A few more locks this morning took us up to the summit of the K&A. Originally the plan was to have the summit lower, and have a tunnel several miles long through the hills, but that turned out to be too expensive, so the solution was to make the canal higher, and pump water to the top. There is one stretch of tunnel about five hundred years long where the land owner refused to look at a canal. It was built using the cut-and-cover technique. A large cutting was made down to tunnel level, then a brick roof was put in, and finally the soil was put back over the tunnel. It took about two million bricks, hand made at the Caen Hill brick works and shipped, of course, by canal boat.

I think this may be the first Harry Potter boat name we’ve seen.

At one of the locks we bought some free range eggs. At another there was some free range bacon, but nowhere to buy it.

We are moored in another picturesque village full of thatched cottages, Great Bedwyn.

However, Great Bedwyn has a couple of other things going for it. For one thing, they have duck warning signs up.

It’s about time someone besides me alerted people to the avian aquatic menace. Thank you, Great Bedwyn.

It’s also the home base of the Bruce Trust, which rents out accessible canal boats for use on the K&A.


Nice to see that this wonderful activity is available to wheelchair users.

This is Greg and Karen’s last night on the boat, so they took us out to dinner (again!) this time to the one pub in the village that was open tonight. Unfortunately the pub is on the market, and no longer had food service. However, the bar staff recommended a couple of Indian takeaways that would deliver to the pub, so we ended up with with an excellent and unexpected Indian meal. Thanks, guys.