It's a zoo out there

The only real casualty of my unintentioned swim was my favourite windlass,(not the one that broke my leg)now lying somewhere at the bottom of the Shropshire Union. An exact replacement was purchased at yesterday's "pit stop", thankfully.

Today dawned as bright, beautiful and warm, but further developed into very hot and sunny. We opted to visit Chester Zoo by boat, via the centre of Chester which is a clever combination of old and new. The old being a set of 3 staircase double locks which are in desperate need of maintenance and thus take forever to get through. Luckily another boat and crew accompanied us through, which halved the workload. In Chester basin we filled with water alongside a sunken narrowboat supposedly being re - floated by a large group of drunken hippies. The water supply resembled a hospital drip so we had plenty of time for lunch before we headed through beautiful countryside to the zoo. We moored for the night a short walk away ,planning to visit in the morning and spent late afternoon sunbathing on the canal bank before calling it a day.