Anchored at Anchor Cottage

We were woken by a boat wishing to pass us as we were across the cut because one of our mooring pins had come out of the bank. Luckily the pin was not lost as they are the type with a loop at the end that I always pass the mooring rope through the loop for just such a contingency.

We bought some diesel at Napton Narrowboats. Only about 30 litres as it seemed expensive at the advertised rate of £1.02 a litre. However as it turned out this was closely comparable to the advertised rate of £0.71 a litre we paid at Sovereign in Banbury. I'll digress a little here. Experienced boaters can skip to the next paragraph. Once upon a time red diesel for pleasure boat use was free of the government duty you all pay when you fill up your car. The EU decided to harmonise the duty situation and now we must pay duty on fuel used to move our boats. However, as a concession we don't have to pay duty on fuel used for heating and generating electricity for domestic use in our boats. But we all move our boats and heat and generate using different proportions of the fuel we buy. Most narrowboats use their engine for all three, in different proportions according to whether their owners are continuous cruisers, holidaymakers, residential or even gas free holiday boats like Syncopaion. As a rough guide somebody dreamed up the proportion of 60% propulsion, 40% heat and electric. When a boater buys diesel they must declare the proportion of their purchase that will be used for propulsion and thus attract 48.5 pence per litre duty payment. This is a legal requirement. I reckon we probably use about 50% for propulsion as we cook with electricity generated by the engine and this is what I declared at Sovereign wharf a couple of days ago, which brought the cost of diesel at 71p per litre to an average cost of £1 per litre for the 20 litres I bought from them. Napton narrowboats assume all boaters will declare 60% propulsion and this comes to £1.02 per litre. I'm not sure it is legal for a seller to compel all buyers to declare 60%. But they are probably within their rights to simply refuse to sell at a different rate.

After a collision with the day boat from the Mill House pub in Braunston (not our fault) we passed back through Braunston where half the crew jumped ship and headed home for a doctor's appointment tomorrow. The rest of us continued with me single-handing up Braunston locks. Luckily for me we met up with nb Hyperion whose ample and expert crew took us with them through the flight.

Braunston is a great place to see working boats as they often congregate here. Ilford and Ibex arrived just as we were passing through.




















We stopped just below Buckby top Lock, near Anchor cottage, site of the shop that sold the original Buckby can, still selling them today although I think today more of their turnover is due to ice cream sales.

Moored at Buckby Lock No 8

Total distance is 11 miles, ½ flg and 7 locks