All downhill today, through ten locks, including our first double lock, where the bottom gate of one lock is the top gate of the next. Since these are double wide locks, we paired up with another boat, Flat Bottomed Girl, to go down, which saves water, and stops the boat drifting from side to side in the lock. Flat Bottomed Girl is brand new, and the owners were trying to avoid bumps and scrapes. Happily, Peggoty came with a full complement of scrape marks on the hull, so I don’t have to worry about adding any more by misjudging the entry to a lock.

As we were going down, we met a steam tug coming up. Hasty is powered by a vintage coal burning steam engine, though she had a modern hull.

Steam tugs like this used to haul boats through the long tunnels like Blisworth and Braunston where there was no towpath for horses. There is a distinctive smell coal burning steam engines. I can remember the last working steam trains from when I was a kid, and this took me back.

I mentioned that some moorings had room on the land for a garden and a shed. This is how you manage to have a shed without any land to put it on.

Royal Leamington Spa is not at it’s best when approached by canal. We gave a miss to mooring in the grungy industrial district, and settled for a grungy residential district instead. However, we are near to shops of all sorts, and a short walk from some more up market shopping, mostly in Georgian or Victorian buildings.

By the way, it’s pronounced LEM-ing-ton, just as the river Leam is pronounced Lem.

When she was eleven years old, Princess Victoria (later to be Queen Victoria) stayed at the Regent Hotel for one night. Based on this fleeting visit she later allowed the town to change it’s name from Leamington Spa, to Royal Leamington Spa, and the hotel displays the royal coat of arms. It’s now a Travelodge.

More cute shops.

Yes, that is a Domino’s pizza place, but it’s not like an American one. Delivery costs extra!

An ugly fountain in the park.
Do I need to put in the ugly church picture, too? No, probably not.

For all my friends who make balloon doggies, you’ve been making them of the wrong stuff. Just run up some in ceramic and you can sell them for hundreds of pounds in an art gallery.

The gallery also had artwork by Bob Dylan and Ronnie Wood, and the lady there told me that Dylan had not wanted to sign his work. “It’s art, Bob. People really expect the artist to sign it.”

Nearby there is a tribute to Ringling’s performing elephants, which made me sad, as Ringling doesn’t have performing elephants any more.

The caption, set in bronze around the edge of the plaza says, “RINGLING BRO’S MARVELOUS ACTING PACHYDERMS WITHOUT A PARALLEL IN EITHER CONTINENT PREEMINENTLY INCLUDING THE WONDERFUL LOCKHART DANCING ELEPHANTS”. Samuel Lockhart was a elephant trainer based in Leamington Spa, whose animals performed for Queen Victoria and in the Ringling show.

I know there have been some cases of mistreatment, but in my experience most circus people love their animals, and want them well looked after. Unless kids get to see elephants in circuses, they may grow up without knowing how awesome elephants are, and how important it is to keep them around in the wild. I felt sorry for this kid, this may be the only elephant ride she ever has.