Stranded Hire Boats

We have been loitering around the top of the South Oxford for a couple of weeks, did the Cropredy festival thing and have just had my 9 year old grandson aboard for a week. Bless him he was a brilliant crew member, fetching and carrying, steering and not a murmer about being bored, well only a little one, not surprising being cooped up with two old fogies like us.
Still the weather has been interesting, we were approaching the bend south of bridge 127 yesterday when we spotted a Black Prince boat stranded on the bend, he had approached too fast and failed to make the turn, BANG straight into the Armco, we were half way round when and Oxford Hire boat came too fast the other way and ,Yes, BANG, he bounced off the Black Prince and the straight into the Armco too. We continued on with a wry smile.
This is the 1st night we have been able to add to this blog due to lack of signal and weather, hopefully we shall sprout a little more as the signal improves.
Saturday we are picking up my son's in-laws for a days cruising, they want to learn the ropes as they are off with friends for a week on a hire boat, there friends have hired narrowboats before, they want to be able to impress, saying they have never been afloat before and how easy it is to learn locking and boating!
Has anyone else noticed the hike in Pub food prices recently? We were at the Folly at Napton bottom lock earlier this week, Ham Egg and Chips £7.95, side order of chips £3.20 (and were not talking gourmet food). Is this all over the country or just locally on the cut to hit the summer traffic?