Much time has passed and life has continued with many uncertainties and adaptations to the new norm…I have now been living on the canals for almost 23 weeks! So over the course of the next few blogs, I thought I would give some recaps from life with the Corona Canal Club, aka myself, my mum, and my stepdad.

To follow on from the last blog, I had settled into a routine of online working, continued research and analysis for my Masters, camp fires in our canal garden, daily fun with Brock the dog, and a growing kinship between a cute family of ducks and myself. They would ‘call on me’ in the mornings if I hadn’t yet sighted them, and after some time, they began to eat from my hand. Brock got jealous for the divide in my attention, and at times it was hard to know if he understood he wasn’t a duck himself (He came to love eating the birdseed I was keeping in constant supply for Sparky and his siblings!).

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There were some beautiful sunny warm days, but I was mostly sat attached to the laptop, feeling like I was slowly going insane with square-eyes, screen time, and little exposure to the outside world. Days rolled into one, as we manoeuvred our way around each other for internet signal, use of the bathroom, sharing meals, music and film tastes, playing cards, and ways to see my sister and her boys, whilst maintaining appropriate social distancing.

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Meanwhile, life had become ultra simplistic, with no traffic to fight against, limited time in supermarkets, no social meetups, less and less time on the phone, as I was getting frequent headaches from Zoom etc, and we moved the boat only for our water refills, pumpouts, and food collections. Small things turned into big adventures, such as the access to a canalside shop during one such cruise, leading to the only case of Corona any of us have experienced during this whole period…

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However, with the announcement of the eased lockdown, it was time to make our farewells, not only to my beloved Sparky and kin, and of course beautiful Brock, but to our lockdown friends, who had been in the Hurleston junction with us.

And then, the next chapter began, with an ‘almost’ return to normal, as we began movement along the canals once more. Although not before we had refilled on our delicious free-range eggs from the local farm, and after getting back into the swing of things with the locks on our way.

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More updates to follow, in Corona Canal Chronicles #2!