Day 6, Friday August 7th, Kilsby Bridge to Barrow upon Soar
Had a fantastic signal last night, only to discover that Google wasn't talking to me. So yesterday's adventures will of necessity be compressed somewhat. Our travels took us through Leicester - well, I can only think of two things it's famous for, and I did rack my brains. After steering all day on Thursday, my legs were killing me. I tried sitting on the roof for a bit, and now I have a bruised bum as well, to add to the standard lock-gate bruised coccyx. Don't waste any sympathy on me, I love it. Never fear, the legs will toughen up; it's just that I don't do standing, as a rule. Anyway, today (i.e. yesterday) I did not-steering, i.e. working locks, making tea and sitting down. Twenty locks were accomplished, at a slow and steady pace, and we found ourselves at some mysterious point on the River Soar, which was of course in flood, as we had as always brought the rain with us. Most of that is for another day (which I will write in a few minutes).
Leicester is actually not all that bad; certainly it didn't seem anything like as rough as we had been led by many to believe. And the sun did finally come out while we were there, and has stayed out since. We tied up in Barrow after a long day, and went looking for a pub to have supper. The first one we came to, the Navigation, had big TVs and a rather uninspiring menu (this is Craig's fault for taking us to gastropubs). So we went on to the Soar Bridge, which is in the Good Beer Guide (a publication the value of which I am beginning to doubt). But they had stopped serving food at eight (on a Friday night! Truly we are in the sticks, or perhaps, being up north, they only have tea). So finally we tried some establishment that appeared to have been built to cater for the local caravan site. Whilst we were waiting forever to be served, a pair of children careened around the bar shrieking at the tops of their voices, so we decided to take our custom elsewhere. Back to the Navigation, in fact, only to discover that they stopped serving food at half past eight. So it was back to Warrior for beans on toast and a pat on the back for ourselves for not spending thirty quid on food we wouldn't have enjoyed anyway.
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Ah, now Leicester. Our Sophie's 'Place of Birth', and actually a bit of a hidden gem. It's northern enough to have proper town (sorry, city) character, yet southern enough not to be economically completely flat on its back.
And it has the absolute best Indian restaurants. Forget all that over-hyped Birmingham Balti nonsense.
Do you think I could get expenses paid by a publisher to take a GPS phone and a laptop up and down the canals of the country, reviewing eating establishments within waddling distance of the bank?
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