Locked in

We had been marooned at Clarence dock for 6 days when finally the River Aire came down to normal river levels. BW opened the gates on Wednesday morning to allow us boaters to leave. We had a bit of a problem though for on the previous Sunday morning little Oliver was taken ill. He had chronic sickness and diarrhoea and at eighteen he certainly couldn't afford to be off colour. Dave was very worried and decided to go home for a few days so that his own vet could look after him. The vet wasn't sure what had caused the problem but thought he might have a virus. When the boat got soaked and all the carpets got wet it was quite possible that Olly may have picked up something from the canal water. Dave phoned us the next day to say that Olly would have to be put on a drip because he had become very dehydrate, therfore he wouldn't be returning to the boat until the Friday. Now this caused us somewhat of a dilemma. We had planned to be back on the Erewash Canal and to our moorings on the 11th or 12th of September because both Dennis and Margaret and ourselves were due to go to Ireland with the E C P & D A ( Erewash Canal Preservation and Development Association ) on one of Shelia's "gadabouts" on the 21st. Dave had also mentioned that as we had been due to return via the tidal Trent to Nottingham, the tides were now all wrong and there was no hope of us getting back in time. So..... we decided that the best thing for Ian and myself was to return the way we came and head for Wheelton were we had arranged to leave the boat for 10 days. Hopefully our first grandchild will also be born during this time. As we were also due to go onto the Llangollen in early October this was the only sensible thing for us to do. This would take us about 6 days so with a heavy heart we said farewell to Dennis and Margaret on the Thursday morning. We didn't see Dave or Heather as they wouldn't be returning until a day later. Both Dave and Dennis would continue on there journey down the River and hopefully leave their boats at Heck just outside Goole. They would then return after the Ireland trip and take their boats back to their moorings at Langley Mill.