A night in Napton

It didn't start off very promisingly. We couldn't find the pub to save out lives, having told Richard and Sandra (of the big Dutch - as it turns out - engine with a triple barrelled name that I can just about remember but can't spell; Richard and Sandra, if you're reading this, please put me out of my misery by writing it in the comments) that we would be two minutes were were more like twenty... and when we got there we couldn't help but wonder if it was the right place. Although the car park was fairly full the place looked deserted - not as if it has been closed since three o'clock, as turned out to be the case, but more like 1982. The windows were blank and cold, and the pub sign creaked menacingly, in Scooby-Doo fashion, in the wind.

I rang Richard, who turned out to be about three yards away - aren't mobile phones wonderful. He said that there were lots of people down on the towpath and on people's boats, and that he'd been talking to 'a young chap called Magnet'. Wow, I thought, Magnetman's here. So things were looking up. Then I met Bones and Maffi on the towpath, and before I knew it, there was Alnwick with its K3 which I am afraid to say Jim envies sorely. It was lovely to see and hear it after so long. Various people congregated on various boats waiting for the pub to open, and we stopped mainly on Alnwick, drinking Graham's splendid coffee (I must have another attempt at making coffee. Tea I am very good at, coffee I don't seem to get at all) though I did also visit Keeping Up. And I also went along to gaze at Magnetman's beautiful, almost untouched, Bantock butty.

Once the pub - it was the Bridge - did reopen it was very nice, and we had another good dinner and did indeed indulge in a good deal of bantering. Got back to Warrior about midnight, and it was freezing, even though the fire wasn't quite out. Under the duvet was nice and cosy though, thanks to the installation of a couple of Tuskers earlier in the afternoon.

This morning seems, holding my breath, to be bright and sunny and not too windy.