I'm all wet again Mr Mannering!!!!!!

This morning no end of boats went by on their way to the tunnel the first one being a hire boat at 7.45. The chap on the boat moored in front of us was busy removing stuff from the roof so I said to Paul should we do the same "no we will be okay" was the reply oh well we will see I thought to my self. We needed to empty the cassette so pulled onto the mooring BW man came up told us there was no rubbish just elsan so Paul nipped off the boat and promptly tripped over a mooring ring he did go down with a crash. The boat that had been moored in front of us came through and was able to make their way through the tunnel then once Paul was back on board it was our turn. We were told the procedure if we had a problem then under the chains and away we went. Only the two boats in the convoy. New headlight was great and we had our high beam light on as well with me pointing it at the wall so Paul could judge the distance. Now I think I have mentioned before how I hate tunnels but feel I have to keep Paul company on the back and of course I have to hold the torch. We were doing really well and as it was our first time in this tunnel I was was feeling confident, then as some of you probably know the tunnel gets lower and narrower so consequently the solar light in the flower bucket took a knock as did the chimney (only a short one we aren't that stupid) then all of a sudden the side jumped out in front of us as Paul had lost his concentration and we hit it with an almighty crash, we were doing so well keeping in a straight line in the middle of the tunnel but hey ho we were soon back on course the bikes scrapped the wall at one point and I was feeling physically sick but suddenly we could see the light at the end of the tunnel (no pun intended) and we were through. Three boats were waiting hope they managed the journey without mishap. We had only just left the tunnel when it got very black and then the heavens opened luckily we managed to get under a bridge to put on our wetties what is it with this part of the country does it always rain so hard.

At the locks at Etruria there was a queue now there's a surprise, all going down but we did meet a couple of boats coming up while doing the restof the locks so it turned out okay until we got to the bottom lock where there were 4 waiting to go down and 5 coming up that was fine but the lock was so slow in filling and seem to leak rather badly so it took an age to get through. Rest of the journey stayed dry I'm pleased to say and we finally made it to bridge 104 and our mooring for the night got here just a the right time as an hour later this mooring was full.

After I took this 3 more boats came in front of the front boat, we are the third one back. Obviously this is a very popular spot. Now lets hope tomorrow stays DRY if I get wet one more time I might shrink.