I want to get afloat again

The threatened rain hadn't arrived by the time I took Helena back to the canal for another visit. She wanted to go to Stonehouse, to the west of Stroud, where the regeneration works had started about two years ago, and to walk all the way home on the towpath. I dropped her off and then drove back to Dudbridge, where I knew I could get a vantage point from a new footbridge over the canal.

There were still many visitors walking along the towpath, but fewer than yesterday, probably because of the events to do with boats and the Jubilee. The other factor was probably the rain, which prompted me to leave the canalside very quickly when the deluge finally broke.

This view is looking eastwards towards Stroud, with the road bridge in the distance that leads up to Cainscross roundabout. Just behind the bridge you can see the canal's water falling over the ruins of the old lock, which will be replaced once the additional flood prevention measures have been installed, and beyond theres is the area of the canal that is currently being rebuilt all the way up to Wallbridge, about one mile distant. Beyond Stroud, the biggest engineering works at the old Capel Mill railway viaduct have just started to breach the two hundred metre gap in the canal ,which was in-filled when a bypass was built in the 1980s.

The boat moving eastwards is Perseverance, owned by the Cotswold Canal Trust and used by Princess Anne in February, when she opened the Wallbridge Lock and Brewery Bridge. This weekend it is being used for short trips along the canal, and is about to moor just this side of the road bridge. Another boat is already loaded and waiting with passengers, and will pull out into the canal when Perseverance nears the bridge.

I used to live on a canal boat in Little Venice, near Paddington, in London, back in the late 1970s, so all this is reminding me of many pleasurable moments of my floating life through all the varied seasons. Before that we used to go as a family to cruise about on the Norfolk Broads in the 1950s, where I learnt to sail dinghies. It is making me want to get another boat so we can potter about on our canal here and enjoy the unique perspectives it offers.

If more money can be raised the next step for the canal's regeneration is to join up again with the Sharpness Canal at Saul Junction, which will allow access down to Bristol or up to Gloucester, the canalised parts of the River Thames and then on to the Midlands and the whole canal network of England and Wales. There is just the small matter of how to get under the M5 motorway, which was built at right angles to the original canal and on top of it! It is possible but will be costly.

Helena has just arrived home safely, and only slightly wet.