did, the other had stalled and wouldn't start. I must admit, with the size of the tree growing out of the stern fender, this boat hadn't moved too far for a long time. Anyway, after several attempts to jump start the engine we opted to tow the boat out of the lock and leaving it in front of the boatyard just forty metres form the lock.

Only a short cruise further on and the canal was blocked by an unmanned boat across the canal. It took quite a bit of maneuvering to get the boat back to the canal side and tied up again, with Kevin from NB Dunslavin on the stern and me on Serafina gently nudging the bow.

We passed through Bradford on Avon, and being such a lovely day there were plenty of gongoozlers at the lock to watch the boats move up and down.

Bradford looks like a nice town, we plan to stop here on the way back to have a look around. Just from the canal there were a few interesting sights. Rachael has already earmarked The Lock Inn for tea.

A little further on, just a short stroll was the ice cream boat, or on such a warm day that seemed to be their main fare. They seemed to be doing quite well with a significant number of tourists walking the tow path.

You get to see a lot of variations on what a canal boat looks like while cruising the Kennet and Avon Canal and this was just another example, just a little further on. Whoever owns this boat cruises in comfort.

We cruised on for around another hour from Bradford, where most of the canal wasn't your usual ragged sides.

The day finished when we moored up on the side of the canal at Limply Stoke positioning ourselves to get into Bath around 11 am and score a mooring above the locks. This site didn't turn out to be the best mooring we have ever had nor the worst but I wouldn't recommend it. We had no internet coverage from Three and no phone either from O2, otherwise I would have posted this blog earlier. Oh, and I didn't mention waking up with the boat listing slightly to starboard.

Thirty minutes cruising further up the canal this morning revealed much better moorings. However, it was around three hours of speed up, slow down to tick over cruising before arriving at our destination of Bath, tying up in the moorings above the lock.