Narrowboat Balmaha – mostly hanging around Foxton

Monday 11th to Saturday 16th February 2008

Tony’s Turn (Bridge 64, Grand Union, Leicester Line)

If you don’t count walkers this is a very quiet spot. No road sounds, no sirens, no tyre squeals, just the occasional moorhen shriek.

Unfortunately Mark, on nb.Kayos, can’t say the same at Castle Gardens in Leicester. The official image of safety while you shop and visit the numerous restaurants, put around by Leicester tourism office-wallahs, doesn’t hold water. Certainly not when the students are in residence or when children are off school or during the evenings at weekends.

Mark came back to his boat to find two lads running up and down the roof, rocking from side to side with the aim of rolling it over. Two more lads appeared later but the sight of his dog probably deterred them.

Security rails on the bridge and fences around the boat moorings are a joke and certainly no deterrent to children from the age of 8.

How did he feel? He felt threatened and wouldn’t like boaters to think this was anything like the risk- free moorings that councillors would have us believe.

A couple of reels of razor wire would deter unwanted visitors but even that won’t stop the stones coming over from the gardens or the towpath opposite.

It’s time Leicester Councillors paid attention once again to Castle Gardens’ nose-diving reputation.

But back to us. It’s moving time again, anchors up, we chugged on down to Foxton and ‘parked’ at Black Horse Bridge.

We knew Moore2Life was heading our way so I called them up and discovered they were just starting down the Foxton flight and would be with us in an hour. Their arrival was announced by a speeding Molly on the towpath followed by Ann and then Chas bringing up the rear on M2L.

Just had time to cut a couple of sticks for Molly before the games began. Anyone who knows Molly will understand what that means. She gets so excited and no matter how much she’s walked she belts up and down the towpath after sticks and tennis balls until you give up.

Another big moment has arrived - Maisy’s holiday came to an end. Kass, Jess and Claire (sp?) called in for homemade soup and to collect the cat. After they’d gone we rigged up a wind machine to rid ourselves of little white and brown hairs. If only it was that easy.
No more night-time walks along the boat roof, no more dashing for the trees, no more freezing to death while she gets her countryside fix. But it still seems empty without her and one can’t help calling “Maisy, maisy noo-noo” when down that end of the boat.

Having passed nb.Valerie on our down way from Tony’s Turn we thought we’d try to catch Les and scrounge a cup of tea. He was in and just about to get stuck into a sandwich and the internet so we distracted him for half an hour. Lovely fella, lovely tea, glad we stopped by.

Caught the bus to Harbro’ with Chas and Ann on Tuesday. A fabulous, sunny day and a successful shop on my part because I found a 12 volt to 19 volt DC converter for the laptop. Tried twice before but this one delivers 6 amps, just what’s needed. Can’t wait to wire it in and mess around with switches and relays so that the dedicated laptop battery gets charged when the engine is running. Yawning yet?

Shared a bottle and plates of tab-nabs with Chas and Ann later on Balmaha. I do love those shrimpy nibbles.

Wednesday brought a layer of ice to the canal. A boat passed by, breaking the ice, while we were still at breakfast so we all decided we would mosey on down to Great Bowden for a couple of days. The sun was so amazing that we sat out on the stern deck to take lunch and by the afternoon I was dangling worms in the water.
But not to be fooled, we kept the fire going and by dusk we were steaming through the logs we picked up earlier. Molly kindly donated her prize log, covered in tooth marks, thanks Ann.

The bird feeder did a roaring trade in sunflower seeds, the smaller discarded seeds making a mottled grey carpet on the ground which suited the blackbird, robin and chaffinch.

I’ve given up brushing paw marks off my trousers. Chucking sticks for Molly results in the occasional leap up the front with its consequent muddy skid marks around the knees. Oh the joys of winter boating and muddy towpaths.

Friday arrived as it usually does, don’t ask where Thursday went, and we moved off to the south. Chas and Ann went west to meet friends while we did the Union Wharf visit for water and waste.
Met “M” from a resident narrowboat and caught up on his news. He told me he’d had a kidney, spleen and bowel and something else removed but was OK again.
He was happy enough and just off to the pub, although he found his operation had limited his usual four pints to one at the most.

On the way down the sun was out, sort of, but cor it wasn’t half cold round the lug-holes. Fingers can retract into sleeves but lug-holes catch the arctic breeze and have nowhere to hide. Some might comment on my nose but for some reason that isn’t affected, probably because it’s so long that it’s already into tomorrow’s sunshine.

Talking of sunshine, here’s V’s experiment with the camera on the ‘sunset’ setting. A bit orangey but it captures something of the beauty of a winter sky.

Saturday I arose to be greeted by a clear sky, frozen canal and -3 deg C outside. Frozen drips on the inside of roof hatches meant spreading newspaper and waiting for the pitter-patter to stop before running up and down the boat.
Good job it was Saturday because I wasn’t going to get out of bed until the central heating had been on for at least an hour and that meant it was gone eight before I emerged to tackle the wood burner.
As it happens the day warmed fast and the ice disappeared as quickly as it came. Hire boats on the move reminded us it was still school half term somewhere in the country.

V walked down town while I rearranged my job list by inserting “play with HF transceiver” in number one position which involved taking metal covers off, and tracing a power fault. Got caught with my wires out when V returned and so I reluctantly reverted to the “important” jobs list.
I hadn’t been completely bad because I’d remembered to switch on the washing machine. The memory goes when I get absorbed in hobbies.

By mid afternoon I’d done a stint in the hairdresser’s chair, pulled off gunwale covers and plumbed in a 12volt laptop computer supply box.
I was a bit surprised to find water lurking behind the sidewall panels, not enough to cause a problem but enough to show there’s un-foamed steelwork lurking somewhere in there. I’ve seen this in a couple of other places on the boat but it only happens in winter when the temperature outside is at freezing point and latent humidity turns to condensation.

We’re really looking forward to our summer jaunt. A previous trip down south on the Oxford Canal brings back memories of hot days, barbeques and sticky warm nights, lovely.
Within days rather than weeks we’ll be off south again, heading towards the Basingstoke Canal. An Easter bash somewhere near Woking means we’ll be cruising anti-clockwise, taking in the Oxford Canal, River Thames and the Grand Union. I’m having thoughts of calling in at Tower Bridge and maybe popping down to the barrier but she says not. We’ll see.