Dot and I got back to Cacho on 19th May, and took 3 days travelling to Warwick. The locks weren't too difficult, but there were plenty of them - about 25 in all, and I'm not sure how many miles to cover.

The weather was mixed rain, wind and sunshine, with the wind being the biggest problem, knocking our relatively lightweight boat about as we entered and left locks. The biggest part of the day seemed to be passing through Leamington Spa - and the parts which the canal passed through were not terribly salubrious; we were later told that with the drug and other problems, Leamington is certainly not a place to moor for the night.

But we had no problems, and saw very few people at all; we passed through the two final uphill locks in Warwick, and found the Saltisford Arm, which we had been told about earlier. What a wonderful place.

We were popped into a comfortable mooring just in front of a "resting" hotel boat, and had a delightful few days in this welcoming town.

Saltisford - gossiping with the neighbours!

The hotel boat was the Leonora, operated by Doug and Clare Petersen, who had a booking cancellation that week, and used the opportunity to have a break, and do their odd jobs. We enjoyed their company very much, and also got around the town, having a terrific day out at Warwick Castle - expensive, we said, but really worth it. We used the break to get up to date with the washing, and to attack the outboard bracket - it wasn't very happy, and I needed the help of the seriously strong Ian, who looks after the site, to lift it up and lower it more securely onto the mounting.

After three days, we decided to make a move, planning to leave at 7.30am on Tuesday the 27th May, but hit an interesting snag - our batteries were flat as a pancake!

Took the lid off the motor, got the manual start working, and we finally left at 9 o'clock, promising ourselves to take more care of the poor things. We covered the 21 locks and one and a half miles of the Hatton flight in 5 hours, and treated ourselves to a big dinner at the Tom o'the Wood pub beside the canal at Rowington, and was it a big dinner or what! "Eat it or climb it," we said.

In one of the pounds, Hatton flight.