Round the perimeter of the field we walk, Malin questing in the hedge for rabbit smells and me just glorying in the huge expanse of Oxfordshire sky, the warmth of the late-summer sun and the wonder of all the world around me. I suddenly notice something jarringly out of place in this natural scene, a white ball, just a little smaller than a child's football. Feeling slightly indignant at such an intrusion into the beauty of the place I move forward and look more closely, it doesn't look like plastic, I reach out a finger and tentatively prod it, it is firm but spongy, and then the penny drops – its not a ball at all, but a giant puffball fungus. I haven't seen one of those for years, and I understand they're good to eat, but how long would it take one person to eat an entire puffball? Smiling to myself I move on down the hedgerow after Malin's retreating figure and notice just how many sloes and blackberries there are this year. At moments like these I yearn for my own kitchen so that I can make bramble jelly, blackberry and apple pies, blackberry vodka and sloe gin for Christmas. As it is I will probably pick some fruit and make the drinks for Christmas because they can travel in my car until I reach 'home' again in November without taking up too much room or coming to any harm.
We continue into the sheep field and are lucky this morning as they are all at the far end; Malin is terrified of sheep and panics if they are too close. I do wonder if, when she was a young dog, she was subjected to the old-fashioned method used to stop dogs chasing sheep. If a dog was a sheep chaser, the farmer would pen the dog up with a ewe and lamb and leave it for a while. Of course the ewe would protect her lamb by butting the dog repeatedly with her extremely hard head and the dog would learn quite quickly that sheep hurt! It was a brutal way to stop the problem but better than having your dog shot by an irate farmer for sheep worrying. Be that as it may, Malin hates going through the sheep field and is not much happier with the cows in the next field either. Mind you, I won't go in there with her if they're too close to the footpath because the youngsters can be quite frisky and see chasing Malin as a huge piece of fun!
As we complete our circuit I see the swallows sitting like musical notes on the fence at the side of the canal. They rise in ones and twos and go scooting along the canal, dipping down and drinking as they fly before hurling themselves back into the air and whirling over my head before settling again. It won't be long before they start to leave, but they go in dribs and drabs so that their departure is not too noticeable – perhaps they know how bereft we feel when they have gone for another season and try to leave us gently, not like the swifts who are around one minute and gone the next!
Safely back across the lock gates we can rest easy and have some well-deserved breakfast, before I set to and start my scone-baking of the day. I decided that, to give myself a definite structure to the day, and to take full advantage of passing trade, I would make and sell scones, cake and biscuits on the lock side. Phoebe quite often puts out the odd box of eggs and any surplus vegetables, but I decided scones were the way to go. I seemed to have hit on a good idea as most people, having come up the flight of five locks, tend to moor up and have a cup of tea, and what better to go with a cup of tea than fresh scones? News of my scones seemed to move up and down the canal as several people asked if there were any left if they saw me in the garden. I left an honesty box on a little table with the goodies and then left everyone to it – it seemed to work very well and I was usually sold out by mid-afternoon. Of course, the trade is very seasonal – six to eight weeks in the summer holidays but, if the weather is good this extends a bit longer as couples without children start to move up and down the system then. Every day I made plain, fruit and cheese scones and bagged them up in fours. Sometimes, if the mood took me, I would bake biscuits and cake to wrap up too, I made Lemon Drizzle cake thinking it would be everyone's favourite, but that and the Choc Chip cookies took several days to sell out, so I experimented with a tea bread recipe that my friend Sally had given me – I sold all nine slices by mid-afternoon and it was double the price I'd charged for the Lemon Drizzle because of the cost of the dried fruit! I did a different fruit cake recipe the next day and the same thing happened – I just couldn't keep up with demand. I would love to have done cream teas, but that is more of a tie and, with limited refrigerator space, it would be difficult to keep the cream fresh.
You meet some interesting people on the canal and, because the weather was so good for the majority of my stay, I was frequently out in the garden and could chat to people as they went through the lock:
There was Hunt, an American historian, who has had several non-fiction works published but was so captivated by the area around the Oxford Canal that he is planning and researching a bit of a 'bodice-ripper' based on the coming of the canal to the area in the late 1700s – I shall await its publication with some interest!
Then there was the guy I saw one day travelling on his own down the canal – he said he was in the music business and was enjoying the peace and quiet, but I forgot to ask what it was he actually did. A few days later I spotted him coming back up the canal and asked the question then – it turned out he sang with the BBC Chamber Choir and should have been appearing in one of the Proms that night, but had decided to play hooky and finish his holiday! I can't say I blame him – the weather was phenomenal at that point.
I got quite friendly with a couple who moored for a week on the stretch of canal between the cottage and the car park, so I passed them several times. Colin spent most of the week hand-painting the 'roses and castles' motifs on his boat and signwriting his boat's name. I asked if that was what he did for a living, but it was just a skill he had picked up along the way, as he and his wife had been holidaying on the canals for several years and now spent about nine months each year just cruising around the canal system.
One evening, as it was beginning to get dusk I heard a boat enter the lock which was quite unusual as most 'holidaymakers' like to be well clear of the locks before nightfall. However, the chap on this boat was no holidaymaker – he spends his time collecting and delivering boats for people all over the country and lives on his own boat somewhere up near Rugby. We chatted for a while as the lock filled up but he seemed in no particular hurry to open the gate and get on his way – I assume he doesn't get much chance to chat with people and it must be a solitary existence for most of the time. Eventually he went on his way, but only as far as the first mooring beyond the bridge as I passed the boat next morning when Malin and I took the air.
I also noticed that there were quite a lot of Americans (or Canadians – sorry my Canadian friends, I can never distinguish between the accents straight off) and Australians (or , possibly, New Zealanders) and I found this quite strange although I suppose there aren't such things as canals in their countries or, at least, not such narrow ones. They all seemed to be enjoying themselves immensely which is more than could be said for some of the British families that I saw/heard come through the lock – they seemed to be finding it all very stressful, which seemed a terrible shame as it is not a cheap holiday option by any means.
Then there was Phoebe's friend, Jason, who lives on his boat and moves it up and down the canal periodically. Twice I helped him and a friend move the boat to different moorings, going through a couple of lock each time. He obviously didn't learn his lesson last year as he allowed me to steer the boat both times and in fact, on the second occasion I got to steer it into the lock while Jason was working the gates! Why is it that my brain has such difficulty working out which way to push the rudder to steer? I don't think it helps that a 64 foot canal boat takes quite a while to respond at the front to the rudder movements at the rear, so I would panic that I was doing it wrong. The Oxford Canal is probably not the easiest canal to learn on as it is a contour canal (i.e. it follows the contours of the land) so it doesn't have that many locks but it twists and turns all over the place, which is not easy if you're a novice steerer!
However, the person who made, what could have been a very solitary experience, much more fun was Phoebe's builder-cum-friend-cum-guardian angel, Eamon. He took me under his wing and invited me to the local hostelry a couple of times a week where he would drink 'diet' Guinness by the pint and I would quaff Stowford Press cider, by the half, whilst chatting to all manner of interesting folk who inhabited the bar. It was a lovely little pub (The Carpenters Arms at Lower Boddington) and they did the most wonderful Sunday roasts as I discovered when I treated myself on my birthday ( and several subsequent Sundays). They also made me feel very welcome and Kev would be pouring my cider as Eamon and I walked in the door. I took Phoebe there for a lunch on my last day there and to say Goodbye to them – Kev reckons he'll remember what I drink if I turn up again next year – perhaps I should come back and see?
The highlight of my stay was when Jeni came to see me for four days at the beginning of September and could share in all my goings-on. Unfortunately the weather was not brilliant, but we managed a little light gardening! (pickaxe and forks to try and dig up some burdocks, nettles and brambles at the end of the garden) and we also walked to Cropredy, had lunch at The Red Lion pub and walked back again and, on the day that it rained heavily, we went to Compton Verney House Art Gallery, on the road between Banbury and Stratford-upon-Avon, and spent the afternoon being 'cultural'. We also both went to the pub with Eamon and had supper with Jason on his boat. It was lovely to share the unique experience that Top Lock Cottage is, with someone else, as it is a very special place despite (or perhaps, because of) the fact that it is completely 'off grid' and with no vehicular access.
I had a wonderful time!!
Another entertaining account Janet...I can feel the arrival of autumn! Love the photo too:)
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