When we arrived in the UK last night, I checked the weather forecast and rather wished I hadn’t. It was a pleasant surprise then to wake up to glorious sunshine, so it was boots on and up the towpath before you could say ‘Grand Union’.
When Turkey started going through a rather politically turbulent phase a couple of years back, which coincided with the arrival of some new grandchildren and nephews and nieces, we re-thought our decision not to have a base in the UK and bought a house in Warwick, near to our respective families.
We were lucky enough to find a very sweet terraced house just one street back from the canal, which is not only our main thoroughfare to shops, pubs and the town centres of Warwick and Leamington, but also our principal place of exercise. The canal is an ever-changing source of fascination for us.
This time of year is particularly pretty, with daffodils and hyacinths lining the banks, and plenty of folk had been tempted out on this sunny and mild Good Friday.
Quite a lot of them were occupying the outside tables at The Cape, one of our favourite canalside pubs, but we resisted the temptation to stop for a swift half, and made it as far as the first locks of the famous ‘Hatton Flight’ before retracing out steps back to Warwick.
The Cape is known in our household as ‘the one drink pub’, as it is necessary to cross the lock (very deep and full of extremely dirty water) by way of a narrow lock gate to get back on to our side of the canal. As neither of us is known for our agility prowess, we’ve never attempted it after more than one drink – perhaps we’ll give it a go this summer.
aviewfrommykitchen.com 