Stuck at Swinton

We are retracing our steps (wake?) back up the South Yorkshire Navigation towards the junction with the Stainforth and Keadby canal where we started. At this point we'll go north and west on to the Aire and Calder Navigation and head towards Leeds.

We moored at the new housing9 estate at Swinton 5 as it's pleasant enough and within cycling dissdxtance of a chip shop 😋

We'd only planned to stay a night but Abby the Tabby had other ideas. She accompanied Leo and Tiger Lilly on the 7am walk but when we met a Greyhound coming in the opposite direction she darted into the undregrowth and refused to come back out. 7 hours later we'd located her with the Tile bluetooth tracker and used our sickle and loppers to hack down brambles, Hawthorne, nettles and bracken to get to her. She'd ended up on a little mound over the other side of a drainage ditch whose very dirty water came well over the top of Vicky's wellies. We think the water must have risen with the torrential downpours and trapped her. Nonetheless she was furious to be 'rescued' and carried over the ditch in her crate. The indignity of it! Back in the boat Vicky ran a cool water bath and washed the ditch water off her bramble torn legs and applied a generous splodge of Savlon to the nettle welts as the rain battered the boat roof. Needless to say we stayed put.

Not content with our plans revolving around her for just one day, Abby took herself off to lie under the nearby Dog Rose the following day. We again found her with the tracker but chose not to haul her back on board. We didn't want her to associate our approach with a negative experience so we waited until she was driven back by the rain in the early afternoon before securing her in the bedroom and setting off along the cut.Read more