Car Shuffle Part Two

There is unlikely to be more information about the next opening of the Northampton Arm before the scheduled review on 6th October. However, there have been suggestions from those close to CaRT that it will not be until the end of October. In any event, opening windows are usually signified at least 10 days ahead so the earliest seems to be mid to late October.

We had planned a short stopover at Northampton Marina if there was an earlier date, just to give us a day or so the build up energy levels for the flight ahead! But that now seems not such a good idea. What is good is the welcome and support that we have had here at White Mills and so our plan now is as follows:

The second part of the car shuffle - collecting the car from Oundle and bringing to White Mills will be done on Tuesday (today) - see below.

We will drive to Rugby and back on Saturday for the WWC meeting and stay over on board for Saturday night.

As Mike's medical appointment is early Monday morning, we will drive home on Sunday but carry in the car all perishables and the usual items for a longer stay at home. We do not expect to come back to the boat until we have a firm date for a transit of the Northampton Arm. On that basis we have paid for a month here at White Mills - at least we can load stuff into the car much more readily than at Northampton.

When we were at Oundle Cruising Club one of the committee members (the Vice Commodore no less) who lives in the town offered to pick us up from the X4 bus stop should that be of help when collecting the car. When planning the public transport part of the shuffle journey it proved difficult to get a taxi from Oundle out to the marina. It may only be a mile but at the moment that is at the outer end of what Mike is able to do. So, Christine decided to ring the Oundle contact and yes, she would delighted to help. So Mike booked a taxi from this marina to the bus stop in Earls Barton. In the end, finding the bus stop and checking the departure times proved much easier than it might have been so there was plenty of time to wait and chat to other passengers, mostly going into Wellingborough for shopping.

The bus arrived as expected and kept almost to time through to Corby. By this stage, Mike was in urgent need of a loo break. Of course, even though he only had to go across the road, the bus had left by the time Mike returned. It is an hourly service from here to Oundle so at least there was time for a coffee. The lift at Oundle was warned of the delay.

The second leg of the bus journey was on time and stayed that way,So, just about two hours after leaving Earls Barton, Mike was on the pavement at Victoria Yard bus stop in Oundle. Very soon after, the lift arrived and Mike was whisked to the Cruising Club. They also kindly opened up so that Mike could use the loo if he wanted before setting off in his car. 

The journey back to White Mills took about 40 minutes and was straight forward - at least following the sat nav made it so, it was a bit of a cross country route. So, from boat back to boat was about 4 and a quarter hours all told.

Meanwhile, Christine had been pretty busy with phone calls, chats with neighbours and cleaning inside the boat.