Off early from The Vine at Dunham, with a short planned stop at Lymm to pick up my Mum who had been out with my sister and future brother in law to finalise the wedding arrangements, then on to Acton Bridge. Along the way we bumped (not literally) in to Charles on Lyra on the tight bend just south of Dutton, but I really did bump in to something! There are some blind, sharp bends between Dutton and Acton Bridge, and with it being a Saturday - hire boat change over day, I was taking it easy and sticking to my side of the cut as much as possible. I was approaching one of these bends when a dinghy floated out from what appeared to be nowhere. I did see the bloke look over his shoulder and I was positive that he saw me coming - it’s quite hard to miss a 50ft narrowboat, some might say, but he did! I did a quick loud whistle, and nothing. I whistled again - and nothing. I finally beeped my horn just before impact and he didn’t move a muscle. He did move though, when I refused to move out of the channel and gave him a fair bump. It was an inflatable dinghy so it did absorb some of the inpact but I nearly knocked the poor bugger out of it. He said I should of mover, I told him I disagreed - that was pretty much it. We moored up south of Acton Bridge on the visitors moorings and spent the night in The Horns Inn.

I’m not sure how many others have the same problem, but when visiting Acton Bridge I never know where to moor! We’ve visited regularly over the past couple of years and it was only a couple of months ago that I noticed a small, rotting sign saying that it was a private morning for a 45ft boat. Since going back to Acton Bridge we’ve never moored there again but moor right at the end of the moorings, where the bank is falling away, and the quickest root to the pub is about a 10 minute walk through thick bushes, spider’s webs and of course biting midges! Don’t tell anyone but this time we moored up in the private mooring again!