This soft wood has a soft spot in my heart. The interior of the boat is tongue 'n' groove pine and you could spend months joining the knots like dot-to-dots. Growing up with pine furniture at home, I recall the gentle sounds of the wooden wardrobe draws opening, the touch of the soft round handles, it's sunshine finish and the sweet pine smell.
From our mooring position, we looked up into a twinkling sky of swaying pine needles and cones. We spent a few delightful evenings burning the cones on the burner fire to give off the delightful scent.
And from the stern we could see the big green hill, an old quarry site (in the distance of the photo). It is a good landmark from the A5 down the way from Hartshill.
Whilst we were in this area, we had another couple of love-birds visit. And they came barring gifts from mother bird. Early christmas treats including this little beauty...
which is ideal for making our hot water bottle! And goodness me do we need this! As autumn is seeping into winter we are blasting the heat out of the Morso Squirrel stove.
In fact only yesterday we visited a local farmyard to collect 6 bags of oval smokeless coals and 2 large bags of logs to see us through the next month. Thanks to Leigh's brilliant idea of buying a wheelbarrow it made shifting the fuel a lot easier, well, for him a least!
Lavender was another mother bird gift, in amongst an abundance of wonderful produce, home-grown and foraged in a wicker basket wrapped with love. The bunch looked beautiful and I wanted to display it on the boat. However, taking on board Leigh's points about the buds dropping off and ways to conserve the scent, I followed his direction and set about stripping the buds from the stalks.
I had a large bowl-full of the rich pastel coloured buds and oil drenched fingers by the end of it. And with a set of pop socks packed two bundles full of the buds and tied them off. These scented packages I have kept in bed so that the sheets and I are scented with lavender from mother-birds garden.
We left Hartshill for Atherstone and have been here for a little bit longer than really we should. The other day, Leigh jumped up to look out the window and look what wild creature we spotted in the overhanging hedgerow...
It's colours were as rich as Indian dye and we watched it swoop and splash the surface of the canal water trying to catch a morsel or two. It really was a wonderful sight!
Here are some other feathered friends we look out the window to...
Last week, we had another problem with the electrics, namely a flat starter battery, and due to our wiring system this put pay to on board lights and water pump.
So we spent more evenings by candle light until we had a local engine electrics company go over the wiring system and sort it out. They fully charged up the batteries and re-wired the system so we can't drain the starter battery flat again by isolating the domestic batteries and installed our 300watt inverter. So this means we now have 24volt electrics anytime of day or night. We are no longer restricted to having to run the generator to charge up electrical items. It feels like a revelation!
And so to date, when we wake in the mornings and open up the stern doors, this is what autumn smiles back at us like...
notice the steam from the water surface??
What can I say? Bring on winter!
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