Car Shuffle and Banbury

A day for the necessary car shuffle, cleaning and shopping. As far as the boat was concerned it went nowhere!

The car had been left at Great Bedwyn Wharf, close to the station. Mike set off to catch the 7:55 from Banbury with a timetable that allowed plenty of time to catch one of the two buses a day from Cropredy at 12:30. Alas, as soon as he arrived at the station, even before buying a ticket, he discovered that the first train - to Reading - was already about 13 minutes late. That would not have been so bad if it were not for the fact that the schedule only allowed about 13 minutes between trains at Reading Station, one of the more complex and busiest stations outside a main city.

In the end, with a couple more minutes delay, Mike arrived just after his planned second train to Bedwyn had departed (on time, of course!) This service only runs every hour so there was most of that to wait. Perversely, it not only left on time but arrived at its destination a few minutes ahead of schedule.

Google Journey Planner indicated that the car should reach the marina at Cropredy by 11:51 and maintained that for most of the journey until Mike came off the motorway towards the end of the trip when it upped its estimate to 11:53. This was the actually when the car pulled into the marina and it took just a few moments to arrange where to leave the car until we arrive by boat tomorrow.

It was a 10-15 minute walk into the village - the marina web site indicates that the bus should stop outside its entrance but other advice suggested that it was safer, given that there was time, to walk to the village bus stop which is listed on the timetable.

As he arrived at the village, the bus on its outward journey was passing through so he was able to check about the return trip. This, despite the earlier setback, meant that there was a 20 minute wait - just enough time to go on to the village shop (which we have used several times in the past when coming this way by boat!) for a packet of crisps.

There were four of us waiting for the bus, one of the others had just collected his boat from Tooleys in Banbury where it had just been blacked and taken it back to its mooring in the marina. He was on his way back home in south London by train from Banbury.

Back at the boat, Christine had done her cleaning routine and also, between showers, visited the town market and other shops for most of the shopping list.

There were still some items left to be sourced so, after a very long lunch break, with the weather now much improved, we walked along the towpath back to Morrisons on the southern edge of town. Having loaded up the rucksack and shopping bag, we came back the more direct route through town.

Christine had promised Mike a (some?) new leisure shirt and proposed an explore of M&S. This was not quite as fruitful as Mike had hoped although it met Christine's specification. (The shirt both of us liked best was not stocked in the right size, however)

A further visit to Debenhams added nothing to the tally so Christine suggested that she be allowed to look around the clothes shops whilst Mike looked for a couple of items (which he failed to find) and then return to the boat. On the way he did however call at BHS and - on his own! - picked up three (more!) shirts for £40!

When Christine came back - alas empty handed - she told Mike about a shop selling the larger bags of fruit and nuts which he has been so missing since the demise of Julian Graves. Nothing quite replaces their range. With it due to close in 13 minute she shooed him off ton find what he may - he returned a little later after an effective foray!

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