Cheese & Canals!

Monday (27 May), from the Premier Inn, was supposed to be a 20 to 30 mins walk to the site of the Cheese Rolling, however given the number of people attending, the state of the ground, and the number of ‘kissing gates,’ it took us over an hour to walk.

Yes, the cheese rolling is as crazy as it sounds, a large round of double Gloucester cheese is rolled down a very steep hill and people throw themselves down the hill after it, in a mix of running, sliding and for some rolling headlong! Thankfully there were very few injuries this year, but that appears to be the exception.

There are 7 races in total, 3 men’s downhill races, one Women’s downhill race, a mixed adult uphill race (no cheese involved) and 2 children’s uphill races, 12 and youngsters, and 13-18 yrs. All the competitors in the uphill races also got to slide back down the hill again.

British eccentricity at its best, but having said that, there were a lot of other nations taking part, and even winning!

After all the official races had been completed, from where we stood it looked like anyone could have a go! But No, we didn’t!

Tuesday, we drove back up to Pock, having to odd issue with the car, occasional “knocking”! Bugger! But it is still in warranty, just!

Wednesday, another day of unpacking, repacking and prepping our festival gear.

Thursday, we met friends for coffee, the ones who had also rented ‘life in Slow Motion’ after us. You’ll remember we first met them in Manchester, on ‘Life in Slow Motion’.

Then we took the car back to the garage, for them to sort out the ‘knocking’, after a quick investigation they diagnosed 1) a sticking front brake, 2) a rear wheel bearing needing replaced!

As we were going away for the week with Nic’s parents, we just left the car at the garage for them to sort.

Friday, we drove to Crickhowell in South Wales and stayed overnight at The Manor House hotel. A nice meal in their restaurant.

Saturday, we walked around Crickhowell, had coffee, then moved on to Abergavenny, to do some food shopping for the week, then picked up a ‘not so’ narrow boat on the Monmouthshire & Brecon canal. Not so narrow being 8 ft 6’ rather than the standard narrow boat of 6ft 6’. ‘Grouse’ is a very nice boat with 2 double beds, which are set up at the touch of a button.

After the obligatory canal boating induction, a couple of things we needed to know, mainly about ‘Grouse’ rather than the canal. We cruised for only an hour before mooring up for the night.

Sunday, a lovely sunny day on the canal, a few miles and five locks up. Rog spent some time helping out novice boaters, including finding the top lock gate open and the lower paddles also open, for those not canal boaters that is a big No No, because you are emptying the upper canal!

Monday (3 June), more cruising today, including the Ashford tunnel, 375 metres of narrow and low tunnel, obviously stopping for coffee, lunch, afternoon tea! life on the canal is slow, the speed limit is 2.5 miles per hour, so you can cruise all day and not get very far. Tonight we went to The Three Horseshoes pub, a mix between a local pub and a really good restaurant. We all had really good food.

Tuesday, our only rainy day of the week, we had only one lock to do today, but as we took the boat into the lock, we spotted a large fence post, wedged behind the lock gates, meaning that we very nearly got stuck. After a little bit of messing around we managed to get it sorted. We then cruised on to Brecon, the northern end of the canal, obviously at the end we have to turn around a 60ft boat! All good fun. The rain stopped, and we had a stroll round Brecon, and a quick shop in Aldi, and back to the boat to start heading back the way we came.

Wednesday, we headed down the 5 locks, no problems this time, actually it was made very easy as a boat was coming up and all the locks were left in our favour.

Thursday, we cruised back to the boat yard to get a pump out, another tricky manoeuvre, reversing in. We then continued cruising for about three hours to Govilon. We went for a walk and the local pub had just reopened, and had 2 for 1 fish & chips, in honour of D -Day, so we decided to partake.

Friday, still heading south down the canal we aimed for a winding hole, to turn the boat around again, then cruised all the way back up to the boat yard, as we decided to moor up over night, to make returning the boat at 9am easy.

Saturday, a quick pack up of our stuff and repacked the car, and headed back to Pocklington, thought we might meet the Dave “hairy biker” memorial motor bike ride, as we passed the National Motorcycle Museum on the M42, but we missed them, probably by minutes!

Back in Pocklington, we went out for a couple of drink and food with family and friends.

Sunday, started the unpacking and repacking process! We worked out we still have too much stuff!