Bath Time

I am boat sitting again while Janis whiles away her time in the Mediterranean. She left last Wednesday and flew to Majorca to crew on a yacht. The owners, friends of hers, invited her to take the boat across to Sardinia with them and she plans to fly back from there.

I tried Skype-ing Janis this morning but the signal was too weak and we had to resort to a telephone call instead. The yacht has just arrived in Sardinia after quite an exciting  forty seven hour passage I believe, being thrown about in a force 6 breeze with a two metre swell threatening them on the beam. She hasn’t booked her flight home yet but she reckons she’ll arrive on Wednesday.

In the meantime the two little ships and I are quietly moored to the south of Bathampton on the way to the ornate Dundas Aqueduct which throws the canal here over and across the River Avon. At this point the waterway follows the contours and is terraced along both sides of the tree covered valley on its meandering way towards Bradford-on-Avon.

 

Bath from Alexandra Park to the south

 

A happy little Chappy

 

I’ve enjoyed a great time here so close to Bath, the ageless city that I love with its now classical white stone architecture that positively sparkles in the Sun. Also my son Alex works here and lives with his wife Catherine and their three year old daughter Penny up on the hill at Combe Down so I have managed to see quite a bit of them, which is a real bonus. On Tuesday last the three of them came aboard and ‘Futurest’ performed her bit by taking us for a trip to the Dundas Aqueduct and back. It began as a beautiful sunshiny day but after a delightful lunch at the little café at the terminus of the Somersetshire Coal Canal branch and then topping up ‘Futurest’ at the waterpoint, black clouds began to build up and umbrellas were needed to get the ship back to her moorings.

 

Balloon and Sky

 

A number of times I have been into Bath to see the sights and for re-victualing purposes at Morrison’s. But having cycled into the city along the busy towpath I’m quite happy actually just to sit on a seat somewhere in the Sun watching the many talented buskers at their work and the thousands of happy tourists that pass by.

 

Crane at Dundas Wharf

 

However time is beginning to run out for us as we have to arrive back in Warwick by the end of October. I know it sounds a long way off but the way we are dawdling along at the moment indicates that we shall have a job to make it before the winter starts. We shall be returning the same way so most things that we consider as worth a visit we have sampled on the way out suggesting (….theoretically at least….) that we should be able to shoot straight through.