Drakeholes

We had yet again an excellent meal at The Gate - we had to take a late booking at 8 o'clock and even so a table was not immediately free. Not that it worried us as we had all evening and such a long walk home afterwards! At the end we chatted with some of the staff as we were by then the last to leave and sympathised when they said that some customers had complained about slow service! OK, so the manager would have liked to be a bit slicker but they did have 42 covers booked and, with only recently re-opened, a number of new staff still being familiarised with the routine. To us anyway they were very friendly and helpful - one of the chefs even came out to tell us how the braised cabbage had been prepared!

The other part of our plan for mooring at Clarborough was so we could walk to the Morning Worship ate the parish church, about twenty minutes away. We arrived to see a good number of bell ringers in their t-shirt uniforms. Alas, none of them stayed for the actual service and the congregation comprised 9 people plus ourselves and a choir of 7. Overall even we probably reduced the average age quite a bit! The service was competent but nothing to write home about, really. The reader who was leading the service spoke to us beforehand but that was it and at the end people just drifted away.

St John the Baptist, Clarborough Parish Church

The morning generally was damp but little real rain. We set off just after midday as we wanted to get as close to West Stockwith as possible in order to meet the tide tomorrow for transit to Keadby. We made a number of attempts to call the lock keeper yesterday and this morning and by late afternoon we were a bit concerned that we could officially book. We had left voice mail messages but we also needed to let Keadby know our expected arrival time.

Hayton Church

Soon after leaving Clarborough we passed Hayton Church very close to the canal. If we had been able to find out their service times via the internet we might well have gone there at 9:30.

Wondering why the guidebook showed two milestones 34, one either side, we spotted why - the standard new stone placed by the Chesterfield Trust was on the towpath side with, presumably, an much earlier one on the opposite bank.

Clayworth

Progress along the canal is fairly slow but we kept close to our schedule with several de-weeds. A stop at Clayworth was brief, long enough to dispose of rubbish and utilise the sani station.

Along one short stretch there were several large blocks of lilies - fortunately these did not impede progress any more than the rest of the edge vegetation but did look prettier!

The afternoon saw some patchy sunshine and we were happily pootling along nearing Drakeholes when Mike finally made contact with the lock keeper. Bad news! Although he could not stop us from passing through the lock he strongly advised us not to as the water levels are so very high. In fact Torksey is close as the river level is higher than Fossdyke.

At that moment we arrived at Drakeholes and there were spaces free on the mooring so we quickly pulled alongside to make our night stop. We knew that there were precious few other options between here and West Stockwith.

It may be some days before it is safe to proceed. The boat moored next to us just managed to pass through Torksey yesterday morning  - we heard the story twice from both husband and wife! Their passage down the river was very fast indeed and they had no difficulty seeing over the flood banks!

6.1 miles - 0 locks