Visitors and Leavers

As the title suggests recently we have experienced some huge mountains and ditches. It all begun with Delia's little adventures to cross the A5 40 foot above the canal, dicing with cars


Can you spot the cat?

She found herself stuck in amongst the hedgerows opposite, were only wild animals meet. We had a couple of rescue missions involving the boat being poled across to the otherside and hauling her out from the prickles.


Then we had little Dylan to look after...


he is a sweetie, full of beans, until after a walk along the towpath.

And this weekend we had two lovely visitors to our floating home...


Happy Birthday PB!!!

Today has been a particularly bitter sweet day. Delia had been missing since Wednesday afternoon, after a couple of days of trailing the surrounding areas whistling and calling into the abyss we printed out some 'missing cat' posters and scattered them about the area. The result was amazing, boaters, house dwellers, dog walkers et all were all on the look out, some even buying a tin of cat food just in case! Nights were slipping away and we both felt her missing presence. A couple of phone calls of sightings lead us to running around the woods calling in hope that she was alive and well. But still she didn't come, were they mistaken?

And so this morning Leigh received a tentative call, a cat fitting her description by the road side. Leigh went to see... I woke to an empty boat. Leigh appeared full of grief. We went together to collect what we thought to be Delia's remains and set off in the car to the vets to check her microchip number, just in case. We felt, however, in our hearts it was her, she was finally found. The vets chip recorder came up with a number but it wasn't Delia's. We couldn't believe it. Leaving the vets for home we thought not to trust a computer system, all other parts married up, colour of fur, markings, paws, weight and size...

It was time for lunch and we were just locking up when Leigh received a call from the pub over the water. Delia had been in their garden. I couldn't handle it. Leigh and PB rushed off whilst I and MB followed in disbelief. Killer, the spotter said, she went over the wall into the horses field. We were scouting the area like mad, Leigh climbed the gate and spotting a black and white face called out, 'Pudding!' and she came running!

As I write this Delia is curled on my lap and hasn't left our sides since. She has eaten enough to fill her belly three times over and drunk more than I've ever seen her consume. In between feasts she has been stretching out and sleeping peacefully and giving us endless kisses. We are so lucky and with so much thanks to folks in the area for all their kindness, it has been an eye opening day. Phew.