We thought that the Wendover Arm was narrow, but the Aylesbury Arm was in one stretch so narrowed with reeds that it didn’t look passable, but we squeezed through as if on the ‘African Queen’. It is a lovely canal and the sixteen locks were no hardship. The first two are in a staircase formation, where the middle gate becomes the top gate of the next lock, they are all narrow with double gates at the bottom, however, many have to be left empty because of leaking lock walls so this does mean that these locks have always have to be filled first.
The final entrance into Aylesbury is preceded by a Tesco supermarket and although the basin seemed full of permanently moored boats I was given a warm welcome from Nigel and his wife, from the Aylesbury Canal Society’s Welcome Boat and directed to a mooring, Nigel gave me a local map and recent newsletters, which brought me up to speed on their history and current situation.
TV reception was a no go because of the offices and the building of the new and impressive Waterside Theatre, but our internet reception was exceptional and Jacquie was able to watch the first days tennis at Wimbledon, live on the computer. However we were offered a cable link into the Associations hard wired aerial circuit should we have needed it.
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