We meandered towards the outskirts of Leighton Buzzard wearing teeshirts during November’s unseasonal warmth of 18°, stopping along the way to enjoy the sheer beauty of our surroundings.

Shortly after we came across a long section with piles of earthworks, with bulldozers and reversing bleeps dominating the views. We called out to a local person to ask what was going on…. building a film set that will be in use for two years and then the countryside will be restored, but he was relinquishing his permanent mooring to find something more peaceful. We didn’t catch the name of this impending epic, but he had our sympathy.

We descended Grove Lock, and settled in for a 14 day stay.

And enjoyed the wonderful sunsets

until we awoke to find ourselves frozen in

There was still the occasional boat able to break through the ice to make progress. Luckily one of those were those amazing couple who run the Jules Fuels boats so we topped up with diesel. What a relief that was knowing that the forecast was only due to get colder.

We also decided to take advantage of the channel that had been opened in the ice to get us a little closer to the centre of Leighton Buzzard. Another shrewd move.

