St Martins

We left Hindford late morning in sunshine. In the distance over the hills I could see black clouds and by the time we were going through the 2 locks it was pouring. We hit our first real queue for the lock. 4 boats in front of us and by the time we left there were at least 10 behind. I helped out a grandfather and grandson as they were trying to pull their boat into the bank, they got themselves in a muddle and kept shouting at each other and getting nowhere. I do hope that they relax for the rest of their holiday.

As it was raining we stopped the boat 10 minutes walk away from St Martins. An overgrown housing estate in the middle of beautiful countryside. The church at the centre of the ‘village’ was pretty and a few houses surrounding, but the rest was non descript. We did encounter a nice shop called Stans. It’s the UK’s largest single site independent retailer. Selling food, garden stuff and household goods. It was like going to a supermarket in a foreign country as unlike Tescos, Sainsburys and Morrisons which look pretty much the same wherever you go this has an individual feel and a different vibe about it.

In St Martins we saw a street with the worst pot holes that I have ever seen. A picture just had to be taken for the blog