Thursday 25th June 2009

We started the day with a walk into the town of Ware. It was another warm day and we spent a pleasant couple of hours looking around. It is a very pretty town with the river running through it.

The view from the town bridge at Ware

This is the New River which is a man made channel taking water from the River Lee to Stoke Newington.

The river frontage has some really nice properties, some of which have some lovely waterside gazebos.

The waterfront in Ware

The charming Gazebos along the river

We left Ware at 1200hrs to make our way to Hertford. This should have been a very straightforward journey with only two locks to negotiate. Unfortunately both had gates/paddles that were out of order on one side of the lock. This meant they both took ages to fill, but we were in no hurry and the weather was glorious by now.

As we approached the town of Hertford, the river narrowed and was flanked by some very pretty cottages. We had to be careful to wind at the appropriate place as there are 3 winding holes, depending on the size of the boat.

The cottages in Hertford

We managed to moor very close to the cottages in this picture and had lunch before setting off on another exploration of the town.

Hertford is a larger town than Ware and is equally charming. We enjoyed another couple of hours looking around before returning to the boat.

A couple of canine characters we met

along the way

We set off again at 1600hrs to make our way back to Ware for the evening. We weren't as ambitious today with our travelling as the heat can be so tiring. I am not complaining as the weather is such an improvement on last year, but operating the locks in such extreme heat is unsustainable.

Looks very tiring doing the lock!!

Tom was tempted by this meringue in the delicatessen. I was very strong and declined but as it was so large, I helped him eat it tonight. (I didn't ask for any help !) It looked amazing but was a bit disappointing.

The meringue of contention

We are now moored back in exactly the same place as last night, ready for our trip up the River Stort tomorrow.