Couldn’t put it off any longer, we’d overstayed in the basin until the Thursday morning (as had the hotel boat), and we had to head down to that well known tautology the River Avon.

Just down a little you come to the first lock, hiding in the trees below Holy Trinity Church, where his Bill-ness was apparently buried.

This River Avon was restored to navigation by a trust, and all the locks are named after people or organisations who contributed in some way or another.

The first lock, with it’s strange RSJ reinforcements is oddly intimidating: even Biggles didn’t know what to make of it. The Upper Avon lock gate balance beams are made of scaffolding poles, which bend and wobble slightly in a rather disconcerting manner; the paddle mechanisms are highly geared and fitted with counterweights, making it easy but tediously lengthy to raise or lower the paddles. All very different from  normal canal paddle gear. At the first lock, one of the paddles was counterweighted to excess, and wouldn’t stay down and shut, creating an interesting challenge when trying to fill the lock.

Anyway, a gentle pootle through a winding river and pleasantly wooded scenery brought us to Bidford-on-Avon for the night. And there’s another difference: you can’t just moor pretty-well anywhere you like, as you can on the canals – you have to use the approved moorings. There are usually some “overnight only” moorings at the locks, and sometimes some in a village or town.

The next morning the gentle meander continued, bringing us to Robert Aickman New Lock. Named for a founding father mover and shaker in Inland Waterways matters, it was a pleasant spot to moor up for lunch, but we were rather bemused by the almost-but-not-entirely-unlike a bridge contraption that straddles the lock. Looks like someone nicked some brick steps at each end. The lock is also very wide, and would clearly take three narrowboats alongside each other. All very odd.

And so to Evesham for a Friday night on the town. The approach to the lock is a bit scary, with the lock layby a pontoon at the top of the weir. Must be exciting when there’s “fresh” water in the river!

Just below Workman Bridge (named after Mr, Workman, it seems) there were plenty of moorings just a short walk from the centre of town – after two days of steady river cruising in variable weather, winding hither and thither, a pub dinner and early night beckoned: we’d hit the Evesham high spots properly on Saturday morning. Moored just up a little from us was another Piper narrowboat Nice Butt, who we’d seen last year somewhere – on the Thames we think. Could hardly forget a name like that…

Just before leaving the Excellence Afloat / Valley Cruisers wharf, we’d noticed a hotel boat and butty pass us, heading for Stratford. With two boats to descend the few remaining narrow locks, and the butty – being unpowered – needing to be manhandled through, we thought our chances of making the town centre by lunchtime were remote. But they fortuitously moored up for an early lunch themselves, just before the top lock; we were soon moored up in Bancroft Basing, with the delights of Stratford at our beck and call, even though the Captain kept jumping ship to check out the facilities.

The basin was busy but not full and during the day mobbed with tourists of all persuasions, but once the coach parties left and the traffic died down it’ became a nice quiet spot nestling between the river and the town centre. Loads of restaurants, proper shopping HIgh Street and the RSC Theatre all within 100 yards walk max. And with a large flower bed for Sir to hide in and amuse Himself within a few feet from the cat flap, even the Captain was impressed with our choice of a place to stay for a few days.

The hotel boat pair turned up soon after lunch, and we realised that we’d seen them before: they’d been tucked up for the winter like Song & Dance about half-a-dozen berths down from us at Cropredy Marina.

There’s lots of photogenic stuff here (although the RSC Theatre complex is probably not included in that!) so restraint is needed.  But there’s a ceilidh dance called Clopton Bridge, and we were rather taken by the hand-cranked chain ferry down on the River Avon. We’d have gone across and walked back over the bridge but for the fact that he packed up for the day just as we arrived.

And after all that wandering, we decided to eat out at the nearest restaurant to Song & Dance, which proved to be one of Mr Carluccio’s establishments, who at 18:45 were still doing the very good value fixed-price lunch menu offer. Sometimes you just have to take the knocks…

Sometimes on the canals one needs to make a detour in order to stock up on essentials. Lapworth/Kingswood Junction is a lovely spot, but a bit bereft of serious shops. For logistical reasons (one crew member was nipping home for a couple of nights to sort out matters medical and dental) we needed to be moored close to Lapworth station on the Saturday night in order to catch one of the few Sunday afternoon trains. With serious lock flights in both directions on the Stratford Canal, the best option looked to be to head up to the bottom of the Knowle flight of locks on the GUC where there was room to turn the boat round, then walk up the locks into Knowle, rumoured to be a proper-job shopping town. That was the “plan”.

Setting off on Saturday morning, we idly wondered at the carefully half-painted King’s Arms bridge, and soon reached Knowle bottom lock.

And it was there that Plan A foundered. Yes there was room to wind the boat round, but there were no moorings apart from a long line of fully occupied permanent ones: not a visitor mooring in sight. We’d have to head back down a mile or more to find anywhere suitable, which didn’t bode well for substantial shopping trip.

It was only noon, and the Knowle flight of 5 wide locks were all close together, so we thought “****er it” and went for Plan B. After all, how long would it take us experienced crew to nip up the flight. An hour? Well, it took about an hour and half, and sure enough, there weren’t any useable moorings at the top, so we continued on around Knowle town to the other side where we eventually found somewhere. It was 15:00 before we got to the shops, 16:15 before we got back to the boat and discovered the nearest winding hole wasn’t big enough for us to turn…

Continuing up the GUC, under the M42, we eventually managed to turn round somewhere near Birmingham Airport, got back to the top of the Knowle flight about 18:15, and – needing to be at the very least below them by Sunday morning – finally moored up at about 19:30.

There’s nothing like a quick shopping expedition to cheer one up. And that was nothing like a quick shopping expedition.