Narrowboat Journal

Narrowboat Balmaha – Harbro’ Arm (still)

2009-11-15T15:47:55+01:00

Tuesday 10th to Sunday 15th November 2009

We start the week at one of our favourite spots on the Harbro’ Arm, just out of range of the bone factory between a row of trees and open fields sloping down to the A6. When the wind is in the right direction this is as peaceful as it gets. We get our share of walkers, some in a hurry and some that love to chat like the fella who wanted to talk about our way of life and his sorrow at not having a boat. People like that remind me that we are very privileged.
Of course, the topic changes when it’s pouring down or we’re deep in snow, but today the sun is doing its best to disperse the mist and the birds are singing and the colours of autumn are amazing.

Wednesday
The solar panel is doing nothing these days (as little as 1 or 2 amp-hours a day) and the batteries call for 4 to 5 hours of engine running each day. We might as well move while the engine is running so we upped-sticks and pottered on down to Market Harborough, to the visitor’s moorings at Union Wharf.

I keep thinking how nice it would be to find a silent running generator that uses gas, runs for a month on a cylinder and is small enough to fit in the engine compartment.

Dreaming done I dived below the deck and changed the oil and filters while V popped down the shops. We’ve clocked up 5600 engine hours in under 4 years, perhaps half the life of this engine if oil change intervals correspond to 6,000 miles on a car.

There were lots of familiar faces in the wharf but a couple of boats are missing, one owner is rumoured to have gone to Spain, permanently. Half the hireboats were missing too though no mystery there, they’ve gone for repainting.

Thursday brought us sunshine in the form of Mike and Jo from Sarah-Kate. Though we haven’t seen them for months we’ve followed their travels on the other side of the country and imagined ourselves cruising with them into Liverpool docks. Memory sticks and TVs are marvellous things and after sharing news and experiences we sat glued to the screen in a guided tour of the old docks, regenerated warehouses and, best for me, ships of every kind.

Though the summer wasn’t too hot and sunny this year we can’t complain about too much rain up until now. The downside is that the reservoirs are still low on water and our winter cruising could be affected.
There is a rumour that the Foxton Locks closure will starve the canal of water between here and Leicester and our pre Christmas cruising plans will be scuppered. That’s unless the gales predicted this weekend work wonders on Saddington reservoir.

Friday
Our 48 hours are up so we’re on the move again. While V did the shops I did the necessary at the services and cruised to bridge 14 where we met again.

Later on Claire and Ter popped in for a meal and a mail drop, leaving early evening just before the rain fell.

Saturday
What a night it was, thought we were going to lose everything from the roof. I’ve two sets of legs for folding chairs up there (don’t ask, it’s a project) and wouldn’t have been too happy if those had gone over the side.

Sunday
Fishing match day. There are voices on the towpath before 8.30am and sure enough there are anglers taking up position with their armchairs, drinks dispensers and tubs of coloured nibbles.

Sun’s out and so will be the paint brushes. We use the BrushMate system of keeping used paint brushes fresh and ready for action. There’s been quite a bit written about it recently what with Herbie, then Granny Buttons and now Bones talking about the usefulness of BrushMate boxes with vapour pads for keeping paint soft. Best thing since sliced bread I reckon. I only wish there were Brushmate reps on the cut, they do seem to be few and far between.

We’ll probably stay here a couple of days, me tickling the paintwork, V listening to her library ‘talking’ book.

Only trouble is that while we’re sitting here someone else is picking up all the fallen wood from Friday night’s gales. We’ve seen a few wood burning boats on the Harbro’ Arm, I just hope they leave some for us.

On a completely different subject we were horrified to hear about Sue and Vic’s dog Meg cutting herself badly this week. Hope she mends quickly. And talking of mending, we’re keeping an eye on a boat build at Kevin’s, looking especially for gimmicks and fancy new ideas for me to copy. There’s a challenge for you Kevin.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Wistow to Harbro’ Arm

2009-11-10T14:00:53+01:00

Monday 2nd to Monday 9th November 2009

The diary says we’re due in Foxton at the weekend so we started out from Wistow on Monday, straight after the early morning showers.

Heading for Kibworth we parted a thick carpet of newly fallen leaves. It’s a bit of a pain when they get wrapped round the prop but at least it isn’t floating pennywort.
Progress wasn’t made any easier by low water levels and the familiar clickety-clunk warned us that we were picking up debris from the canal bed.

We passed the occasional boat with a smoking chimney telling us someone was at home, but otherwise we had the place to ourselves. What was left of the leaves on the trees looked lovely, so I am told, in their yellows, red and browns though I much prefer the fresh greens of spring, but what do I know.

Fleckney gave us empty moorings, hedge to hedge sunshine and a couple of days to put our feet up. V gave me the nod so I gathered a few wires and scrambled up on deck to do my Marconi bit.
65 feet of wire 30 feet up got me through to Graham’s cousin Malcolm in Shropshire (5&8 on 10 watts). I know propagation conditions are good but this is a first for me and prompted me to start making my own Z match aerial tuner.
The second experiment with a 30 foot whip was a disaster on 80 meters so I’m now looking for a piece of 2” diameter drain pipe to make a base loading coil. V hates this sort of thing because it means that while I stop and check every builder’s skip along the way, she has to stand guard and cough if anyone comes along.

Tuesday
Strange things happened this morning between 8.30 and 9am. Canal water charged off in the direction of Kibworth locks and in minutes our home was on the mud. We waited and waited for a boat to appear but when nothing came under the bridge we guessed someone was fixing the low water problem between Kibworth and Wistow. It didn’t last long, an hour or so later we were afloat and the cupboard doors stayed shut again.

Rain stopped me playing outdoors so I set to with the screwdriver and pulled the covers off the bedroom finrads. How did all that fluff get in there?

Got carried away with the sander and discovered just how thin the top layer is on ash veneered plywood. Unfortunately re-varnishing only made it look worse.

Wednesday
Someone decided I wasn’t getting enough fresh air so the coat and shoes came out for an airing. Fleckney with its few but very useful shops and post office is only ten minutes away so I made it there and back without whinging. Didn’t see a single builder’s skip so I’m still in the market for drain pipe.

I don’t know why, but our MSC water gauge needs adjusting every few months. Maybe it’s a temperature thing because it corresponds with the onset of summer and winter. Trouble is it means emptying a packed cupboard where I keep all my secrets and I find the whole thing such a distraction that what could be done in ten minutes takes a complete afternoon.

Thursday
It’s time to leave because I’m in danger of liking it here, my feet are growing roots.
After testing the tunnel light we set off through Saddington to Foxton via Debdale. Don’t know why I said via Debdale, there’s no choice in the matter is there. Not that I’ve got anything against Debdale you’ll understand.

Seeing Foxton was like seeing an old mate again, nothing has changed, the same buildings, the same old faces.
Popped into the shop and bought engine oil and filters from Foxton Boat Services (Beta agents) but surprised how much the filters have jumped in price.
We’ve done 5600 engine hours in under four years and I’ve given up counting the oil changes, we’re still on the original set of fanbelts though.

Moored halfway between the boat basin and the village where it used to be a 14 day limit but is now 48 hours. The canals are going the same way as town and city parking – ever increasing restrictions. Me-thinks there’s a move to tighten things even further because photographs were being taken around Blackhorse Bridge, official looking people who checked the boats and then the cars in the layby. And it doesn’t look like holiday snaps to me.

Friday
Caught the bus to Harbro’ this morning for supplies, it’s still one pound each way if you buy a return, free for me of course.
Back at Foxton we found Keith and Jo on Hadar, fresh up from Harbro’.

Tea and coffee flowed while we got to the bottom of Keith’s recent health problems.
We marvelled at how calm they were after all the poking and prodding and still not having answers. Here’s hoping everything gets sorted quickly so that Keith can put hospitals behind him.

Saturday
At Blackhorse Bridge we found Kass, number one daughter and her fella Joe. While they popped over to Mary’s to see the twins we counted the Jo(e)s we knew. There’s Jo and Keith, Jo and Mike, Jo and Alan (x2), at least five of them. The evening found me all confused as the topics of conversation switched between family, weddings and Joe (or Jo), you know how girls are, mind reading half the time and changing the subject without announcing it.

Sunday was a practical day, so I could take part too.

With Joe steering we cruised down to Great Bowden and back, taking in the pleasures of autumn countryside colours and the glue factory fragrances.

Joe was particularly unimpressed by the glue factory and gladly accepted the offer of a gas mask for our return journey through the pongs.

It was dark before our visitors left and almost light again before our buzzing minds slowed enough to let us sleep. It was good to see them so happy together, with so much in common and most of their lives still in front of them. The next visit will include Maisy, the other princess. That should be ‘fun’. I can guess who’ll have to do the after-dark walks along the boat roof, runs down the towpath and leaping up trees in the pitch black, freezing nights around Christmas time.

Monday
Knowing coal-boat Hadar was leaving the area, on her way to Welford, we set off in pursuit for a couple of purchases.
Two bags of coal should do us for now and we’re trying Jo’s ‘blue’ to see if it does the job. I’ve tried several ‘blues’ over the years but always come back to Elsan’s thick, dark blue fluid, it gets no complaints from either of us, but it would be nice to get away from its spiralling price.

Goodies stowed we said our goodbyes to Keith and Jo and while we made use of the services at the end of the inclined plane arm, Keith and Jo chugged through the basin and into the first lock on their way up the flight to the summit.

While they’re servicing customers down south we’ll amuse ourselves somewhere between Harbro’ and Leicester.

For now, we’re happy out in the countryside east of Foxton, miles from the crowds, with the birdfeeder hanging on a nail attracting the finches, blue tits and a little grey mouse that darts between the twigs at the base of the tree.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Raynsway to Wistow

2009-11-01T17:17:52+01:00

Tuesday 27th October to Sunday 1st November 2009

Last week we called in at Raynsway Marina and left our floating home in safe hands while we motored down to our David’s place in Bournemouth for Matt and Hannah’s wedding.

I have to say it was a brilliant wedding, not at all your standard stuff, very different to the low-budget job I was at thirty-something years ago. We never had chocolate fountains and Frank Sinatra at our reception. Come to think of it we had to wait weeks before we could see the photographs and I don’t remember anyone capturing the moment with a movie camera.

After the service, during the photographs, we discovered many old friends from our Bomo days and played the game of linking strange looking twenty-year-olds to their parents who, in the main, had hardly changed since we moved away.

And here we are modelling the latest going ashore wear.

But as often happens the time raced by and my check list of people and places to see was hardly touched when it was time to leave. Overnighting in Bristol, we picked up MiL and brought her back to the boat so that she could visit her first great grandchildren, twins Evie and George.

On that subject I just want to say that I don’t ever want to hear another complaint about me taking too many photos of the same thing. In one week I’ve seen the twins with aunty, twins with uncle, twins with grandparents, twins with great-grandmother, twins with uncle Tom Cobbly and all.

Back at Raynsway, on Tuesday, we pulled the plug on the shore line (with many tears) and saying our farewells to Manager Dave and Dil we slipped away onto the river in the direction of Leicester.

I don’t know whether the bridge repairs at Birstall Lock have deterred boaters from going through Leicester but the rubbish on the water was the worst I’ve ever seen. What would normally pass through the lock during normal boat activity has built up and looks quite daunting when making an exit on the upstream side. Proper prop stopping stuff. Try saying that quickly.

The water levels in town were quite low after many weeks without rain so we crawled along so as not to disturb the domestic refuse beneath us.
While some rivers have a carpet of weed, Leicester just has a carpet (or two or three). We saw coconuts galore, outnumbering footballs this time and wondered if this was connected to an outbreak of flu. Or perhaps coconuts are cheaper than footballs this year.

North Lock, next to Frog Island, is one of those places worth a visit to see unusual jetsam. I once pulled out a pack of prepaid phone cards and spent a happy hour sifting through them looking for unspent ones, though where I’d use them I haven’t a clue. This time it was a sleeping pigeon. I lifted him gently from the water but couldn’t wake him. He wouldn’t have thanked me anyway, once he’d seen the state of his feathers.

Saying a few words I committed him to the earth behind the stinging nettles and placed his leg rings in a jar of weak bleach to deal with later.
What do you want those for, asked V. I must report it to the RPRA, said I, and did my best to fill out the form on the Royal Pigeon Racing Association’s website.
RPRA were kind enough to thank me and pass the details to the owner who lives in Leeds. I had to explain to V that racing pigeon owners like to know which birds go astray so that they can wring the necks of any in the persistent offender’s breeding line. Sounds awful doesn’t it. I don’t know who told me that but someone did.

The following day we stopped to talk to BW, or their contractors, cutting stray branches at Ervin’s Lock and I was shocked to hear they were ordered to destroy all cuttings, yes even trunks and branches, because there was a risk that they would end up in the canal and do damage to locks. What a shame and what a waste.

Changing the subject, the prettiest garden through Leicester has to be this one in South Wigston. Year on year it never changes, summer or winter someone keeps it immaculate.

At Kilby Bridge we saw a few familiar faces, some of the nicest blue shirts can be seen here early in the mornings. Looks like a work party is preparing for lock repairs somewhere in the west, Dunn’s lock to Gee’s lock stoppage perhaps?

The buses through Kilby Bridge have changed since we’ve been away. The X4 to Leicester is now the 49B and its route includes bits of Wigston Meadows. V pointed out that it was a good job I didn’t go to town as first planned because I’d either still be there or hopelessly lost on the 49 or 49A.

MiL made her escape after doing the twins-in-arms bit. Claire and Ter did the running around (they’re wonderful people) and we were back on the road the same day, on our own with the water lapping at our feet and the wind in our faces. It felt strange sleeping in our bed that first night. I’d got used to sitting up without dodging the overhead wood panelling and within hours I’d cracked my nut a couple of times whilst turning over.

Wistow is our home for the weekend. Storms are forecast for Sunday but Saturday was perfect for experimenting with electronics and home made aerial matching units. Graham (G8LUV) loaned me two bits of kit to try out and once the boat jobs were done I was allowed to play with the wireless. These were no doubt the most successful transmissions from the boat so far, though I guess atmospheric conditions played a large part in that. Now all that remains is to find a way of operating inside the boat because V remarked that I was attracting strange looks from people walking by.

Sunday is a stay indoors day. It’s blowing a gale outside. Leaves, like birds, are going horizontal past our portholes. V was talking about walking to the garden centre but after this morning’s rain I think we should give that a miss. Unlike yesterday we’ve not had one boat go past us, not so much as a single hire boat.

Short term plans are to meet up with our daughter and her intended and get to see poor old Keith and Jo on Hadar, on the Harbro’ Arm.
There’ll also be a planning meeting where we’ll decide what canals and rivers will have the pleasure of our company next year. I’m all for popping across to France on a calm day but I think someone might veto that one.
I have to say it’s brilliant being back on the water after messing about in cars and houses, even after leaving on the lights and flushing the loos every two minutes without the worry of having to empty them.

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Narrowboat Balmaha

2009-10-22T12:55:28+02:00

Monday 19th to Monday 26th October 2009

Sorry, sorry, sorry there’s no Blog this week.

Access to the internet has been terrible on T-Mobile so there’s no chance of posting pictures and besides, we’re going south for a few days to Hannah and Matthew’s wedding.

I guess it sounds like excuses and so it is.

Normal service will be restored shortly.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Trent Lock to Old Junction Lock

2009-10-19T16:38:11+02:00

Monday 12th to Sunday 18th October 2009

After a brilliant weekend at Trent Lock - even Sunday turned out nice - we returned to our cruising plan and under blue skies, without a trace of breeze, we said goodbye to the River Trent and hello to the River Soar.
We nattered to a Canaltime hirer while we took on water and I laughed when he mentioned his reluctance to go down the river from Sawley because the maps didn’t show anywhere to turn the boat. The same thing happened to us in the summer when we couldn’t see where to turn a sixty footer on the Aire & Calder. Of course it all became clear when we got there, the navigation is so wide that winding points aren’t worth mentioning.

The cruise to Loughborough, with a stop-over at Zouch, went without incident and the boat basin was welcoming with plenty of spaces. Best O’ Mates was there as we pulled in, just off up the road like ourselves for a spot of shopping.

The night was spent at bridge 34 which seems to be gathering popularity as a stop-over between towns. Sunny days and clear skies at night produce blue-grey mornings with mist off the fields swirling across the water.

Pillings flood lock was open again after last week’s heavy rain but we were reminded that with the winter approaching normal lock operations would soon come into effect.
The uphill side of Old Junction Lock looked too attractive to miss so we pitched on the rings and spread out across the towpath with table and chairs making the most of the sunshine.

Thinking it was warm enough for paint to dry I sanded and varnished the utility room floor. Leaving the windows open to get the air to circulate I walked off looking for a distraction and hearing the click-click of lock paddle gear I poked my nose out to see who was coming our way.

It was Dave and Dil on Trundle with her fresh coat of bitumen (Trundle’s not Dil’s).
Well one thing led to another, chatting made the throat dry, wine fixed that and before we knew it the afternoon was gone. Aren’t boaters lovely.

The weather on Thursday was a complete contrast with wall-to-wall drizzle and to make matters worse the computer’s mouse died. Nothing for it but to get on with boat jobs or, at the very least, make lists of boat jobs and decide who will do them another day.

The weekend was a bit special with visitors from the south. Roger and Babs came up to see us and while the weather behaved itself we pottered about on the Soar.

Someone mentioned walking and I could see the subject wouldn’t go away by ignoring it so I joined the party on a tramp along fields, woods and country roads in a sweep around Cossington.

We chanced across the Royal Oak about mid way which was most welcome for resting the legs and reviving the spirits.

I have to say that having another boater like Roger to chew over ideas with is so, so useful. Problems shared are problems halved most of the time and a fresh mind on a troublesome subject often produces simpler solutions

Taking of fresh, we’ve a fresh topic of discussion these days – Signal Crayfish.
We’d just tied up one afternoon this week when V pointed at something in the water next to the boat.
Being curious I lifted this thing out and discovered a freshwater crayfish of the imported Signal variety. Well that’s what the fella on the bike said.

He had just the one claw (not the biker) but seemed very keen get me with it so I thought it better if he return to the water before losing a finger.

Aha, said the local guy, these are nasty imported crayfish, vermin, not nice to English crayfish and not nice to anything small enough to go in their mouths. Fish numbers are in decline, he said, because they eat the eggs. Nothing survives once these critters get a hold, so he said.
But then he dropped a bombshell, he said we must on no account put them back in the river, it’s against the law.
Oh dear said I and proceeded to get him back out again. But the next one had two claws. Anxious not to make things any worse I asked him what we should do with it. Eat it he said. 5 minutes in boiling water, then eat it and another twenty of his friends, with salad.

My first investigation into the matter of catching and disposing of ‘Signals’ has opened a real can of worms. It seems you can’t do anything right with them, they mustn’t be caught and if accidentally caught they mustn’t be released.

I can’t release him and I can’t be sure what I should do with him. I would put a collar and lead on him but he hasn’t got a neck. He’ll want to play in the water won’t he, does he eat the same things as us I wonder. Where will he sleep at night? We shall have to keep and eye on him at night too, don’t want him getting lonely but V’s tooth glass is already cramped without him going in there.
Where do we stand on the subject of signal crayfish, should we catch his brothers and supplement our meagre diet with fresh fish? Or are we stuck with him, doomed to be followed by the little fella for the rest of his days. Do they make good pets I wonder.

One thing I do know is that he’s vicious, go anywhere near him and both claws go up in the air. He’s not afraid of humans, that’s for sure.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Sileby Mill to Trent Lock

2009-10-11T20:23:57+02:00

Tuesday 6th to Sunday 11th October 2009

Had a surprise call this week from friends Dave and Margaret from Cornwall who were out for a couple of weeks on a hire boat in the West Midlands. Dave bumped into Bill and Michelle on a visit from N.Carolina and cruising on their boat nb.Shilling and our names came up in conversation.
We met blog readers Bill and Michelle in Braunston back in October last year and they remembered us. What a small world we live in.

This looks like being a quiet week. We’re hanging around Sileby Mill doing pre-winter boat jobs and getting that horrible tax return out of the way.

The mornings are developing a wintery look with the sun low on the horizon filtering its light through the mist. But within minutes the effect has gone as the sun rises above the hedge.

I’ve just bought one of those hot glue guns and wonder why I’ve never had one before, they’re brilliant. I wander up and down the boat looking for things that need sticking. But I discovered that this glue doesn’t like silicone, the roof vent surround fell off a day later. Now I’m wondering if it comes unstuck in water. It says on the box that you shouldn’t try to pull the glue off your skin, the skin comes off too. Whatever, I still think it’s brilliant.

Just across the river from us nb.Trundle, from Raynsway Marina, is having having her bottom blacked so we popped over for a cuppa and a natter with Dave and Dil. Glad we did because they helped solve the question of where to meet up with cousin Roger and Babs when they pop up for a weekend. That’s one downfall with rivers, there aren’t that many places to leave a car for a couple of nights.

Thursday
A rainstorm the other night brought fresh water down the Soar along with rafts of floating pennywort, the stuff that was treated in July. Someone must have switched fertiliser for weedkiller because there’s loads of the stuff, it looks like it had a good summer this year.

Once the dreaded weed had passed we set off downstream calling in at Loughborough for munchies and a post box for my Kent aunt’s ninetieth card.
Seeing as how they tell us we’re all living longer these days you’d think there would be a reasonable choice of cards on the rack. A choice of two, that’s all I had. I was going to send a funny one and write my own words but V reminded me that not everyone understood my stupid sense of humour. She’s a girl, I let her choose.

Every time we came across a mooring place on the journey down the Soar we discussed its merits and passed it by, thinking we could just go that bit farther and save journey time the next day. We eventually finished up at Redhill tired out and ready to drop, unfit or what?
The power station’s fumes were blowing t’other way and we hardly heard a sound from the works so decided this was another spot we could add to our list of acceptable moorings.

Friday’s cruising lasted all of ten minutes because we were a stone’s throw from our destination Trent Lock and the pontoon outside the Navigation pub.

Nb. Best o’ Mates joined us for a couple of hours before motoring back up the Soar. He corrected my belief that there was cheap diesel on the Erewash because he’s from these parts so the next time I see that red and yellow boat I’ll give its skipper a piece of my mind. 46p a litre, huh.
Thought we might bump into Mark from nb.Lorimar as he works nearby but it wasn’t to be. We’ll catch up with you another time Mark.

Saturday was good for meeting relatives. A new aunt this time, one I only discovered a couple of years ago. She runs a hardware and sweet shop in a small town in Derbyshire so there was no time to lose in finding her. Cousin Sue brought her down to the boat and I’m afraid our first conversation must have sounded more like an interrogation as I tried to fill in the gaps in my knowledge of the ancestors. They left us with black and white photos, cake and a Draper tools catalogue, one couldn’t ask for more. I think a 72 piece drill set might be in order before too long.

Sunday is gun practise day. Somewhere across the fields they’re blasting away at something or other but from within the boat it sounds just like a tennis match between beginners. A couple of volleys and then quiet while they picked up the balls from the net.

Narrowboats compete with sailing dinghies for the water outside Trent Lock. Yesterday we saw raft races in the morning, followed by canoes and sailing dinghies of various shapes and sizes, accompanied by rescue boats that dashed here and there towing boats and crews back to safety. The raft races had us in stitches, the yells of excitement started before they’d even let go of the bank and within minutes one was up-ended spilling the crew into the water. Great fun too for those of us watching.

This morning around 9am we were greeted by the strains of ging-gang-gooly-gooly-watcha from a circle of uniforms and the raising of the red duster that signalled the start of sailing practise.

Boats coming down the Trent zigzagged as they tried to work out who was going to tack when and where. Most of us seem to be woefully ignorant of the rules of the road when approaching sailing boats and seeing how so many ran down the marker buoys in the centre channel some of us haven’t a clue why they are there or the dangers of snagging one with the propeller.

I suppose the weather will improve once the sailing is over, prayers for wind will change to prayers of sunshine for the journey home and we’ll see an end to this breeze and drizzle.

Something else to see the back of, is snoring. Not hers this time but mine. It’s starting to affect my quality pillow time because I’m getting jabbed in the back every five minutes. I don’t know what has started it, I’ve never been a snorer, it’s always been someone else’s problem. I now find I can’t nod-off in front of the TV, my snoring startles me.

Perhaps the dinette is a temporary solution but there has to be something that will fix the problem, anyone got any cures?

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Barrow to Sileby Mill

2009-10-06T12:23:19+02:00

Monday 28th September to Monday 5th October 2009

The week (in brief).

Boat bottom blacking isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and whilst we happily did it ourselves two years ago I thought we’d give someone else the pleasure this year.
While Sileby Mill Boatyard did the dirty work we would be free to walk the countryside, sit and read the papers, watch TV and more or less please ourselves for the four days the boat is out of the water. But it wasn’t to be, there’s much to be done while she’s on land like repairing the stern band paintwork, repairing bow and stern fenders and messing about with the steelwork that sits under or near the waterline.

For me this week was business as usual while I tested painting skills and ‘prepared’ for our first Boat Safety Examination.

This is our first ever visit to Sileby Mill Boatyard and our choice for bottom blacking turned out to be a good one.

The staff were friendly, efficient and they accommodated all our needs. While Dave did the dirty work I pottered about doing my bits, tidying up the gloss paint and pulling away four years of accumulated clutter from near the copper pipes between gas locker and cooker.

My experiment two years ago where I brushed on extra thick layers of Intertuf produced no noticeable differences to the rest of the hull below the waterline.

Out of the water she looked to be in good shape with hardly any rust spots showing but once Dave had done his work with the jetwash several million rust patches the size of new penny pieces came to light and it looked the same as it did after I’d blasted it two years ago.

Since International’s Intertuf is fetching a price in the high 30s we’ve switched to Rylard’s bitumen at £24 a tin and Dave rolled rather than brushed two coats with a third coat at the waterline.
We’ll see what that looks like in two years time.

Now that the bitumen is on and dried I have to say it’s a pity the best part of the boat can’t be appreciated because it’s under water.

Gas safety examination was done by Chris Williams of Ovation Boat Services who lives aboard a couple of boats at Sileby. I shall try to use him again in another four years because he completely relaxed me with his friendliness and boat chat, so much so that I almost forgot to ask him if we’d passed. V didn’t want to be around so she went exploring but you really wouldn’t know an examination was happening, he almost does it without you noticing. He travels a fair distance for installation, repair and BSS exams and to cover the Midlands he bases his work at Braunston as well as up here.

Apart from the paintwork and gas safety there were plenty of distractions as Dave and Dil from nb.Trundle at Raysway Marina called in at the yard to prepare for their blacking on Monday and Keith and Jo from nb.Hadar called in on their way south to the Foxton to Mkt Harbro boat procession on the 10th October. You do meet some super people on the canals don’t you.

What I thought was a candle making business next to Sileby’s mill has turned out to be a workshop making candlesticks, clocks and unusual household objects from iron.

If you’re stuck for a Christmas present this year then how about iron foxgloves or an unusual log basket for the fire or a clock made from a steel RSJ. I think I can safely say you won’t find these things in the shops, they must be unique to Sileby Mill Candlestick factory.

I found the workshops fascinating with presses, lathes and stamping machines banging away below the exhibits on the floor above. The shop upstairs is worth a visit if you’re passing through and while you’re there take a look at the sign on the boatyard gate.

Blacking and boat safety done (passed first time) we were trailered back into the water on Friday.

Saturday was crew change day with V going to her Mums and Mike (ex Hyperion) joining for a weekend cruise. There was food in the fridge and instructions on how to get it out and onto the plate. Mike brought bottles galore and a whopping great cake (thanks Pat) so we had no excuse to be miserable.

Our cruise down river to Zouch and back went like a dream with neither of us falling in, though someone did lose his hat in the high winds.

The food turned out alright, the bottles disappeared at an alarming rate and I have to say I found Mike’s company very agreeable, this last couple of days being a bit like a holiday for me.

V’s back at any moment and I’m running late so while the floor varnish is drying, the washing machine spinning and newly acquired music belting out I’ll upload this drivel before I run out of time.

Normal service will be resumed next posting, my editor will be back to correct mistakes (facts, dates and spelling), and I shall be rid of this silly smile that the mouse gets when the cat is away.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Holme Pierrepont to Barrow on Soar

2009-09-27T16:24:37+02:00

Monday 21st to Sunday 27th September 2009.

Monday
Ought to have been tired this morning after a late-ish night in the company of Steve and Diane off Festina Lente but managed to keep to schedule as we slipped away from Holme Lock at half nine.
A lovely couple, Steve and Diane are easy to get on with and, like V, are able to laugh once again after careers in teaching. It will be lovely to see them again but our cruising paths for next year probably won’t overlap.

Nottingham was our next stop, alongside Sainsbury’s and a short walk from town. Ropes went through rings and feet hit the pavement running (almost) as there was plenty to do. The shopping list was short but tricky, something to wear for a wedding and bits for my hobbies. Both mutually exclusive and somehow to be blended with Nottingham’s cultural bits.

I managed two shirts but V threw a wobbly when I pointed her at the kind of clothes I’d like to see her wearing. She changed her mind and so plan B came into effect and we finished up walking miles out of town to Meadow Lane down by the County Ground which we’d passed on the boat this morning.
Anchor Supplies had everything I could possibly need. It’s full of ex MOD equipment and every bin, bucket and shelf had to be thoroughly examined for things that are must-haves for the boat or my hobbies. The guy running the tools department soon twigged where we were from and proceeded to interest us in his developing chandlery section. It turned out he had his own boat at Sawley and we could tell he’d rather be sailing than selling. I could have spent more than my four pounds but baulked at the £395 they wanted for the pneumatic 20 metre telescopic mast.

Tuesday was a little better. Aching legs or not, we managed Maplins on the northeast side of town before checking out The Victoria Centre with its millions of shops and then the Broadmarsh Centre with its hundreds of shops.

But the best bits lay several feet below us - the famous Nottingham caves.
After coughing up a tenner (one standard plus one concession) we donned hats and carried speaking boxes down to the subterranean caverns.

These caves have served as pottery kilns, a tannery, slum dwellings, railway tunnel, air raid shelters, and in recent years as the foundations for Broadmarsh shopping centre.

Carved out of a softish sandstone they served the residents above for drinking water, cess pits, hiding places for outlaws and if rumours are to be believed, temporary accommodation for Robin Hood.
Many of the caves have been re-equipped and fitted with dummies to illustrate some of the occupations carried on inside them.

1940s air raid warden.

16th century tannery.

Just about worth the money I’d say, providing you make use of the speaking thing that you can hang round your neck. We tried synchronising two of them but gave up when we had to stop and restart at each new section of tunnel. I could hear V’s machine chundering along at least two rooms away so how it would sound with several parties walking together I can’t imagine.

Above ground, wars and revolutions destroyed the castle and for some reason we didn’t feel inclined to do the big museum tour but preferred to walk downhill to the free museum below. The sandstone tump under the castle wall, however, is quite impressive with its shuttered cave entrances which, according to the book, are still to be explored.

The Brewhouse Yard Museum is free to locals or £3.50 to visitors, so it was a good job we were local at the time.

This place is fascinating, and well equipped with shops we used to know and love.
Also fascinating was the conversation between one old boy in his nineties and a not so old lady with whom he recalled his work on the very first computer, naming colleagues I’m certain I’ve seen in technology history books. Born in 1915 I think he said.

Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem pub didn’t get a visit either I’m afraid, we’ll save that for next time. It claims to be the oldest pub in England but I thought the oldest continually licensed premises was in Norton St Philip near Bristol. Perhaps the two things aren’t the same.

Nottingham has trams too and they are terribly smart in appearance but my impressions were that they’re too infrequent and spend too long waiting at traffic lights.

Not far from Sainsbury’s a wet looking ratty sat by the towpath. Nothing seemed to scare him so I’m assuming he’s eaten something he shouldn’t have and was on his way into the canal.

Wednesday by contrast was a quiet day cruising the remainder of the Nottingham and Beeston Canal and the short section of the Trent to its junction with the Soar.

I don’t know if boaters feed the cat off the boat nearest to the Beeston lock services but it ain’t half noisy. As soon as we tied up it jumped off the boat and came running towards us yelling for attention. Pity I didn’t bring ratty with me.

For those of us interested in mason’s marks there are a few faint ones in the stonework of Cranfleet Lock. Mostly T shapes, butterflies and arrows they appear in fairly recent stonework so there’s a good chance the mason who did it is still around. I’ll spare you the photos.

Thinking our feet had healed we tried walking up the Erewash Canal but gave up after a mile and returned home just as it got dark. The Erewash looks quite pretty at this end so we thought we might give it a try if there’s time before the winter stoppages. Someone told me diesel was cheaper too so there’s another reason to go.

We said our goodbyes to the Trent and poked the bows at the Soar early on Thursday morning.
Calling at Kegworth Marine for diesel and gas we took on gas. Seeing the diesel price of 59p we couldn’t sail past but we soon discovered that the owner only sells it on a 60:40 split.
I didn’t argue but he must have seen my look of disbelief and proceeded to give me a jolly good talking to about an impending Customs & Revenue investigation into why they haven’t received the extra duty they’d expected.
Apparently HMRC have stated that are “happy with 60:40” meaning that they will leave compliant boatyards alone and not put them through an expensive (£1000) tax investigation when they come to see who has been fiddling their declarations.

I sympathised with his concerns and departed without filling the tank. I think he told me his diesel revenue was down 60% since derogation. I also think he told me that boaters could turn up by car and buy 100 litres at 59p if they claimed it was for a generator. No questions and no forms to fill in.

And so we entered PC (Pennywort County). V reckoned she’d seen a statement somewhere saying the Soar was sprayed in July to eradicate floating pennywort but I laughed because the distribution and size of the floating rafts of pennywort tell another story. Anyway, I’ve named this Pennywort County and perhaps we should take pride in our achievements in turning a rare, foreign aquatic plant into a common or native species on England’s rivers.

And I see that the canals are getting in on the act too; in the shadow of the Uni’s student accommodation the boat basin at Loughborough has its own thriving clump of pennywort. Every boat that stirs the waters sends the clump on its travels in a circular motion around the basin, along the walls and under the pontoons.
How wonderful, soon the students will have something to camouflage their fag packets and lager cans. Everything has its uses.

After fighting our way through the packs of Freshers roaming the streets and hanging round the drink shelves in supermarkets we camped below their windows, just where we were advised not to stay overnight.

Friday
Last night was quiet, not a mouse stirred, not a drinks can could be heard hitting the water. We’d survived a night in Fresher’s week at Loughbro’.
Taking water and doing a dump in the boat basin wasn’t easy but we got through the railings obstacle course and after chatting to the cleaning lady made our way though the back streets towards the river.

An interesting cruise up river round the corners and around the pennywort clumps brought us to Barrow on Soar and to an empty spot on the designated moorings above the lock.

Crumbs, what a busy place this is. Boats by the hundreds in all directions, even canoes, some of which I was forced to shout at when they wouldn’t stop chiselling green paint off the boat with their ragged paddles.
But not all canoeists are horrible, one Maggie from nb.Forever Young stopped to natter as she paddled back to her boat. I’d quite forgotten she’d moved down this way from Crick. We’ll see if we can spot FY in the marina as we head up to Sileby after the weekend.

Sticking my 25 foot aerial into the air brought some comments from walkers. Most wait until they’re out of earshot before making a comment but there’s always one little’un who can’t resist shouting “What’s that for Mummy?”

My aerial matching unit experiment wasn’t an immediate success but after three or four ‘tinkerings’ it did a reasonable job and all that remains to be done is try it on a long wire between 30 foot masts. But how time flies when you’re enjoying yourself and before I knew it the day was gone.
Being back in Pennywort County has its advantages. V’s sister and my brother just happened to be playing badminton near Barrow so she popped along and took a mail delivery. No TV tonight we’re opening letters, whoopee.

Saturday and Sunday were more of the same, V cooking, ironing and reducing the washing pile, me playing with electronics. You have to get your priorities right I always say.

I must say I was quite impressed by the village of Barrow with its various shops and the friendliness of the locals as they stand and chat on the street. The bakers impressed me too with their perfect chocolate éclairs.

From here we shall go to Sileby Mill for a good old bottom blacking. While she’s out of the water I shall mostly be tarting up Balmaha’s stern bands and getting her ready for her first boat safety examination.
I’m reasonably confident, having tested the gas system with a home made manometer (isn’t that a device for checking men?), removed draught excluders (and spider’s webs) from vents and made covers for the batteries (what a waste of time).

Unless one end of the boat fills with water during the dragging out process or she falls off her supports I don’t imagine there will be much of a blog next weekend. But we’ll see.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Cromwell Lock to Holme Pierrepont

2009-09-20T17:21:15+02:00

Monday 14th to Sunday 20th September 2009

Monday
Just to give you an idea of the size of things here’s a narrowboat arriving at Cromwell lock on the low side. Although the chamber is huge it’s only the top end that gets used by the likes of us but the lower end is great for de-acceleration after steaming flat out up the Trent and against the overflow from the weir.

For those who get here first there are pontoon moorings with electricity but we always seem to get the ‘wall’ with its slippery ladder set into the concrete and massive bollards set ten feet back from the edge, just out of sight. Not being a local boater one isn’t sure what the river is going to do so it seemed prudent to leave plenty of slack rope because, as the advert states, things can go up or down. Having said that we hung about another day and when boats started leaving we snuck onto the pontoons and found a working power point, and set to with the washing machine.

Tuesday 15th
The pontoons are full again this morning. Got talking to the couple on nb.Brand New Start and discovered they were Mr and Mrs ‘Best of Mates’ who we’d last seen in June at Wistow when they were travelling with nb.Grumpy Git. This wasn’t a cruise but a boat move because BNS is going for sale on the T&M. I wish we’d paid more attention to the boat spec’ as friends Pam and Terry are looking for a new home afloat.

We followed BST to Newark and moored in front of Sioux, a widebeam that keeps popping up on the Trent. Again, we’re on the ‘wall’ because the pontoons are over subscribed, but it’s only two minutes to town, the castle and a museum so can’t grumble.

Newark town centre is interesting-ish with a couple of very old buildings (preserved) and several old buildings boarded up ready for Semtex. Connections with the Civil War abound and buildings like this 1400s merchant’s house pre dating the war by one or two centuries pop up between offices and shops.

For those of us having time to explore Newark I must recommend the museum inside the old Trent Navigation Company warehouse at the water side. Themed displays covering domestic, industrial and farming life take place on several floors and whisk you through your childhood years (if you’re as old as me), back as far as the 1800s. There’s stuff I remember when I was a nipper and unfortunately there were exhibits that I can still lay my hands on today. And the whole thing is free, which is nice.

The castle was a bit of a let-down because there’s so little of it left, just two walls. Thank you Oliver Cromwell and the thieving locals that removed the stones.

By way of illustration here is the outside of one wall

and here is the inside.

Wednesday 16th
After a quick visit to a well stocked Morrisons and a flit around the outdoor market we pushed off up river in the company of a narrowboat whose name I can not pronounce. It looks something like Eridinor and when I get a chance I’ll see if Google can tell me something about it.

Not a bad day for cruising but the light did funny things to the eyes.

We gave in at Hazelford lock and moored on the wall on the low side.
I’m getting into the swing of chatting to lock keepers, they seem to appreciate a call on the VHF if you want to pen-up and even if you don’t want to. But occasionally it all goes pear shaped and I forget to finish with an “over” or conduct a conversation when he’s not listening. Give me morse code any day.
Temperatures are dropping noticeably and it won’t be long before V wants the fire lit in the evenings. I thought I was prepared but pulling the chimney out of its bag up for’d I discovered the moths had been at work. The chimney scrubbed up reasonably well and took to paint without any problem but the china man’s hat was full of holes and accidentally ‘slipped’ overboard. Cousin Roger’s centurion hat will survive for another year but we’ll have to do something about the other one.

For anyone who doesn’t know Hazelford lock it’s a contender for the best lawn competition. Not only does someone manicure the lawns by the lock but also the paths and BBQ areas down river and around by the weir. Paths criss-cross the mini headland between banks of wild flowers and huge blackberry bushes. I got that information first hand because V made me walk it.

Thursday 17th
We left it to well after 9am before calling the lockie but couldn’t coax him into talking to us so V made her way up to the lock to work it manually.
We were doing alright with opening and shutting gates when two blue shirts arrived, at 9.30 on the dot. As is the custom they noted boat name and number and asked where we were going before letting us go. It’s all very well this note taking but we get weekly checks from roving employees too. We’ve been ‘done’ every week since we got onto the Trent so what with the lock checks someone must be running a book on us.

Just up the road at Gunthorpe we were hit again. This time I had my say and moaned about the broken services near the lock. Our blue shirt explained that they were waiting for a new septic tank and despite getting financial approval there was no date agreed for repairs. Telling me they have the money but not the go ahead is the same as saying it’s not going to happen isn’t it?
Someone’s been watching too much parliament on the tele.
Good job we have a spade. Now where’s that lovely lawn?

Friday 18th
The next day I was out cleaning the brass when a helicopter landed down at the lock. A blood wagon arrived soon after and in minutes they were back on the road, slow and quiet. Too lazy to go and see what it was about I can only presume they weren’t impressed with the broken toilet block.

Such was the weather that everyone was outside relaxing or cleaning something and that’s how we met our neighbours Diane and Steve on Festina Lente. Probably not the FL that we’d seen down south as this is quite a popular narrowboat name.
Both ex teachers they had plenty in common with V and all three agreed they were glad to be out of it. You never hear merchant navy sparkies talk like that, I’d return like a shot. I think it’s safe to say that now that we’ve got no navy.

Saturday 19th
Another smashing day, in fact the whole weekend was smashing wasn’t it? We pottered up to Holme Lock and found a space alongside a low wall, low enough to step off this time.
Not being used to delays at locks I was in for a shock when we had to tread water for half an hour. This is not the place to rush through on a sunny weekend. There’s a sign above the lock, that says
“This stretch of river is extremely congested. Great care should be exercised at all times”.

We can see why. The weekend, the sunshine and the water is like a magnet to dozens of little darlings in canoes. Some pass on the left, some on the right, nobody looking where they’re going.

Being right next to a National Water Sports Centre & Country Park the navigation is bound to clog up when hundreds of medal winning hopefuls spill out onto the water to show off. How we didn’t squash some I do not know.

If I’d had a pair of those milk-bottle-bottom glasses from the joke shop then I would have gladly worn them and zigzagged my way towards the lock. That would have had them scattering.

Anyway, this was an ideal day for boat jobs so I set about sanding and varnishing bits of floor and oiling bits of the roof.
Didn’t get very far because the guy on the next boat, being a bit of a character, kept me listening for an hour or so. He’d been around, done a few things and wasn’t afraid of telling people a thing or two, particularly where waterways developer’s ideas were concerned.

Not the quietest of moorings, we had loudspeaker overspill from the canoe slalom events on one side and boat fit-out noises from the other. On the one hand I could satisfy my curiosity by peeping over the river bank at the canoes but on the other it was most frustrating not seeing what was going on inside the boat.

Today is special for a couple of reasons, one is our daughter’s engagement to Joe and the other is Mike and Jo’s 22nd wedding anniversary. Congratulations and best wishes to you.

It just so happened that my worst case of VHF garble happened straight after the engagement news. I didn’t know whether to Over or Out and eventually settled for both, which is frowned upon.

Sunday before 9.30am is the best time to move unlicensed boats through the Trent locks, I discovered this morning.
Our lock keeper missed an interesting couple of boats owned by collectors. Collectors of tree branches, plastic toys, bikes, cans, bottles, you name it, if it goes on the roof then it must be collectable.
There was a gap of half an hour when all went quiet and then it started in earnest. Boats of every shape and size, made of steel, wood or plastic poured downstream in the morning and upstream in the afternoon. We heard them on the VHF radio. “Good morning Holm Lock, this is Morning Mist about to leave the marina and requesting pen-down at your convenience”.

I liked the old couple on the narrowboat that followed a plastic down to the lock at a respectable distance. The lock re-opened to let them in but the old fella didn’t so much as turn his head as he pulled over to the water tap and proceeded to tie up. VHF, what’s that for?

But he was most definitely not amused when the tap refused to give up its water. That rang alarm bells for us because we were counting on filling our empty tank tonight ready for our stay on the County Hall steps in Nottingham tomorrow.

I can’t see the council letting me run a hose pipe up the steps to their kitchen somehow. So now we’re on rations.

V says no showers until we find water, so things aren’t so bad after all.

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Narrowboat Balmaha - Boston to Cromwell Lock

2009-09-14T12:38:04+02:00

Monday 7th to Sunday 13th September 2009.

Before we talk about Monday look at this naughty boy or should I say challenging boy if I’m pc. Sunday evening he climbed the un-climbable fence, stripped down to his underwear, wet himself, then ran along the pontoon when he saw me brandishing the camera and dived into the river.

This clever lad, egged on by the girls who watched him from the road, then completely stripped, dressed again and climbed the fence back to the road. Blinking marvellous when you consider how much has been spent on stopping him doing what he just did.

Back to Monday and it’s time for us to settle up with the guy in the office. I took the meter readings to him and he looked puzzled. Shouldn’t be that much he said, looks wrong to me, you can’t have used several pounds worth of electricity without an enormous, greedy immersion heater. Have you noted the decimal point, he asked. No, well then that’s where we’ve gone wrong. Those meters have a decimal point that you can’t read in the sunlight. Instead of pounds we spent pennies over those three days so we were well pleased.

I got it in the ear when I asked how many narrowboats crossed the Wash. He’s not a fan by any means and had plenty to say on the matter including predicting the day when insurance companies won’t cover the sea transit between Kings Lynn and Boston, not for love nor money.

Monday isn’t a busy day, plastic owners have gone back home and it’s just us motoring up the Witham in the direction of Lincoln. There’s not a lot to see, yet I still find it beautiful, a bit like the southern Fens. Cows pop their heads over the river bank to see who’s daft enough to cruise these waters.

A solitary postman kept us company where the road followed the river, delivering to remote farms and dodging tractors carrying hay cutting and turning machinery.

The journey to Washingborough took six hours so this was a longish day for us and though the sun broke through occasionally the wind still got us despite the high river banks and tree cover.

I am starting to appreciate the odd bit of river art in the form of flames, cornstalks and metal cows. It breaks the monotony.
While not wishing to appeal only to the farmers here’s a real cow alongside its iron copy.

The RAF is very much in evidence at Washingbro’. While I studied a pizza delivery plane high above the clouds another pizza or pancake plane roared overhead. Most fittingly V found Nicholson’s description for this section of river “Overhead AWACS fly lazily away on missions, having taken off from nearby Waddington airfield”. I counted five of these beasties clipping our hedges so someone isn’t flying off on a mission.

Tuesday
Washingbro’s moorings are within sight of Lincoln and within the hour we were tied up right outside the shops.

A hop, skip and a jump later we were up the hill and in the cathedral. Actually we couldn’t do the grand tour as Uni graduation was under way.

While a voice droned on in the nave us commoners crept about the numerous side rooms admiring the silver, the wood carvings and paintings. As for me I was looking high and low for stone mason’s marks and peering through gaps in doors that obviously led to secret passages.

Rapturous applause signalled time to leave, it wouldn’t be long before cloaked and hatted graduates flooded the cobbled yards in front of the exits. The castle beckoned next and we did the walk up to the stone thingy on the pimple.

The Victorian prison would have been interesting but our timing was wrong, the grounds had been turned over to the university bun fight and the castle grounds were fast filling up.

We stopped on the way down the hill to take late elevenses in one of those front room tea shops. While half the customers chatting excitedly about life in halls of residence the other half, whilst pretending to be otherwise occupied, listened intently to what the student population got up to in term time.
Outside, a pavement artist roped off a square and worked his magic with silver sand. I imagine he’s waited weeks for weather without wind or rain.

To do it justice we should have given Lincoln a couple of days of our time but our current schedule says no. I’m growing strangely attracted to Lincolnshire and the chances are we’ll be back for a proper tour of the city.

Saxilby just managed to squeeze us in under the trees by the road bridge. I wasn’t bothered about the trees until I saw what the birds had been eating. Bushes laden with juicy black berries were miraculously stripped of their fruit and the digested remains were transported to the boat paintwork. Someone once said that Britain had invented the strongest glue in the world but I suspect they didn’t mean superglue or two part epoxy. First choice has to be dried Ready Brek on a breakfast cereal bowl but a close runner up must be Saxilby bird poo. Even after a thorough soaking I still had to use a chisel.

Wednesday and Thursday were lazy days at Saxilby. By biding our time we managed to get prime position on the moorings next to the footbridge and in wall to wall sunshine. V pointed out that by walking I would discover that there was more to the town than Mr Tong’s hardware store. There were hairdressers, one is never enough in a village, and a shop that does most things that you can eat or read. There was even a post office, and of course the Co-op if you’re prepared to walk a little further.

More sun meant more barbeques, yes in September in Lincolnshire. We had to be done by 6 o’clock when the moon came out but it was a welcome warm spell after a couple of weeks of wind and dull skies.

It’s almost four years since we stepped onto a brand new boat and time hasn’t been kind to the stern deck boards. Cuts and scratches in the textured plastic coating, ragged board edges and severe colour fading were starting to bother me but it was the crumbling plywood edges that concerned me most.

During the last 12 months I’ve tried applying various things like car polish, baby oil and engine oil. Engine oil was the funniest because the next day, after rain, we couldn’t walk on it for fear of skidding and falling over the side. We had to endure newspapers on the deck until the slipperiness had gone. Mind you the finish was beautiful and the deck looked like new but it didn’t last more than a couple of weeks.

This time I thought I’d try teak oil. It has saved my bacon many times on the side door wooden inserts where the varnish cracks and water gets into the wood. As soon as I see the wood go a shade darker I scratch the varnish and apply teak oil. It doesn’t exactly match the satin finish of the varnish but it saves having to keep the doors closed when it rains.

So more out of desperation than woodmanship I wiped the stern deck with teak oil and waited for the morning. Results looked good, the original dark brown colour returned and water ran straight off instead of soaking into the scratches. But best of all the plywood edges are sealed against water ingress and the aging process has slowed. There are other things that need the aging process slowing down but for now we’ll concentrate on the boat and leave V out of it.

On Friday we pottered on up to Torksey and settled down furthest from the others so we could run the engine and play aerials.
Anyone who knows Saxilby will know about the apple trees between the road and the water’s edge. Everything within arms reach had gone by the time we arrived but on the way to Torksey there’s a single tree full of big red-uns so out came the fishing net and in came a pound of eaters. These were eaters with a sharp edge so V picked the last of the blackberries and made blackberry and apple in pancakes, yummy.

The warm evening sun brought out the weekend boats, mostly plastic, and although I had plenty of sanding and varnishing to do the unexpected fine weather had put me in holiday mood.

It had been so warm that caps and jackets had been dispensed with and the captain had ordered shorts and tee shirts once we’d finished with engines.
Cook was pleased when the galley was closed and orders came through for crew to assemble shore-side for a barbeque.

Saturday was very much like Friday with smashing weather and plenty to see as boats came and went. One skipper pointed at a pike on the other side of the canal, describing it as six feet long, at least. It’ll just have to stay there because I’m not fishing this year, haven’t even renewed my licence, besides he’s over sixty feet away.

Graham (G8LUV) called to say he was going to the Loughborough Ham Fest with his cousin Malcolm (G3NUB ) and the event’s description had me drooling and desperately needing to go. But, as much as I’d like to be there I can’t but I’ll certainly try to add it to next year’s cruising plans.

Sunday was quite a day. The tides are neaps not springs so there’s little rise and fall and we’d decided to go down through Torksey lock to sit on the pontoon moorings until Monday afternoon’s tide. We wandered down to the lock to get instructions while filling the water tank and emptying the ‘other’ tank but no one came on duty until midday. When we eventually found the lockkeeper he didn’t look hopeful on a pre-tide lock transit because the electronics box says only 720mm of water over the cill. I must have looked desperate so he said get in the lock fast and he’d have a go at shifting us even if it meant flushing us through from behind. This I wanted to see.

Down we went and with inches to spare on the gauge we watched the gates open and the water rush out. Engaging forward gear nothing happened, we were six inches out of the water, the stern was stuck to the bottom and no amount of flushing was going to shift us onto a falling tide.

You can’t always trust those water gauges.

Three hours later as the clouds replaced the sun we were joined by three other boats and we made a more dignified exit on a rising tide.

Someone must be having an air show down Boston way because the Red Arrows and a Vulcan flew overhead from over that way.

We appeared to be cruising quite fast until we were overtaken by water skiers. It was quite exciting having waves go down the side, hit the fenders and splash the decks. There was a moment, as we rolled over their bow wave, that I thought we were going to lose all our crockery but there was no harm done, no beer spilt as they say.

What took us two and a half hours going downstream took us three going up and we made it to Cromwell lock a couple of minutes after the first plastic of the day. Not bad going on a neap tide I’d say, mind you I had to put a bungee strap on the throttle to hold it at 2000 rpm all the way up.

It was getting dark when we arrived and we were glad to find a bit of wall to tie up to. Tomorrow, as boats move off to Newark, we’ll grab a pontoon mooring and test our new cards in one of those electricity posts. Luxury.

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Narrowboat Balmaha –Torksey Lock to Boston

2009-09-06T16:38:07+02:00

Monday 3rd to Sunday 6th September 2009
We started the week at Torksey and with permission stayed slightly longer than the regulation period.
The poor guy behind us thought he was going to stay too when a ‘something wrong’ alarm sounded every time he started his engine. The boat he had been travelling with left him on the bank to sort things out so I went over to see if I could help. A Vetus engine in a trad stern are two things I know little about so I checked the bits I could get at and gave my opinion. The charging system for his engine starting battery was letting him down but he’d got tons of energy left in his battery so I advised him to carry on to Newark where he could get help. A call to RCR told him the same thing so he set off towards the lock in time for the morning tide.

Two things keep coming to mind at this time of the year, tax returns and porthole varnishing. I had put off both for long enough so made a start on the paperwork whilst waiting for varnish to dry. Why I have to declare my non income at this time of life is completely beyond me and why after all these years we haven’t solved the problem of water getting under varnish and turning the wood black is another mystery.

Someone tell me how to put an end to both, please.

I believe this is a special day in the calendar - Merchant Navy Day. If nobody tells me otherwise then I’ll assume it is and remember those thousands of merch' sailors that lost their lives in the wars.

I have a red duster that lives in the sock drawer, an old tatty one and rather too large for this boat and because we weren’t moving I didn’t bother hanging it on the stern. I don’t remember which ship ‘donated’ it but I like to think it was the Pass of Balmaha our last tanker which, being coastal trade, suffered ripped and mucky flags through frequent visits to the filthiest British, Belgian and French refineries. Oh the good old days.

Tuesday
It’s moving day again, hooray, it’s good to be cruising in the sunshine.
Saxilby is only an hour away and with plenty of mooring spaces we picked a quiet one right at the end furthest from the other boats. Mistake, goods trains run overhead. I thought all the railways round here were defunct but we’ve parked up under the noisiest line in Lincolnshire. No wonder all the boats were down the other end of the moorings, I never learn.

But it hardly mattered because we were out most of the day. Graham (G8LUV) came up from down south with my new HF rig which is about the size of a car radio and can easily be hidden behind a dinette cushion so it shouldn’t bother V when I’m tinkering with it. Not only did we get treated to a new toy but Graham took us to Lincoln to replenish our empty food cupboards.

And there was another treat in store when I was introduced to Birkett’s radio shop on the hill going up to the cathedral. Like a small boy in a sweet shop I had to see everything and sample the goodies. Apologies to Sue because I made her husband miss an appointment.

Wednesday
Another cruising day, this time under grey skies. We reached the end of the Fossdyke at Lincoln and joined the River Witham, hardly any wider than the Fossy and nothing noticeable in way of flow. If this had been the River Soar I would have expected yesterday’s heavy rain to put the river into ‘red’ but this water was terribly well behaved.
I’m glad we did Lincoln yesterday on foot because it can be a little bewildering coming into the wide open marina in town, or Brayford Pool as it’s called, and seeing no obvious way out. There’s a narrow channel called the Glory Hole that passes under an old timber building, built on a stone bridge over the navigation.

From here we pass between shops, under ornate bridges and through crowds of onlookers all wanting a smile and a wave.
V with her sharp eyes spotted The Witch & Wardrobe, the pub featured on the Nicholson’s Waterways Guide No.6.

The well known Stamp End district follows with its Napier Turbochargers (Siemens) and a guillotine gated lock.

Lincoln is an attractive place, both from the streets and the waterways, rather busy in terms of teens and twenties but not very well represented by the old fogies of which I might be considered a new member.

We couldn’t do the place justice on this visit so we’ve pencilled in a stop next time through to check out the history and perhaps make one last visit to Birketts. The owner, by the way, has plenty to interest those interested in WW2 aeroplane electrics, including aircraft landing lights, airspeed indicators, radar and a variety of dial indicators. His shop would make an ideal meeting place for RAF electronics types, particularly those who served their time on Lincolnshire airbases between the 1940s and 1970s.

Enough of Lincoln, we left the glitter behind us and cruised on under darkening skies passing the odd bit of art stuck on the river bank to amuse travellers.
A couple of rusty steel cows, a stone flame pointing at the sky and these giant corn stalks. I presume it tells us what is growing in the fields because we haven’t a hope of seeing over the high river banks.

After a half day’s cruising we arrived at Bardney Lock with its floating pontoons and electricity.

I tried my one and only BW card, the one I last used on a pump-out at Long Sandall, but it came up empty on the display. Ne’er mind, there’s big gaps between boats so we can run our engine without upsetting anyone.

They seem a friendly lot down here, a community of boats, mostly plastic, locked behind steel fences, many of their owners were out on the grass nattering as we walked down to the services building.
As sometimes happens they were waiting for a tanker to empty the holding tank so we had to keep our legs crossed until Boston.
Don’t let the cats in flower baskets put you off your guard, they aren’t the only animals belonging to the house next to the lock.

As I stopped to stroke the cat I was aware of something creeping up behind the fence on my left. Then came a long, deep growl which got my attention, this was followed by what I can only describe as a menacing doggy grin – hundreds of long white pointed teeth inches away from my hand.

Thursday was a nothing day. It rained and blew so we kept our heads down. I was torn between paperwork and the wireless, needless to say which one made me smile.

Friday looked better so we hit the road again and with the wind behind us completed the last leg of our journey to Boston.

We drifted right down to the last lock on the non tidal river, past BW and marina moorings looking for the services, in particular a loo dump. Nothing, no signpost, no likely buildings and no one to ask so we cruised back up to the moorings and reversed to the bank alongside a twenty foot pontoon.

If it hadn’t been for another narrowboat on these moorings we would have panicked because we stuck right out into the channel, almost touching boats on the other side. Feeling very uncomfortable about our ‘loose end’ dangling so far out from the bank and having no way of securing the pointy end to stop us swinging with every boat that passed I dug out the Christmas fairy lights and hung them in the cratch as a visible warning to those cruising after dark. As it happened high tide brought boats from the Wash well after dusk and I slept a little easier knowing our bow was illuminated by 120 flickering LEDs. It didn’t help my nerves having a couple of trip boats squeeze past us as they ran up and down the river running drinking and shouting competitions.

But we were still afloat in the morning.

Saturday’s weather was good, windy but sunny-ish so we wandered down town and practised our foreign languages in the marketplace. Why they are attracted to Boston I’ve no idea but they are, and in no small number.

To be fair to V she offered to go up St Botolph’s Church tower on her own so I couldn’t complain when my legs gave up before we reached the top. And even the top was only two thirds of the way up so it looked bad when I halted a second time and then a third time.

Once onto the viewing gallery one’s breathing slowed enough to give a toothy grin, a fair impression of the Bardney Lock dog.

The views were amazing, the market place, the windmill, our moorings and the river snaking its way down to the sea all laid out before us. Well worth the agony of that climb I’d say. Well worth the three quid to get onto the stairs in the first place. The lady in the shop opens the door with one of those huge iron keys that only castles and churches have and once you are on the stairs she shuts and locks the door again. There’s only one way to go and that’s up.

The climb back down to earth was a pleasure, no problems there but a developing cough was giving me jip so we popped into Boots the Chemist for something in a bottle.

You’d have thought I was a hospital case by the questions I got when I asked the medicines lady for the right stuff to stop me coughing. I was quite red and my pulse rate was high by the time she told me she needed to consult with a specialist before giving me what I wanted. Back she came with more questions and then finally she took pity and told me that out of three types of cough mixture she would only let me have one.
V said it was my age and something to do with where the pain was. A likely heart attack victim she thought. Tsccch, I’ve just climbed Boston Stump, surely that says I’m fit for cough medicine.

I suppose I should have sat on the park bench with the others before taking a swig from my bottle in its brown paper bag but I couldn’t wait and once out of the chemists the top was off and two tablespoonfuls were on their way down.

Feeling better we walked across town to the windmill. I turned down the chance of climbing seven floors to the top and settled for coffee and carrot cake on the first floor.

The Maud Foster windmill was built in 1819 for the Reckitt family, famous for Blue laundry whitener, Brasso and Dettol, so the booklet says. It cost £1826 10s 6d to build, was Boston’s 15th and last windmill and worked until 1948. It’s now back in working order, grinding flour for a living.

Generally speaking, in the words of someone else, Boston hasn’t much to recommend it. The old bits that could have been preserved alongside the river look shabby with numerous broken windows. In contrast St Botolph’s Church, or Boston Stump as it is known, is quite attractive and seems well used and integrated into the community. The market place isn’t particularly small and though useful for vegetables and stationery lacks variety.

Uninspiring and could do better would be my summary.

However, the water side of things has much to offer. There are dozens of finger pontoon moorings, electricity posts and a relaxed attitude from the BW office.

We found the loo dump eventually, it’s hidden from view if you come on a boat but in your face if you’re walking from town. We’ll have to moor on the lock landing to do the necessary and hope we don’t get in anyone’s way.

The rule round here seems to be to pick an empty mooring on arrival, connect a shore line, enjoy the view up and down the river and when its time to leave visit the lockkeeper and own up to electricity and the nights spent in town.
Here’s our view of town.

ASDA is ten minutes walk whilst town with shops, banks and market (we only saw Saturday’s) about fifteen minutes away.

Sunday was a repeat of Saturday without the going out. V did the ASDA bit while I tinkered with the aerials and radio. There’s more work to be done on the power cables before I can fire this thing up in full power and if the weather holds then I’ll stick my head down the engine hole and waggle a couple of wires over the battery terminals to crack that problem.

Yesterday, using a double whip dipole at twenty feet I managed to contact Leicester but not Shropshire but that was during the worst part of the day on 80 metres. On Friday evening I managed to grab the attention of a German station but he didn’t want Europeans, I know just how he feels.

Comments

Narrowboat Balmaha – Doncaster to Torksey Lock

2009-08-30T14:55:33+02:00

Monday 24th to Sunday 30th August 2009

We’ve had a quiet week, cruising-wise, starting just round the corner from South Bramwith, near Doncaster, on the River Dun and finishing above the lock at Torksey on the Fossdyke Navigation.

The aim this week is to get off the Trent before Wednesday’s hurricane arrives and on to the Fossy where water levels don’t vary with heavy rainfall.

Monday saw us move eastwards under grey skies along the Stainforth and Keadby canal.
We’d only intended going as far as Thorne and sitting tight while the rain passed but after phoning Keadby for lock slots we realised we could be up and off the Trent before the bad weather hit us.
We stopped for engine filters at Thorne having heard the chandlers kept Beta spares but as it happened they only stock Fram filters and I decided against paying an extra £10 for an oil filter.

Just after the last swing bridge on the S&K canal lay a railway bridge that’s just too low to get under. It opens on its own, I guess there’s a man pressing buttons somewhere, and it does something I’ve never seen before, it slides sideways across the canal. Really weird.

Keadby’s lock moorings were plentiful when we arrived in the early afternoon but soon filled up as new arrivals pulled in off the Trent.
For amusement we watched boats fly downstream with the tide and swing back upstream towards the lock. It’s a lot easier doing it from the viewing platform I can tell you, we can see the fast water in the channel 50 feet out but unlike boaters making their manoeuvre we can also see the pool of still water right outside the entrance.
One boat avoided a collision by plenty of hard-astern but there was an almighty ‘boing’ from another as it hit the wall on the upstream side on the way into the lock. I’ve seen locals get it wrong so there’s not much hope for strangers like us. But the trick seems to be to creep very slowly upstream and to remember that the water immediately outside the lock is practically stationary, there’s no tide to fight against so there’s no need to accelerate into the lock.

Of course things weren’t helped by a ship (the Cabrana) mooring right next to the lock entrance.

To finish the day we took icecream from the van at the moorings and nattered to those who’d made it down from Torksey and Cromwell locks.

On Tuesday we were up with the lark. With our penn-down booked for 7.45am we hung around at the road bridge and waited for the nee-nar, nee-nar, which signals bridge opening. Nb.Hot Tub joined us in the descent and when he looked across at me as the gates opened I did the gentlemanly bit and bid him go ahead. I’m not daft.

As he shot out into the incoming tide I watched for any wobbles, swerves or signs of difficulty and seeing nothing untoward I hit the pedal and we shot out after him.

There’s nothing much to do on the way upstream but grit teeth and stare into the distance looking for gravel barges. The occasional cow wanders over and stares at mad Englishmen who, out of boredom take their pictures.

Half way to Torksey we were overtaken by two gin palaces, their skippers sitting two or three decks up in glass cockpits wearing tee shirts while we shivered on an open stern deck wearing winter hats and coats.

Arriving at Torksey in well under four hours we found the cruisers just setting off on the next leg to Cromwell Lock having stopped on the pontoons for lunch. I’m working on an idea for strapping an outboard motor to the stern the next time we do the Trent, that’ll show them.

Not messing about we took a leaf out of the cruiser’s book and called the lock keeper for our penn-up. I can’t stop saying penn-up, penn-down, it reminds me of Hewlett Packard vector drafting machines.

There were some worried looks as we pushed in at the back behind three plastics, sorry, cruisers. If they weren’t so wide we’d have got another narrowboat in at the same time.

As it happened the weather improved as soon as we’d finished cruising, typical. A walk to Torksey village revealed no shops so we bought pickled onions and chutney from the lock keeper’s house.

Sadly we discovered we’d missed Granny Buttons. Andrew caught the same tide as us and was now through Cromwell Lock further up the Trent. We’d missed him by about three hours.

Wednesday, as predicted, was a bad weather day so paperwork got sorted into two piles - files and fire. Bit of a mistake having a fire in the rain because the roof was covered in black soot the next day.

Thursday was much better so V and me took the number 106 bus to Saxilby. The local old people’s home disgorged its contents ten minutes before the bus arrived and as happens in villages everyone knew everyone. We learned from one couple all about the huge portions served at the Wheelhouse restaurant near the moorings so we mentally booked a table one evening this week.

Saxilby Co-op is the grocer, pharmacy and butcher all rolled into one. There may be other shops but we didn’t see them.

A little birdy told us that nb.Seyella might arrive today so after studying the tide tables and calculating earliest arrival at 5.30pm I confirmed with the lock keeper who pointed out there were two tides each day and boats were arriving as we spoke. Oops.

A quick lunch and down to the transit pontoons where we found Geoff and Mags and a load of other boats fresh off the Trent.

The sun came out along with coffee and lager and we caught up on their news and travel plans.
Their neighbour Bob the Gas was a bit of a character and had me fascinated by his navy stories.
I kept getting the nod from V to let him go and to leave Geoff and Mags to get on with their lives, and their lunch as it was approaching 4pm.

That night we ate at the Wheelhouse Restaurant and I can confirm that the plates are big and the helpings enormous. We noticed some people were taking home half of their meals in doggy bags. I’m afraid I stuffed myself silly and I had to quit half way through my ice cream. Now I know why they keep buckets by the tables.

Friday brought another cousin, one I’ve never met before, Dad’s side of the family again.
Sandra and her partner Tony turned up on two Harleys, having motored up from Cornwall to a Harley bash in Sherwood Forest. Of course the photos appeared and stories were told which went some way towards filling in the history of long lost uncles and cousins from Kent.
Had a great time, lovely couple, smashing bikes drool-drool.

Saturday was a boat job day, the sun didn’t make up its mind one way or the other so it was a case of scrape wood, slap on teak-oil and run inside.

Graham (G4LUV) called in the morning to say he’d found an HF rig at a car boot sale near Rugby, which might be just the ticket for me. While I looked up the spec on t’internet he negotiated with the seller and when all looked perfect he did the deal in my absence. So now I’m back on the air, or will be when the kit arrives. There’s just a small matter of fixing a ‘noisy’ inverter and securing an aerial mast somewhere near the bow.

Typical bank holiday, everyone and his dog is out in a boat. It’s mostly plastic in these parts which matches my smiling face because you have to wave, grin and say hello every time they pass. Some hoot as they approach as if to say “Here I am, wave please”.

And finally to Sunday.
Half past seven and everyone’s fast asleep so keeping the side hatches closed I tuned into the amateur band around 3Mhz. There’s a host of old codgers going on about their runner beans and the weather and worries about 400 watt transmitters affecting their pacemakers. One guy went on for five minutes about police looking for someone in his neck of the woods and when he switched over to his mate there followed the sound of snoring. Brilliant.

Then I realised I’m perfectly suited for this wireless hobby, I’m ready to prattle on about canals, boats, weather, towpath grass cutting, or lack of, and how long batteries last when you’re burning 25 amps through a transceiver. And I can tell the world about it because I’ll have every frequency between DC and Daylight (as Graham so nicely puts it).

Can’t wait.

=============================================================================
Wheelhouse Restaurant, Torksey Lock, 01427 718301

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Ferrybridge to Doncaster

2009-08-23T14:58:42+02:00

Monday 17th to Sunday 23rd August 2009.

Where has all the summer gone?

As we rest alongside the steel sides of the River Dun Navigation on a Sunday morning in sight of the Stainforth & Keadby, under a bright grey sky I wonder whether this year we’ll manage to get an average British summer. I recall many days starting sunny and ending cloudy, breezy and cool. The barbeque has been out of the cratch no more than a dozen and a half times and in contrast to our faces our legs still have a tinge of pink about them.

MiL has returned home c/o T & C who are wonderful and did all the running about in a car but while she was with us we took in the sights of Ferrybridge, Goole and Long Sandall. Of course nobody knows about Long Sandall, it’s a few houses and industrial buildings stuck on the northeast edge of Doncaster but it’s very important to boaters because of its mooring potential for the likes of us.

It’s also home to Julie and Mark with their cats Poppy and Soona on nb.Poppy.

Julie put me right on the tall green thing in Goole docks by passing me the internet link to Goole’s information pages where my curiosity was satisfied on subjects like coal trains (watery ones) and Tom Puddings. Take a look and read the comments from dock workers who relate some of their experiences in the use of ‘green things’ that lifted puddings into the air to tip their contents into ships’ holds.

We popped down to Goole a second time and while Mum guarded the boat, V and I walked through the docks to town and out the other side to the banks of the River Ouse. I stood there fascinated by tankers coming and going between Goole docks and Immingham, the refinery I was well acquainted with in the late 1970s when I messed about with radios on the Pass of Balmaha.
V used to visit me with Kass, our new baby girl, and sometimes stay overnight in our little cabin, quite legally of course. There was no way to do it in secret anyway, K’s constant crying would have put paid to that. Fortunately the generator and cargo pump noises gave us some respite when she whinged at night.

This ship visiting Goole for steel is about the size of the chemical tanker POB and of very similar colouring, keep-away-orange hull with used-to-be-white accomodation steelwork.

Seeing a sailor’s memorial on the river bank I was amazed to see how many local ships had been lost in the 1800 and 1900s.

There were names of barquentines, brigantines, galliots, schooners, ketches, steamships and of course motor vessels (MV) like those we see today.

Right behind the memorial we saw this odd looking house with what looks like the remains of a windmill. Note the obligatory street furniture that pops up in front of every building of interest. I guess it used to be a mill because there’s a millstone outside the garden wall. See, I’m not totally daft.

But someone wasn’t so bright on Monday night, or maybe they were just unfortunate because the rescue boat was called out three times to pull boats to safety from the Trent and Ouse. One was stranded on the sandbank, a practise I was hoping to do deliberately one day because it’s an option when losing the ‘window’ at Keadby lock.

It’s the wasp season up here in Yorkshire and millions came out to taste V ‘s jelly with summer fruits in the making. Every tin can and yoghurt pot was pressed into service to catch the little blighters and by five o’clock, their bedtime, we’d collected over 70 big-uns.

Doncaster’s visitor moorings were a mixed blessing. On the plus side we managed to get a space for the 72 hour free stay and visited the huge open air market and beautiful modern indoor shopping complex. On the downside it’s 9 out of 10 for street noise. Juggernauts, farm vehicles and motorbikes without silencers roar overhead on the nearby bridge while blood wagon sirens scream day and night. If you wake in the night then the church bells get you every quarter of an hour.

And back to where we started, River Dun north of the extinct power station. We have steel and plastic boats enjoying a Sunday out, cruising past at 5 to 10 mph without causing so much as a creak on our ropes. Isn’t it lovely to be on open waters, we’ll be back before too long I’m sure but for now our sights are on the Trent with an incoming tide and, if there’s time, a penn-up at Torksey and a quick cruise down the Fossdyke and Witham to Boston.
It’s rumoured that Granny Buttons is down that way after crossing the Wash from the southern Fens. I’ve a mind to pick his brains about the sea crossing and I’m hoping he isn’t too insistent about taking a pilot.

Comments

Narrowboat Balmaha –Sheffield to Ferrybridge

2009-08-16T16:27:54+02:00

Monday 10th to Sunday 16th August 2009.

On Monday we were still in Sheffield’s boat basin at what they call “Victoria Quays”. After yet another peaceful night we walked up the road to do a spot of shopping. Town is only ten minutes away, five of that is waiting at the pedestrian lights unless you do what the locals do and cross where there’s a gap in the dual carriageway barriers.

Thinking the city centre shops were extensive and spread over a large area we caught a free bus (Sheffield’s FreeBee Bus) to the far side of town. We soon discovered why it runs every 7 minutes, it only takes 7 minutes to do the circuit. Sheffield’s centre is relatively small, everyone takes the tram to MeadowHall (Meadow Hell as some call it) where the shops go on for ever.

Back on the water there’s an interesting boat on the visitors’ moorings with its name written in Chinese-ish. Looking at the pictures I see it means Hak Tin Ngaw. Obvious really isn’t it.

I did what the book says and called the lock keepers for the Tinsley lock flight to book our passage down on Thursday. When I asked what time we should start the descent he said 8am, 8.30 latest because this was the busy season.

At first I thought he was having a laugh because we only saw one or two boats move in or out of the basin each day. But when I found out what their job involved I began to appreciate what he meant.

Tuesday.
A little birdie told us that the boat club near the top of Tinsley locks had spaces for rent while their owners were away and having an eye to an early start on Thursday we pottered down the first two locks with Phil on Handley’s Pride. Settled in between two narrowboats we coupled up the power lead and revelled in the luxury of electricity without the engine.

Leaving Sheffield boat basin I marvelled at how few of the old factories and workshops remained. A single wall here and a small brick building there among the trees and shrubs was all that was left.

Once installed on the pontoons we met the couple next door who cruise two months of the year and live in Spain for the rest. Things didn’t start too well as I upset the lady by loosening the sliding mooring ring on the post which suddenly let their boat free from a ten degree port list.

When she finished getting dressed she came out and let me have it with both barrels. Oh dear.
He was gracious about it but I felt I had to continue grovelling whenever his wife caught me outside the boat. He also put me right about the anglers on the lock landings, he said it doesn’t do to upset them because angling is considered a religion in Sheffield.

Dave the lock keeper told us that the shops were only 3 minutes away, through a tunnel and over the bridge. I went with V, to keep out of the way, and we wandered round a small retail park with little to offer a boater. While V looked at card making materials in HobbyCraft I wandered through the aisles looking for painted apples and stuffed birds. Imagine my horror when I bumped into the lady off the next boat. I grovelled some more but I didn’t feel she was quite over it yet.

We ended up at MacDonalds as a special treat for me going on a walk. I ordered the double cheese burger meal with an upgrade to extra large. Slightly more chips and more ice in the coke but the burger was just as tiny as ever. Bit of a swizz, I thought.

We’ve got rellies coming tomorrow (Ter, Claire and mother-in-law) so I tidied up and splashed baby oil on the back of the boat. No point in doing the front half because no one sees it when you’re moored stern first on pontoons. Who’s a lazy boy then?

Wednesday brought T, C and MiL (now in her 90th year) for lunch onboard.

It’s nice when visitors come, we eat better food and I was allowed one of my favourite sandwiches – egg and cress. Yummy, and bigger than MacDonald’s extra large cheese burger.
The mail drop was extra special too, ferrite beads for experiments. I’m hoping they’ll eliminate RF interference from the inverter when I’ve found a place to put them.
V’s ipod docking station arrived too but it also presented niggly problems - mains hum on the audio line to our HiFi system. More messing about needed when I get a spare day.

And as if that wasn’t enough the water pump started coughing again this morning. I’d just soaped my head when it started and I thought, oh great, here I am covered in soap suds when the water pump packs up.
I managed to rinse myself alright in the end but I didn’t want to worry V so didn’t tell her until after she’d showered.

Having put MiL in the bedroom we slept on the dinette Wednesday night. It’s always a poor night’s sleep the first time in a strange bed. Tomorrow night we’ll sleep like logs, it always happens.

Thursday is moving day and we’re up and about before 8.30am.
The lock keepers are cycling here and there preparing the locks but I can’t get my card out of the electricity post. Try a pin says someone so I poked it but it refused to budge. There’s 24 thingies left on it, enough to last a fortnight I’m told so there’s no way I’m leaving it behind.

In the end the lockie brought his tools and pulled the card reader out of its housing to free my card. Thanks, and here’s a donation for the boat club says I waving a note.
Don’t give that to me, he says, and promptly goes off knocking on all the boats to find someone willing to take it.

It’s a lovely place, slightly chaotic but very funny and everso helpful no matter what you need.

As we started down the locks I watched our blue shirt (Derek) buzz about like a spider racing to get its web made before the last fly disappeared.
Once unlocked we (V and lockie) worked the paddles while I did my best not to remove the cratch on the walkway or get caught on the cill behind me.

The work of a Tinsley lock keeper isn’t just about boat numbers but more to do with timing, concentration and physical effort required to shift them from one end of the Tinsley flight to the other without delaying boats coming back up the other way.

We only saw two lock keepers who shared the work of balancing water levels, unlocking paddles, guiding boats through, making them aware of the hazards, helping with heavy gates and balancing water needs for a return journey. With our sixty footer in a sixty one foot lock it takes a fair bit of supervision to avoid overhanging walkways and protruding ironwork that could rip your boat in half.

When you consider what they have to do and their interest in boater’s welfare while at the Sheffield end of the canal I think they deserve their pay and our praise.

And if it wasn’t for their introduction we wouldn’t have known about the boat club moorings between locks two and three. Free for the first night and at miniscule cost thereafter you get the benefit of pontoon moorings with water and electricity, whenever spaces are available.

Once down the flight I felt totally at home on the river again. Wide open water with the depth and quality of the river Thames, we cruised without interruption through Rotherham to Sprotborough. Now there’s a funny name – Sprotborough.

We walked to the village and bought icecreams to eat in the churchyard while we looked for relatives who had fallen asleep.

Have you noticed that, no matter what lovely building you want to photograph, there’s always a telegraph pole or dog poo bin or bus stop in the way. This time it was a street light.

After dinner we relaxed to the sound of water and the screams of children playing ‘watch me’ on the slippery top step of the weir.
At bedtime we relaxed to the sound of the local trip boat cruising up and down past our portholes blasting out seventies pop mingled with the yells of sozzled party revellers.
It reminded me of V’s Christmas parties in Bournemouth where her school teacher friends sang, danced and fell over to Spanish holiday music.

In its favour I have to say these parts are rather attractive with their trees down to the water’s edge, wide open waters and few walkers even in the holiday season. On the other hand we did see a couple of groups of children at the nature reserves messing about on the river bank. One group of young teens stood to attention and looked sheepish as we came round the corner and latched eyes on them. A plop in the water behind us told me someone had found a stone lying around and thought of an improper use for it.

Friday saw us first away from Sprotborough’s offside moorings in the company of Phil on his blue narrow boat.

Our first lock was barred to us because Mr. Whitaker was moving one of his tankers upstream. You don’t argue with one of these, neither do you try to hold the boat’s rope in your hand.

We had intended stopping at Doncaster to look at the town before going further but the moorings were full again. It seems this is the end of some people’s travels and after a day’s stop and shop they turn back to the north.

Turning our backs on Doncaster we motored on and nearly got the boat washed for free by the fire service.

Water was sucked up from the canal and then squirted back at high pressure, no explanation given, they just do it from time to time.

And finally we said our goodbyes to Phil as he turned right at the junction with the Keadby & Stainforth Canal.

Our day ended at Pollington on the Aire & Calder just before the Rix Phoenix tanker set the water a-wobbling. Listening to the skipper’s conversation with the lock keeper on the VHF we were sure he wouldn’t be back until after the weekend so we could sleep soundly in our beds tonight.

Saturday took us as far as Ferrybridge where we will stay for the weekend. Late enough to enjoy a cooked breakfast but early enough to catch an empty mooring we set our sights on the secure moorings upstream of the power station chimney and downstream of the flood lock.

Not long after our arrival the plastic gin palaces came looking for somewhere to stop and spill out their fishing rods and barbeques. Too late mate, we’re here and we’re staying, I said under my breath. They probably wouldn’t be happy here anyway, too many wasps.

V did the walking/shopping thing while me and MiL sat back waiting to be fed.

With the wind picking up and drizzle setting in there was plenty to do watching those poor cruisers attempting to line themselves up with the floodlock without clouting the concrete walls.

Sunday saw the sun come out again and with it more plastic boats. I don’t want to give the impression that there’s lots of them about, it’s the same ones, a dozen at most and without them the canal would be too quiet. A handful of narrowboats chug through on their way to foreign places (Leeds?) and a few widebeams which don’t look out of place on a canal of this size. Whatever they are they hammer through at 5mph++ without disturbing anyone, the waves burble a bit as they squeeze between moored boats and the steel bank sides and the depth of water below us means we never surge back and forth like we do on canals down south. There’s another big plus point for the navigations around here, no hireboats.

If the weather holds up we’ll most likely call in at Goole this week so that I can get my ship fix. There are ice creams there and a chandler or two so plenty to keep me busy.

From there we plan to drop MiL somewhere on a road and head off towards the Trent and Newark. The summer up here is drawing to a close and we don’t want to be caught by the perma frost this side of Leicester.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Ferrybridge to Sheffield

2009-08-09T18:40:13+02:00

Monday 3rd to Sunday 9th August 2009.

Monday morning we quit town and waved goodbye to the Ferrybridge chimneys. While V walked to the shop for groceries I set sail for our next meeting place at Kings Mill Bridge.
It must have looked a funny place for a boat to hang around because a local dog walker engaged me in conversation, throwing questions at me until V arrived and we set off.

On the way across country what looked like a chemical works was getting the demolition treatment. While twisted steel and wire reinforcement went one way, brick and concrete blocks went the way of a crushing machine.

I sent V down below as clouds of coloured dust and assorted bitter smells drifted our way from the clearing operation and I wondered just what nasties they had uncovered and sent into the air.

Instead of turning right down the New Junction Canal which had brought us to Ferrybridge, we continued straight on to Goole and its docks, boat yards and sea going boats.

There’s space for three-ish 60 footers on the BW visitor moorings next to Goole Boathouse’s diesel pump (50p/Ltr self declare) and we replaced the last boat leaving.

Boat names like Selby Libra and Selby Doris remind us of yesterday’s waterways trade while Farndale-H and Fossdale-H point to those that hope trade doesn’t get worse.

One can’t do anything boaty without someone joining for a natter and while the diesel went in I learnt about taking the tide down to Trent Falls to do a spot of bottom blacking and anode changing. No matter how hard I studied the tide tables I couldn’t get us out of Goole docks and back in again during the hours of daylight. Pity because I’d love to sit on the sand in the sunshine and give the boat a good looking over below the waterline. We’re deciding whether to go for a bottom blacking this winter or delay another year. Beaching at Trent Falls would help with decision making.

The local canal museum was quite interesting and free. The icecreams took us outside where we came upon Tom Puddings. We’d only just learned all about Tom Puddings and here were watching three of them being restored. These little beauties were linked together, filled with coal and towed to power stations where they were lifted and tipped to empty them. A bump at one end fitted into a hollow on the next one so that they hinged and gave the appearance of a snake as they rounded corners on the canal.

The next day, still curious about what went on in Goole docks, I pointed the boat towards the sea.
Something like a lighthouse and a loading machine sat on one empty wharf. Whether this is still in use or not I couldn’t tell you but it is very well preserved.

There was more to see but V wouldn’t have it and quoting the book and hinting at dire consequences if we trespassed on ABP’s territory I was persuaded to turn round and head back to inland waters. I could see a ship beyond the swing bridge but decided it was too early in the day to incur V’s wrath. I’m sure Associated British Ports would have understood.

Leaving Goole by the ‘safe’ route we cruised what seemed an endless waterway to the turning down to Keadby and Sheffield. And who should we bump into but Ivy-May a narrowboat we recognised from the Fens in 2006. And what’s even more remarkable they recognised us.

We didn’t stop and after what seemed liked ages, through locks and lift bridges, we arrived back at the Stainforth & Keadby Canal junction. This time, pointing towards Sheffield, we mounted the River Dun Navigation. Yes, I thought it was the Don but that’s further down, here it’s the Dun, don’t ask me why.

Yet another power station came and went only this time it was quiet, no smoke, no steam, no staff.

Rounding the back sides of factories, some silent, some being stripped and flattened we caught sight of ultra modern buildings and the town of Doncaster. Its few visitor moorings were full so being adaptable we tied to rings in the wall beneath the overhanging loading chute of a derelict wharfside building.
It rained (as usual) and the night passed quietly if you don’t count the gurgling of pipes sticking out of the wall that poured something wet onto our gunwales.

The next day we had Rotherham in mind. Thinking we were in England’s industrial heartland I was shocked to find ourselves completely surrounded by countryside. Trees as far as we could see and the occasional bridge or bunch of bridges far above us kept noise to a minimum. No buildings housing steel forges, no chimneys belching out smoke, no thump-thump of hammers and hardly a soul to be seen.

Even standing on tiptoe we saw little of Conisbrough castle. This was one occasion when we could have done without the trees.

Mr. Waddington seems to have been a popular figure, he had a fleet of boats and a lock named after him. His boats now line the pounds between locks waiting for trade to return to the waterways. As they are in such good condition I wondered if anyone had thought of turning them into floating homes. Perhaps we’ll dispense with ideas of a Dutch barge and go straight to one of these monsters.

Today’s locks, far inland and miles from the sea are still enormous, dwarfing many of the Thames locks. Here’s one rebuilt to 700 tonne standard and opened in 1982 by Victor Waddington, chairman of, you guessed it, Ernest Waddington Ltd.

For those thinking of visiting, here’s a lock gate control box for when the lock keeper is away from his office (which is most of the time). There is absolutely no need to get bored, there are plenty of buttons to press and lights to watch and sequences to get hopelessly wrong.

On those rare occasions that we see office buildings along the river I get the feeling that there’s no particular attraction to the water. Whether that’s to do with leisure craft not being too plentiful or the constant sight of commercial craft I’m not sure.

We were reminded that building close to the water’s edge isn’t without its dangers.

Rotherham lock in the middle of town had a surprise for us. Several black mink ran around the lock walls, tame enough to run between your legs as they playfully chased each other. This lock reminds us there’s a length restriction on boats from here to Sheffield. We just managed to get in the lock without fouling the gate behind us. Fortunately for us top gates weren’t overly leaky and most of the time we weren’t in danger of sinking at the bow.

Ahhaa, spotted a couple of clumps of dreaded floating pennywort, but it’s not the worst weed for grabbing your propeller, this stuff is.

Both angler and boater keep to a narrow open channel and sometimes it draws the odd sarcastic comment from the canal owners, I refer of course to the anglers. Most are cheery enough but the sour ones won’t acknowledge your how-dos, preferring to look down at their feet even when you shout it a second time.

Very occasionally you run across rubbish, especially at weirs but thankfully there’s very little pollution on this scale, I’ve seen worse in Leicester.

The book says we must call a lock keeper at the Tinsley flight. He has a key that he won’t share so we can’t wander up when we want to and I suppose it stops naughty boys letting all the water out. Our booking was for 10 o’clock and our ‘escort’ duly arrived and showed us the ropes, giving us plenty of warning of the dangers and making the transit as pleasant as possible.
Something really funny happened that V won’t let me tell you about but needless to say we enjoyed our cruise upwards and were set free onto the summit with as much help and kindness as one could wish for.

Close to the summit we were set upon by walkers and anglers. Having seen hardly anyone for days it comes as a bit of a shock to see people thronging the locks. Like many canal tourist spots they stand and stare, most never uttering a word, just a glazed expression on their faces.

Near the summit the lock landings take on another meaning, this is the angler’s domain. Fortunately we don’t need them, the locks are all prepared by our lockie and as we leave one we enter another but what would happen if you pulled over to the side? It doesn’t bear thinking about.

And finally we arrive at Sheffield’s boat basin as the sun almost came out.

Sheffield boat basin – first impressions.
A quiet, well laid out terminus or quay, if that’s what you want to call it, without pubs, clubs or bars. Surrounded by dual carriageways it’s not on a walking route to anywhere, yet it is only five minutes into town.

I couldn’t put my finger on it at first but after a day it dawned on me, it lacks vegetation, ducks, swans and perhaps an identity. It has fish because there are No Fishing notices everywhere and they are huge, typical marina carp, big and lazy. There are buildings on three sides, including a Hilton Hotel but apart from wedding parties out for photographs there are no signs of working or home living souls.
But we were glad of the peace and tranquillity and the occasional security presence and the absence of yoof in the early hours.

Sheffield’s city – first impressions
The cathedral is pretty central and to save building one they adopted the parish church in 1914. After WW1, presumably because objectors didn’t make it back, the place was turned round 90 degrees and increased in size by adding a tower, spire, sanctuary, chancel and nave. Further alterations planned for the end of WW2 were shelved, presumably objectors made it back this time.

Before we’d finished crossing the nave we were approached by a most helpful fella who conducted us about the place pointing out the crypt with its only WW2 damaged window, its Norman stones stuck randomly in walls, an indoor sundial (what?), Masonic heraldry and stained glass windows. I appreciated the windows and, of course, the conducted tour.

I didn’t mind the tram rides either, very efficient, whizzing about over four main routes of which we did a couple before lunch at the price of a £3 day ticket for V. Kids like me go free.

The wheel did its best to dominate the landscape while the Peace Gardens, Millenium Galleries and Winter Garden occupied a few minutes while I looked for a place serving elevenses.

The indoor market promised much and delivered little but to be fair we weren’t looking for mobile phone covers, cramped pavement cafés, wet fish, raw meat and foreign veg.

All in all we found the centre of Sheffield to be clean with very little graffiti or any sign of vandalism.
Given a pack of Stella and a pair of garden shears I could have done some real damage on Friday night.

Either the paint sprayers up here don’t go out much or the council cleaners are on to it the very next day. Even the canal structures along the way were scrubbed to perfection.

I’m glad we made it to Sheffield, it has been an eye opener for one such as me with expectations of derelict factories, tall chimneys, polluted water and ‘school-holiday’ hassles.
We saw two factory walls, half a dozen towpath walkers and a near perfect canal threading its way along a wide corridor of green trees. I could count on one hand the car tyres, poly bags and footballs floating in the canal, and I didn’t see a single coconut.

We can stay up to nine days if we want, so the nice BW man told us, but we’ll move out of the boat basin sometime during the week because we shall have the pleasure of MiL’s company and I’m sure she’d appreciate a cruise.
I wonder where we’ll go next.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – New Junction Canal to Ferrybridge

2009-08-02T15:51:20+02:00

Monday 27th July to Sunday 2nd August 2009.

On Monday we left Kirkhouse Green and shared the locks and lift bridges with a single handed boater from Boston who was out doing the Leeds & Liverpool ring. Brave fella.

The lift bridges are a bit on the large side but they’re fast in operation and we’re through and on our way in under five minutes.

Completing our journey north along New Junction Canal we turned left onto the Aire & Calder Navigation. We thought the earlier canals were big but this one is huge, possibly 150 feet wide and deep enough to handle loaded gravel and oil boats drawing 2.3 metres.

Pollington Lock appeared as the weather improved so we quit for the day. V went to look for a shop and discovered Yorkshire hospitality when a farm shop owner gave her a frozen loaf from his own freezer to save her going without. The farm’s beans and courgettes tasted so much better that night than the tinned variety we’re often reduced to eating.

Keeping an eye on the clouds we did a short walk around the lock and took an early dinner outside in front of the BBQ.

Now that the locks and bridges are automated it makes for easy travel but it’s good to be reminded of how it used to be when we encounter the remains of chain winches turned by hand to open old swing bridges.

That night a whopper of a Lafarge barge returning to Goole swept downstream, oblivious of our presence at the canal side where we gripped the bollards as if our life depended on it.

We usually get plenty of warning because the water surges and boils well ahead of these canal monsters but lying in bed after midnight there’s little you can do except grip the mattress and wait the five minutes or so until everything returns to normal.

Tuesday started sunny but warnings of nasty weather got us out of bed and on the move. Whitley Lock near Eggborough with its long empty moorings was a short cruise and we grabbed a couple of giant bollards, pulling ourselves tight to the bank.
The wind turned fresh and the waves crested so outside boat jobs were cut short and we battened down.

Wednesday was forecast bad and bad it certainly was with wind straight off the Yorkshire prairies. Battened down all day V turned to knitting shawls for promised twins from a niece while I reluctantly started filing a years worth of paperwork. Fortunately there were no unanswered letters or unpaid bills in the “pending” folder.

The need to sand and varnish something gave a welcome distraction but I discovered I had bought water based varnish for the bow doors which can literally ‘run’ with damp during the winter. I just hope all the work isn’t undone after a damp cold spell in January.

BW use large tug boats on large canals and they all seem to be employed around Whitley Lock. We get the usual warning signs when they’re approaching and a jolly good battering as they pass by which sounds worse than it is because we’re moored above a concrete cill that clouts the baseplate every time we leap up and down in the water.

Both Messrs LaFarge and Rix displayed their stone and oil tankers today and put us in a mind to move as soon as the weather improved. Twice I went out to check the boat for damage after punishing spells on the concrete below us.

I can see why they post notices warning boaters not to moor on pins but to only tie ropes to rings and bollards. The last thing you’d want is to break free during a working barge’s night cruise.

Thursday’s forecast looked better so we moved off only to get caught in a deluge. V thought it funny enough to take photographs of me in misery at the tiller.
At least she joins me when the rain has gone and reads the Nicholson Guide notes so I know something about the places we pass through. We mistook the first flour mill as Allinson’s, the people that make the bake-it-yourself-bread flour, but it turned out to be someone else’s, possibly King’s Mill bread seeing as it was situated at Kings Mill Bridge.

At Ferrybridge we came across an unmanned, closed flood lock. There were electricians tinkering with the gubbins under the lock keepers room so after explaining our position they offered to work the lock for us.

We have discovered that lock lights often don’t mean what the book says, in fact you have to take any light with a pinch of salt.
For example, when the lock is unmanned and available for boater operation it should display an amber light and if the river is running in the ‘red’ then we’re to see a flashing red.
But sometimes they’re all off, showing neither red, amber or green, sometimes the river is in the ‘green’ but the light flashes red.
We were naturally cautious at first but we’ve learnt from others that no one takes any notice and boats continue whatever lights are showing.

And so under the control of the contract electricians and the gaze of the power station cooling towers we rose two inches and entered the river section of the Aire & Calder.

From here our journey was limited by the river flow.
The book tells us to give plenty of room to barges on tight bends. It also suggests passing them on the ‘wrong’ side when this happens so I made use of the new rule by cutting my own corners on the way upstream. We met nothing and no one, the journey up to Castleford went like a dream through a river valley with greenery down to the water’s edge. Monkeys, elephants and lions wouldn’t have surprised us, here we have a very pleasant green oasis in a landscape of worked out coal fields.

Don’t get the wrong idea from the Ferrybridge power station picture, the power station isn’t the ugly scar I’d expected it to be, all is well maintained and the grassy slopes down to the river would grace any golf course.
However, the nearby town lacks signs of care with its affordable housing surrounding a handful of small shops, some with painted over windows, centred on a tenants and residents association meeting place.

An hour away lies Castleford with a short straight section of canal parallel to the river. This has its attractions in a yesterdays wharf packed with inactive Hargreaves tugs and remnants of Hargreaves’ oil industry. BW’s yard lies behind spiked metal fencing near the end of a narrow lane which terminates in bushes littered with discarded carpets, poly-bags and food wrappers.

We were told not to leave things out at night in case light fingered needle users pay a visit to the canal. But during daylight hours this place has a certain charm about it and being close enough to Wakefield I hoped to meet a long lost cousin from those parts.

Got chatting to a couple on the boat behind us while my dinner got cold on the table. David and Joy live on nb.Jemima at Market Rasen, Lincolnshire and keep themselves busy as storytellers and community artist. Joy was adding the final touches to a couple of swans on the boat’s side but had I read the brochure earlier I would have asked many more questions.
David’s background is navy at fifteen, salmon fishing in the Pacific, puppeteer in Holland, peach picking in the Pyrenees, teaching murderers in a Chinese prison and a semi-professional basketball player. He is now a forester, chainsaw sculptor as well as community artist and play worker. Phew!!
If you are down that way why not look them up or find out more on the web at “Tales From The Heartwood”.

Friday brought said cousin and several goodies in the shape of a bag of Yorkshire’s best comestibles and a lifetime’s worth of photographs. Eating parkin and sipping Yorkshire tea we shared family experiences plucked from the fifty odd years that we were oblivious to the existence of each other.

While commitments put Sue back on the road during the afternoon we, being mindful of the changing weather, set off back to Ferrybridge before the heavens opened again.

Flying down the river we arrived back in half the time and found the place as we’d left it.

Not knowing what the night life was like in these parts we prayed for safety and were rewarded with rain. Whilst rain is the best deterrent for two legged creatures it positively encourages omnipeds and multipeds. Snails trail up and down the bank looking for plant stems that reach across to the boat while earwigs quickly discover rope highways onto bow and stern decks and are drawn to door cracks which open into our living space.
Many’s the time I’ve pulled back the stern hatch and they’ve fallen on my head, yuk.

Saturday was a wash out, not just for us but for most parts of the country.
I resisted playing with the water pump when it started coughing instead of pumping and decided to leave it alone until it failed big time, like during V’s morning shower.
But the varnish brush made its appearance again and during the drying cycle we walked through town via the lock and the flour mill.

If you approach the lock on a boat going upstream you’ll find locked gates and barbed wire covered fences preventing your access to the lock itself. But stop the boat and walk away from the canal 20 yards to where the fence ends and you can walk along a path back to the lock with its various electrics and winding mechanisms. Visiting boaters don’t know that but the locals do and the lock has become a public footpath to grown ups and children alike. Even tinies in pushchairs get to see inside the lock chambers as they pass the places that boaters are forbidden to go.

Sunday 2nd August 2009.
The weather wasn’t sure what it was doing until long after breakfast but eventually turned out nice.
Breakfast on a Sunday is becoming a lengthy affair comprising fried egg, bacon and a wireless set.
Ever since Graham introduced me to the Radio Society of GB News on 3.650MHz (stop yawning) I’ve tried to keep the 9am Sunday appointment with its general QSOs before and after the news. Today ‘s broadcast made me jump out of my skin when Graham contacted the announcer and mentioned my predicament on a narrowboat which triggered his official ‘bonjour’ over the airwaves.
V was half listening three rooms away and her only comment was “do you think he’ll play your favourite record?”
Can you tell that she doesn’t share my enthusiasm?
But what do girls know, eh.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Zouch to New Junction Canal

2009-07-28T13:51:01+02:00

Monday 20th to Sunday 26th July 2009

At 9.30 on Monday we started the engine and stuck the pointy end towards the north. The remaining locks of the Soar held no surprises and after admiring the Ratcliffe power station chimneys again and again and again we finally put them behind us and sailed out onto the River Trent.

A right turn where we normally go left put us at the start of our new adventure, to the north, up the east coast highway towards the Humber. Having only the barest knowledge of what lay before us our eyes devoured everything that moved and we studied carefully every notice warning boaters of dangers ahead.

At the first lock, to our surprise, we bumped into nb Jabulani, fellow travellers from Loughborough, coming from Nottingham and now heading towards Birmingham. This idea of ending the journey at Nottingham and returning south seemed too common for my liking and got me wondering what was putting people off. Was it the Trent perhaps?

We cut short our day once we’d entered the tranquillity of the Beeston Cut and walked back to the river to watch other boaters scream down the Trent and perform white knuckle manoeuvres as they fought for a place on the lock landing.

Some might say the river was calm today but there are reminders along the way that things can change quickly.

Back on the boat our neighbours on nb.Innisfree made us feel at home by pointing out TV aerial alignment and confessing they were Blog readers. I admire anyone who has the courage to build his own boat and this was obviously no ordinary narrowboat. I must have looked at the stern many times before it dawned on me there was nowhere to put the tiller arm. Hidden under that canopy must be a wheel.

After taking a day-off for rain we pulled in the ropes and did the Nottingham tour, often below street leve, and ended up on the river again surrounded by football and cricket grounds. We were going to visit the town hall and wave at the BBC TV cameras in the hope that we’d appear on tele’ but decided against it when we saw how much of the journey was still in front of us.

The cruise down to Hazleford Lock with its 48hr moorings was a dream. We felt spoilt having electrified locks and it was good to be back on a river and, better than the Thames, the banks weren’t plastered with no mooring signs. The Trent isn’t private like the Thames, it didn’t suffer us, it welcomed us.

On the way we spotted two boats from the boat kits supplier near Peterborough. There was Papillon, last seen on the Fens and Ollie, seen at Loughborough last week. Both Dutch barge in shape they look so attractive, drool - drool. Other boats of great interest to me were old dredgers, hulks and converted barges of enormous proportions. If ever I need a big boat fix I’ll come up here instead of going down the Thames.

Newark Castle looked impressive on the right hand bank and though we didn’t stop this time we’ve made a note to pull over and explore the place on the way south.

Newark Nether Lock keeper John, or Della to his friends(!?) asked V how she felt about going down the Trent. She answered by saying she was a little nervous to which he replied he was scared stiff of what he was about to do. He told her he was kayaking from Darlaston in Staffordshire to Trent Falls on the Humber for charity, starting on the 25th, in two days time. He told us he’d never kayaked before but now he was committed to 165 miles of it in aid of Beaumond House Community Hospice. Brave man.

As rivers go the Trent looks promising for a bit of excitement. “There’s a bit of water on” a passing boater shouted to us as we flew out of a lock, and when I queried the journey time to Torksey the lock keeper replied “you’ll be there half an hour early - there’s five foot of fresh”.

Unsure of the procedures at Torksey Cut and Keadby Lock I asked a lock keeper on the way down if there was any advice he could give and whether there were techniques for getting into the locks on the tidal section. He told me there was nothing to it, just watch the others. That didn’t exactly fill me with confidence so I determined to consult as many boaters as possible and err on the safe side.

As it happens the first part of the journey down was a doddle, the tide eased us along at 6.5 mph and we hardly saw a soul. We saw a few narrow boats pushing against the tide but all seemed to be making good progress, none struggling.

Although warned in the literature to keep out of the way of commercial craft we only saw one barge, she was 600 tons –ish and approaching Cromwell lock to turn and load at the nearby wharf. We didn’t feel threatened and I doubt he gave one thought for us because the river is wide enough to take a couple of cruise liners.

Thursday
At Torksey we found one space left on the transit pontoons. Being 20 foot too long for the tail end of a pontoon we knew we’d hang off the end so using only bow and centre line we were pleased when the tide’s gentle rise and fall didn’t throw us off.

The atmosphere in the Cut was reasonably jolly but I sensed a bit of them-and-us, us on this pontoon and them on the one opposite. We eyed each other trying to work out who was going downstream and who was going upstream and who were friends with whom.

We formed our own gang on our pontoon, just two boats going downstream on the morrow. What drew us closer was discovering we both knew a family in Cornwall 33 years ago. Our new friends Dave and Jenny on Beulah-Ellen emigrated to NZ long ago and when hearing that we still kept in touch with said family in Cornwall passed on their greetings through us.

Don’t ask me how it all works, what with emigrating and still cruising in England. Something to do with summers here on a narrow boat and summers there on a sailing boat. Sounds good to me.

To stretch our legs after covering so many miles standing to attention we walked to the lock to see who was living on the other side. Hoards of white plastic boats fast asleep on pontoons met us so we turned to go back home and were gladdened to find a table of home made produce at the lock house back door. I can thoroughly recommend the plum chutney.

If you don’t ask about start times for the journey to Keadby you won’t have it forced on you. You can phone or you can follow the examples of others or you can study the tide tables, calculate distances and tide speeds and come up with a result. I was perfectly happy with my calculations until the morning of departure when I discovered we were on British Summer Time while the tide tables were printed for GMT.

When D day arrived my eyes were on the steel pontoon post watching the tide rise foot by foot. At 10.20, not 10.30 as previously agreed there was a starting of engines so we jumped into action and made second place on the grid.

Out of the cut and against the tide we crawled along at 3.5 mph and spotted another narrowboat about a mile in front. He stayed there the whole journey, just a dark shape on the horizon, sometimes disappearing from view but reappearing again as we reached straight sections of river.

But before long a small cruiser crept up on us and a while later we spotted another bunch of boats far behind us. Sometimes in line and sometimes spread across the river these tiny dots were travelling together with bow waves telling us that they were doing some serious motoring.

As the tide turned we speeded up and the GPS told me we were doing a respectable 7 to 8 mph. Passing West Stockwith Lock on our left we saw who we presumed to be the lady lock keeper on the phone watching the traffic bound for Keadby and the Humber.

Mile after mile of pancake flat fields with an occasional tump of a hill passed us on the left and the right. I suppose it shouldn’t have been any surprise that this was power station alley, there are few villages and even fewer towns along the way so no one to protest about blots on the landscape. With plenty of evidence of new building work at many of the power stations I questioned my beliefs that they were in decline and in need of additional atomic energy stations from France.

But while we gazed at the vapours from the cooling towers over the river bank we were brought back to earth by puffs of smoke from Beulah-Ellen’s engine room. Reducing speed we drew near to see if we could assist. Dave emerged minutes later to say all was well after removing something that had fallen onto the engine exhaust.

But too late for us, the gaggle of boats behind were upon us and try as I might we couldn’t pull away. They passed at what must have been 10 mph to our 8 and it was obvious that even though they sailed together there was some rivalry between them and in the end the shortest narrowboat took the lead before Keadby lock.

On the way we came upon a rather unusual lift bridge, it was designed to have one end filled with water to tilt it upwards and allow tall ships to pass. I rather hoped it might lift for us but nothing happened. We saw our first and last proper ship at this point on the river and my mind went back 30 years to a previous life aboard tankers.

Here’s a useless piece of information, each year the Trent chucks more water into the Humber than the Thames chucks into the sea. That must say something about its size and the respect given it in times of flood.

We were struck by the lack of boats or ships on the Trent, we’d heard so many stories about giant barges eating narrowboats for breakfast but nothing, just a handful of tiny craft taking the tide downstream. Another thing that surprised me was how the apparent gentlemanly start to the journey finished as a race. The locals that know these waters don’t mind where they go, darting across the river to benefit from the deeper, faster water. And on their approach to their destination they bleat like sheep on the VHF pleading for gates to be opened ready for them.
But now I know their little ways I’ll be ready next time. I’ve just got to fix a bracket on the back door for the VHF and make a table where I can spread out my charts and follow that deep water channel.

Four and a half hours after leaving Torksey the race was over and we all turned 180 degrees at the lock and sat in the channel adjusting engine revs to hold our place in the queue.

Waiting an hour in the tide you can see why there’s a hurry to get off the Trent. The river is dropping, the cill of the bottom gates is rising to meet our base plate and the locky is all on his own. When he isn’t operating the buttons in the office he’s catching ropes at the lock side, answering desperate boaters on the VHF, chatting to his lock keeper friends on his mobile phone and after all that, opening the swing bridge above the top gates to let us out onto the canal.

What’s worse is he can only squeeze in three narrowboats at a time, one each side and one down the middle.
It can take 30 minutes to cycle through everything and us poor blighters outside haven’t a clue what’s going on because we can’t see the lock gates and to make things worse there are no red or green lights showing in our direction.

When it comes to your turn you rely on the mistakes or successes of the boat in front to guide you on the approach and the turn into the lock. With a fast current against you it’s cautious to creep up to the lock and judge the water’s effect before turning. At the moment of commitment you realise you’re either going too fast or too slow and it takes swift action to correct your movement so that you enter without touching anything. With apologies to the very nice couple aboard Elizabeth-Ellen here is the situation one or two found themselves in.

Apart from the slow fill on this lock there was one thing worth noting. Several stones are carved with delicate mason’s marks. I’ll save your yawns by leaving out descriptions and pictures.

My thoughts on our journey down the Trent? Fun, a lot of fun and the non locals, those of us without a bus to catch, enjoyed the experience with its speed (8+ mph in the last hour), its sights and the thrill of the wide river with its sunken islands, the red marl rocks and mud banks, all to be avoided. We cheated by using the river sketches and tide tables passed on by Mr. Locksley (at Kilby Bridge) and carefully plotted our course from side to side missing everything dangerous to shipping. Our two feet draft would have happily skimmed over every one of them I guess but the 600 ton gravel barges might have had trouble had they wandered from the course.

Going back up stream might be fun particularly with a mind to tides because I’m told there’s only a two hour flow as opposed to a nine hour ebb. But that can wait, our minds are now on Wakefield, Doncaster and Sheffield, mine’s on Goole too but I don’t think I’ll get that one past V.

By Friday night we’d done Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and now we were in North Lincolnshire. The night passed quietly under a bridge somewhere along the Stainforth and Keadby Canal but stones on the roof at 6.15am kicked off our day a little earlier than planned. “Nobody for miles” said the next boater, safe as houses we thought but obviously on someone’s route home to Crowle from a party in Belton. Nothing damaged, or at least we shan’t see any damage until after the rain gets into the paint chips.

Goodbye Lincolnshire, we’re now in Yorkshire and beginning to get the feel of northern canals. Struck by the lack of boats on the move or moored on the canal we start thinking we must be off the beaten track. There are no signs that boats moor along the towpaths, lily pads have taken over and there are continuous armpit high weeds with the exception of tiny clearings opposite numbers painted on the offside. This is serious angler country by the look of it and once through passport control at the Lincs / Yorks border we found hundreds of them. This is Saturday and woe betides boaters that venture out on a match day between 10am and 4pm. It would have been murder for progress had the canal not been so wide.

There’s no need for winding places, they built the canal wide enough for big boats and we can spin a 60 footer almost anywhere. This is still a route for commercial craft and there’s a chance we’ll meet a 300 ton barge looking for somewhere to dump its gravel.

The land around us is quite flat, where we can see through the stinging nettles, but away in the distance we saw the remains of slag heaps, grey mountains higher than trees with patches of green clinging to their sides.

Villages pop up along the way, some with boats, mostly plastic ones. Louis and Joshua’s boatyard on our left reminded us of our visit here in 2004. One or two unanswered questions at the time led us to place our boat order elsewhere, with no regrets so far.

Plenty of lift and swing bridges keep you in good shape, some need pushing with your backside, something V is very good at, but I was shocked to find many had been electrified.

Where the railway runs alongside the canal it isn’t unusual to see a fella come out of his hut and close the road barriers across the track at the same time as the canal bridge is opened. Why this happens I haven’t a clue. V asked one of them if the railway was disused because we hadn’t seen a train for two days to which he replied that it most certainly was a working railway and the next train was due in September.

Strange lock gear appears here and there, some using chains to open and close the gates and managed with a standard windlass.
We almost stopped at Thorne but it was light on mooring places. We almost stopped at South Bramwith but it’s a busy spot for weekenders running to and from their marinas so we took a right up the New Junction Canal.
This canal is dead straight and goes for 5 miles or so. The monotony is broken by swing and lift bridges with buttons to press which makes operation easier. We fought the anglers for a couple of miles but gave up when we found a two boat length of heavy duty cofferdam piling.
Pins or no pins we’re staying here for what’s left of the weekend, anything to see the back of those anglers.
Was this a national or international match I wondered. Must have been hundreds of them. I was told the winner caught 2 kgs of fish in six hours. But it would have been different if I hadn’t lost three hooks to those bream under that tree, said one guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I wonder what they talked about in the pub afterwards, is it like boaters with pumps and toilets and hire boat antics?

The sun came out in the evening, nearly as warm as down south, so I did the decent thing and barbied everything on the plate.

The local accent hasn’t gone unnoticed but I’m trying hard not to copy it. We still haven’t got over our cruise to Bristol and accentuating our Rs is a difficult one to get out of.

Sunday we stayed put. It’s a good job I stuck the aerial into the sky last night because it rained this morning, in fact it rained on and off all day. We watched the passing boats, plastic slightly outnumbering steel I’m afraid so that tells you something about the place we’re at.

Friends Dave and Jenny on Beulah-Ellen came past as I was cooking breakfast (for me, V has healthy cereal), and we waved and shouted stuff across the canal.
It’s a wide canal so you have to shout but the advantage is you don’t have to slow down, you can hammer past without affecting moored boats. That’s a plus point for the north. I’ll do my best to think of another.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Syston to Zouch

2009-07-19T15:51:27+02:00

Monday 13th to Sunday 19th July 2009.
Recent rains hadn’t made any appreciable difference to the river level so we wandered north from our weekend retreat in the country. We’re always mindful of sudden jumps in river levels after our spell on the Soar two years ago when we were the only mugs to turn up for the boater’s protest against waterways spending cuts. On that occasion we watched in horror as the river flooded after a couple of days of heavy rain and threatened to sweep us off the moorings at Castle Gardens, Leicester.

Today the river was well behaved and we caught ourselves smiling on several occasions during the run down to Loughborough through Sileby, Mountsorrel and Barrow. It’s nice to relax on the river bank over the weekend but there’s something very satisfying about setting off on a mini adventure to the next overnight stop.

We caught sight of Beryl (past chairman, RBOA) on nb.Wasp at Mountsorrel and shouted our greetings as we waited for the lock to fill and, confessing to being shy of large gatherings, we apologised for not being in town for the next IWA festival at Redhill.

Barrow deep lock has an interesting traffic light system to warn you about the state of the river below it.

If you really want to see the rest of the notice you have to get out of your boat and peep over the fence which isn’t easy if you’re under six feet tall.

Couldn’t help noticing the spread of floating pennywort all the way down the Soar. It starts at Leicester football ground and is just as widespread as previous years even after their best efforts to remove it.

One notable publication lists the five most invasive plant species in the country as Parrot's feather, New Zealand pigmyweed, creeping water primrose, water fern and floating pennywort and the Government recently estimated that tackling the problem costs us £2 billion a year.

I wish someone would tell me how much of that was spent on clearing the river Soar. I’ve written down what I think they spent.

Talking of invaders we’ve got our own little fight going on - against earwigs. They’re sneaking in somehow under cover of darkness and dropping on our heads as we move around the boat. These crafty little rascals are learning lessons from the spiders that came in a couple of months ago but I draw the line at fast moving nipper carrying insects and their squashed bodies are piling up in the corners awaiting the vacuum cleaner.

Just after Pillings Marina we grabbed a spot on the first set of bollards just before the council tip. It sounds horrid but it’s a nice spot, reasonably quiet and not terribly well used by walkers and anglers. The worst bit is trying to keep still when a certain wide beam trip boat goes past twice a day.
Hasn’t Pillings filled up? We remember seeing it under construction and paying frequent visits there when we needed water but you’d have a job to sneak in unnoticed now and where the visitor’s water point is I haven’t a clue.

It looks a nice place apart from the electricity pylon right in the middle.

Woke up the next day to find an enormous Dutch barge behind us. Got talking to the owner who built it himself from one of those kits from a company down Peterborough way. Kevin W will know the one I mean.

I was so sure I’d seen this boat on the Thames or on the K&A but the owner swears he’s never been down that way. I was so sure that I went through my Dutch barge picture archives (sad aren’t I) but couldn’t find it.

I thought he was very brave coming this far up the river especially with an air draft the same as the bridge height.

Loughborough did us well for the few days we were there. The new facilities at the wharf in town and the nearby shops made this a comfortable stay for us. The town centre is only minutes away and there’s no danger of losing your way back to the wharf as the builders have been considerate enough to paint the wharf buildings with shocking colours. Doooohh.

Incidentally, boaters shouldn’t be put off by the apparent lack of a rubbish disposal facility, it’s the other side of the little building housing the loos, behind an unmarked door. Access is by BW Yale key when a clasp isn’t padlocked over it. Doooohhh.
Those of you with shiny gloss paint below the gunwales should watch out for the ladders which you are expected to climb to reach the water tap in front of the red building. They protrude further than the big rubber bumpers that are supposed to protect the boat sides from the ladders. Dooohhhh.

Claire and Ter dropped in for a couple of days and seemed to enjoy the cruise up to Mountsorrel and back, which was followed by Claire’s 50-something birthday at her daughter’s place near our moorings, which was nice.

Take a big breath, there’s millions of candles to blow out.

Saw these little fellas sheltering from the sun on our cruise up river.

[horses]

I’m told you can pay more than ten grand for one, can you believe it. There must be an awful lot of meat to cost that much. The French like them don’t they.

On a different note, we’re still seeing baby ducks and moorhens on the river, might be a second or third attempt at raising a family because Mr Pike is very much in evidence this year.
But you never see a baby heron do you, why’s that?

Just as we were thinking Loughborough was a nice place we got shot at as we passed the flats going towards town. There was a pinging sound followed by something whizzing about around our feet and when I looked across at the houses I saw a four year old girl standing at the window holding a BB gun, looking at us, expressionless.
I suppose she was copying her older brother but fortunately didn’t have the necessary ammunition and instead discovered that her little round coloured sweets did just as well. There was no harm done and it was hard to get cross with her and, of course, no mummy in sight to pass on our thoughts.

Mike and Jo popped in for lunch on Saturday, Mike bringing his car footpump for my experiments. I’d retrieved a large round plastic fender from the Avon and wanted to use it for places like Zouch (pron: Zotch) where the stonework under the water sticks out further than the edge of the bank where you tie up. But a hole in it stopped it working as a fender so I stuffed a bicycle inner tube inside and thought that filling it with air would do the trick. It looked like it was going to work until a muffled explosion told me all was not well.

Where do you buy wheelbarrow inner tubes?

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Kilby Bridge to Syston

2009-07-12T15:30:58+02:00

Monday 6th to Sunday 12th July 2009.

Not an awful lot has happened this week so I’ll be brief.

Monday was leaving day for Derek and Sheila on nb.Clarence. A ‘friendly’ boat arrived from upstream and they proceeded across Leicester together. What with the padlocks and the occasional wino hanging around the canal it’s preferable to go in the company of others.

The day went fast as usual with V doing shops, banks and doctors, me doing the difficult stuff like upgrading the computer’s hard drive and reloading Windows (what a pain but it will be worth it).
The shower pump is one worry less as it’s working every time now. It’s marvellous what a bit of sandpaper can do.
A working shower meant there were no excuses not to wash. To make the most of clean skin we had friends Paul and Dawn round for a meal. It’s been months since we’d seen them and it was good to catch up on local gossip. Unlike me both of them are terribly talented people, their pastels and oil paintings are amazing with portraits of horses, dogs and tiny furry pets looking more real than photographs.

Tuesday
The weather was mostly yuk with thunder and lightening between bursts of sunshine. The trees shed their bits on us and all the boat cleaning and polishing of previous weeks was undone. But at least it gave me time to mess about with the computer.

Graham called in on his way north from London and took the loaned wireless away for repair.
When you want to tinker with electronics it doesn’t help when the boat’s electrics emit radio interference every time an appliance draws power from the batteries. It’s enough to stop all work on RF kit so maybe it’s time I looked at the Mastervolt inverter.

That evening we ate in the company of Richard and Rosemary, friends from Whetstone Baptist, who keep us up to date on what’s what in church. Apologies go to whoever made the original photograph on the card for R&R’s 40th wedding anniversary.

Wednesday
We were joined at lunchtime by Tim who was doing a spot of fishing before he picked up the children from school. Full of questions about living on boats he was fascinated by the way we live in our long thin metal tube.

Thursday
It’s our day to go. We’re off through town and once joined by Mike and Jo we get shifting through those locks.

Two locks down and we caught up the Valley Cruises boat ‘Calder Valley’ with a very nice family from darn sarf.

They’re experts after years of hiring and alongside them it was an easy cruise down to Castle Gardens where they were going to moor for lunch and essential shopping like milk and bread.
As it happens they didn’t like the look of town, the moorings were full and the other side didn’t look appealing with its winos lounging on and around the fixed seating beside the river.

And who can blame them?

Leicester has some work to do if it wants to change its image, it’s not just about making town look pretty with fresh paint and flowers, it has to lose its threatening residents, the ones that can’t sit straight on a city centre seat, the ones disgorging beer cans from plastic bags, the ones that take a widdle in front of the shrubs or up the side of the bridge piers.

Memory lane and Limekiln Lock announce the start of propeller alley. I tested the water point just upstream of the lock, not that you’d recognise it as one because it’s not on BW’s veg pledge list. It was in water but I wasn’t feeling up to doing a taste test.

Then came the filthy water between Limekiln and Belgrave locks. Full of plastic bags, plastic sheets, carpets, bright coloured ceremonial robes, coconuts and black oily water. We crept through in order not to disturb the mess below the surface and got away without a prop-clot.

And we finally fell out into beautiful countryside as we passed from Belgrave to Birstall.

By the way, I see someone has nicked the gold shiny ram from the weathervane on the old brick buildings back in town where the new ‘student lets’ encroach on Leicester’s factory heritage site.

Leaving nb.Calder Valley at Birstall we motored on to Raynsway Marina for diesel (65p self cert) and a night on the pontoons.

We must thank Mike and Jo for their company and windlass work through town and for making the journey so much more pleasant. Thank you both, yet again.

Raynsway manager Dave and Dil from nbTrundle made us feel at home over a couple of glasses and filled us in on changes since we were here two years ago. The marina has been sold and bought again and the same high standards are in place with the new owner.

Friday
We spotted nb.Clarence on t’other side of the marina but there were no signs of life so we let them be. Tis time to move on so we cut loose and cruised down to Old Junction.
Though the sun was up and down all day we cooked outdoors on the stern boards and managed to catch the best of the weather. Seeing how nice it was I stuck the aerial mast into the air and trawled the bands.

Saturday
The sun is more down than up but it didn’t deter Ter and Claire who brought holiday photos, mail and a bottle of plum brandy from Belgium to go with the chocolates. Yummy.

The weather was really on the way down by evening so just as the wind got up I popped my head outside and caught sight of the aerial wire fighting with the trees. I thought it best to dismantle the mast before it disappeared into the fields.

Sunday
A quiet day? No, boats of all shapes and sizes whizzing up and down. They hardly disturb us, if you don’t count the day boats.

We’re on the river and depth is sufficient to keep us fairly still, but we can certainly tell when canoes go by. Why does a shallow draft portable fibreglass canoe have such an effect on a 60 foot steel boat, even the hireboats don’t bounce us about that much?

I’ve been watching the couple on a cruiser behind us since we got here, he’s out fishing all day and I mean all day. Yesterday he was still sitting there in the pouring rain in shirt and trousers, such was his commitment. It almost made me want to join him but you’ve got to give it hours to do it justice, besides I’ve gathered together all the ducks on the river with V’s sponge cake and I haven’t the heart to shoo them away.
Such soulful eyes and cries of “where’s me cake?”

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Wistow to Kilby Bridge (Part 2)

2009-07-06T14:01:34+02:00

Tuesday 30th June 2009

Hasn’t it been hot. Haven’t we been sneezing.

Just finishing breakfast when there was a knock on the boat. Who could this be so early in the morning. It’s Mike off Sarah-Kate brandishing a cake with a candle. Ahhh, it must be my birthday. On his way back to his boat he dropped by to offer food and a lift to the shops, very kind, thanks Jo for letting him out.

And so it came to be, with cards and greetings coming in from all over the country I was allowed to do what I pleased and helped to celebrate another year down the pan, thank you everyone.

Birthday or not there was still the matter of a shower pump to attend to (anything but watch tennis). The Johnson pump works sometimes but often goes silent when it’s time to empty the bath. I’ve tinkered with it on and off for weeks but it refuses to perform at embarrassing moments. Once again I checked the hoses were clear and the impeller free to turn, bled the air from the housing and primed it with water. It always works when it goes back together, but it just doesn’t last.

Enough, time to sit down and eat. Our brother and sister came over to share a meal with us (they’re married, legally of course, I’ll explain one day) at a nearby Italian restaurant. It’s brilliant eating Italian with chips instead of pasta, can’t stop dreaming of chips when you live on a boat can you. But must have been mad eating spicy lamb in a room packed with people on the hottest day of the year.

Wednesday 1st July
Another hot, sticky day and more socialising as Graham (G8LUV) and Sue pop onboard for a spot of lunch. Don’t know what the girls talked about but the real business of wireless on boats was discussed in the easy chairs and I’m back in the market for a 12 volt HF rig if anyone is selling.
Graham left me with a few Radcom magazines to read, they’re always welcome especially during the tennis season. They also left us with drinks, chocolates and ice cubes, a huge bag of them. Brilliant, thanks, perfect during hot weather on a boat with no freezer.

No sooner had Graham and Sue left than number one son David arrived. Staying onboard for a few days we shall extract his news bit by bit and find out something of what he’s been up to by the time he leaves on Sunday. Girls are different aren’t they, there’s no keeping them quiet, while boys can put the lot into one sentence and it’s all done in a couple of minutes.

Thursday
Shower pump refused to work again so V baled out the bath. I noticed that the pump worked again when I slackened off the impeller cover so I sanded down the rubber thing to reduce the friction on the end cover. This seems to have done the trick.
Seeing as how David has wheels we shall mostly be doing the shops today. V’s got blood tests at the quacks and I’ve seen a bigger hard drive that I want for the computer. And to cap it all we shall eat at brother and sister’s on the other side of town. Yummy.

Friday
I traded off another trip to town against fixing electric problems on D’s car. I prefer the fixing bit any day, shops appear to offer much but I often come away empty handed and I have to say I feel the whole shopping experience is generally a waste of time. I don’t think V agrees.

Met Mr and Mrs Loxley, that’s not their real name but I don’t like to ask now that we’ve crossed paths so many times. Nb.Loxley is about the same age as Balmaha, give or take, but theirs is still new while ours is looking somewhat hammered. Marinas do have some benefits you know.
Anyway, they’ve been up north where we’re hoping to go this summer so we gathered notes on tide tables and Trent maps and to help them we passed on info for the Nene and Fens for when they go east.

Thinking that was enough excitement for one day we then had the surprise of meeting nb.Clarence, a boat we’d last seen under construction at Brauston before Christmas. After hearing the stories of her launch and completion it will be good to get onboard and see how she’s made.

Saturday
The shops are within easy reach with busses every hour so I lost V for a couple of hours which gave David and I time to do a cooked breakfast. I’ve taken to frying sliced spuds before adding bacon and eggs and toast for a decent start to the day. Hunger sets in again by eleven o’clock but V should be back with pastries by then. Perhaps Mum was right, I must have worms.
I did have them once, after a trip to Moscow, but that’s yet another story.

Didn’t get chance to worry about the tummy because we had visitors again - number one daughter Kass and Joe. He’s going to have to change his name because we already know dozens of Jos. They stayed for half a day eating and drinking us dry (not really) before returning home. Joe came prepared for a cruise with captain’s hat and fishing net but logistics didn’t permit which basically means I wasn’t prepared to do the 4 hours to the nearest winding hole and back on a busy weekend with boats racing each other for the moorings.
Never mind, I’m sure we’ll go for a cruise next time they come to see us.

That night we toured Derek and Sheila’s new home and admired the fit-out and colours on this gleaming 65 foot trad style narrowboat. Derek was true to his words when he said we could empty his drinks cupboard and we sat chatting and nibbling cheese and salami well after my bedtime. Thank you both, lovely hosts, lovely boat.

Sunday 5th July 2009
Clear of kids we are free to cruise again so when Derek said he was thinking of making a start on the journey through Leicester we suggested we share locks as far as Blaby.
Cooler after a shower of rain we motored down to Blaby Bridge and pulled over for the night.

On the way down we passed Forever Young coming t’other way and quickly exchanged greetings before we were out of earshot. Last time we saw them was at the festival in Leicester, June 2008. Their boat still looks extremely smart.

Clear skies and bright sunshine met us at Blaby so when Derek called us over to share some space on his barbeque we broke out the burgers and fold up chairs. Sitting on the towpath we opened a bottle and had just started eating when a cloud zoomed in and deposited its contents. But within minutes we were back in the sun and umbrellas were stowed away just as cyclists made their presence known with their rush of wheels and the odd quip about us dining out.

Totally bushed for some reason we could hardly keep our eyes open so hit the sack in what turned out to be a quiet spot in Leicester’s suburbs. I think it was the culmination of hot sweaty and sometimes sleepless nights that did it so apologies to Derek and Sheila. We have pencilled in a return session when we catch up with you.

A couple of days alongside should see us done in these parts and all being well we hope to follow Clarence through the city towards Nottingham and the River Trent. Weather forecasts of a week of rain may affect our Soar and Trent transits but we’re determined to go north this year and not repeat 2007’s diversion onto the Trent & Mersey canal.

Comments

Narrowboat Balmaha – Wistow to Kilby Bridge (Part 1)

2009-07-05T12:59:22+02:00

Monday 29th June 2009

Re - Site of Special Scientific Interest

Well, knock me down with a feather, the other end of the SSSI is a few yards east of Kilby Bridge. That means eight miles of canal between Debdale Wharf and Kilby Bridge is of special interest to scientists.

I just had to ask someone about this so I spoke to an ecologist at the Milton Keynes office of British Waterways and asked who had been consulted over the SSSI designation and when it was implemented.

English Nature, or Natural England as they are now known, made the decision as far back as 1986 so there was no point in arguing about it now. But when I asked further questions about designated mooring places I was completely put at ease by her answers.

My version of her words goes something like this.

“Boaters are free to moor wherever there is piling”.

I made the point that weeds and shrubs were so well established that it is difficult to see the piling.

“We have had a problem with the (veg cutting) contractors”.

I asked if we could moor, as we had done in the past, at non piling locations where reeds were few, the water deep enough and the towpath wide enough to use pins without affecting walkers and cyclists.

“Yes, you can moor there too”.

I asked three times for that to be confirmed and there was no change to the answer.

Incidentally, signage for ‘designated mooring places’ is unlikely to appear because Natural England are opposed to signs, so it’s a case of as you were lads but watch out for the rare pondweed.

Talking of pondweed, there was no mention of it on the ‘phone, just rare aquatic plants. That could mean anything that hasn’t been logged as a common plant.

It seems that boats are a cause of disturbance to rare aquatic plants by their motion through the water stirring up silt. Rare plants don’t like stirred up silt.

Just like legging boats through tunnels perhaps there’s a case for banning the use of propellers through SSSI areas and returning to horse-drawn power. No, that wouldn’t work, too many trees along the way because we’re still having “trouble with contractors”. I shouldn’t laugh, someone might read this and jump into action, with horses, not contractors.

It also seems that rare aquatic plants like spot dredging, it clears the nasty silt away but Natural England don’t like mass dredging, I suppose it clears the rare plants away. I like mass dredging because it returns the waterway to its original purpose as a canal for boats.

Thinking about it, the canal was originally void of all aquatic plants and what grew over 200 years must have arrived from neighbouring ponds and wetlands. My guess is that NE’s rare aquatic plants are quite adept at spreading around the country and don’t need scientists to protect them on the canals. My other guess is that scientists take the easy path, the towpath, when they’re out spotting plants. Perhaps they really ought to spend more time tramping the fields and ditches and fighting the brambles on the other side of the hedge.

Just imagine a rare plant growing in the cracks between concrete slabs on the M1 motorway, would NE jump up and down with excitement and restrict the use of the M1?

Anyway, rant over, it seems we can moor on any piling or anywhere else where we aren’t a danger to others.

I thought I saw a family of freshwater jelly fish near Cranes Lock. These are so rare that they are only found in two places on the planet but I’m keeping quiet about it, don’t want more trouble from the anti boating department of Naturalist Britain.

Normal Blog Service (Part 2) will resume Monday 6th July 2009, 3G permitting.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Up to Wistow

2009-06-28T16:41:43+02:00

Monday 22nd to Sunday 28th June 2009

At last it feels like summer, but I’ve underestimated the use of the barbeque and we’re down to the dregs, those crumbly bits of charcoal that lie in the bottom of the bag. There’s enough to light one more fire and after that it’s back to the stove.
We’re mostly on our own, each night a couple of boats join us but they’re generally gone in the morning. You can tell we’ve been here longest by the number of flattened weeds along the bank.

We still see boats heading for the Braunston boat festival, if the Leicester Line is anything to go by they must be pouring in from the Oxford and Grand Union Canals. Glad we’re here not there.

Tuesday was earmarked for work. There’s a new shutter lock to install in the stern doors, a job that’s been waiting for three years and I couldn’t put it off any longer. With the door panel removed and all the parts assembled for fitting I had almost run out of excuses when along came Del and Al on Derwent 6. Breathing a sigh of relief I pushed everything aside and joined them on the towpath for a cuppa and news catch-up. Such was the news that I went right through to dinner time without lifting a finger on the lock.

This was our first look-see inside Derwent 6 and well impressed we were too. Amazing attention to detail, hundreds of good layout and storage ideas and a very high quality fit-out, which is a rare find and a credit to the cabinet makers at Fernwood. Six months from launch and she still smells like a new boat and the exterior shines just like it did when she came out of the paint shed. If only there was a way to keep it like that.

I can’t remember how the subject arose but when the time came to part Del donated a refill for our barbeque and we ate out once again on a balmy summer’s evening. Thanks you guys, you saved our bacon (well, actually the chicken).

Wednesday was sunny yet again and we planned to move up to Foxton. The sky was deep blue and cloudless first thing and I couldn’t leave without poking the camera through the porthole.

Reaching Foxton around 1pm we met Mr Ter who was doing a spot of consulting in the vicinity and just happened to be carrying a bag of mail for us. While we sat on the taff rail chatting V worked the locks on the way down to the boat basin. This didn’t go unnoticed by V or the public who, leaning over the lock wall, made the usual comments about who does all the hard work.
I have to say it’s not all fun, I could be suffering from claustrophobia in those deep locks for all you know.

Did my best to cross the centre pond without touching the sides but it wasn’t to be and coming out of the bottom lock we only just missed Vagabond by using the bow thruster, and turned right to Black Horse Bridge in preparation for a Tesco drop tomorrow.

Thursday started grey but things brightened up about the time of our grocery delivery. Being the only boat on the moorings we were surprised to see another one tie-up behind us so close that we could have shared the same rope. Thinking this was unusual V met him and discovered he was hoping to join another boat at the swing bridge. He was a single-hander and not as young or agile as we. The bridge in question was only two minutes away and not the easiest to manage when you’re on your own. Brambles have taken over what must be one of the shortest offside lock landings for a swing bridge. I wouldn’t want to have to attempt it on my own.
But he didn’t need to wait long, while V shoved large packets of food into tiny spaces in the boat I cut the ropes and set off towards the bridge.

While he wandered off to Harbro’ we spun 180 and returned to Foxton before setting off again, this time to Debdale for diesel (55p self declare).

I haven’t thought out the full implications of this but just north of Debdale Wharf there’s a new sign telling us that this is the start of an SSSI area. Apart from cruising in such a way that we don’t chop the rare pondweed with our prop and stopping only in designated mooring areas there’s nothing to spoil our fun. However, this bit of canal is getting like the Harbro’ Arm was four years ago and is in need of weed clearing. Does SSSI mean no dredging?. Perhaps a few quids worth of signage saves thousands of pounds in dredging expenses. Very clever.

We looked for designated mooring places but couldn’t see any. Does anyone know what they look like?
We also looked for a sign to say we were out of the SSSI area but we hadn’t seen one by the time we reached Fleckney. Designated or not we moored anyway. And we cooked pondweed on the BBQ (not really).

Friday was wet and V said we didn’t have to go anywhere if we didn’t want to but I was worried about overstaying in a non-designated mooring area.
I agreed to stay for the weekend so V changed her mind and we went.

Spotted a friendly local blue shirt filling up a low pound and forgot to ask where we could find the north end of the SSSI. Making way again we were caught up by nb.Grumpy Git so we shared locks for the rest of the journey. Knew we’d seen this boat before but it wasn’t until we looked through the magazines that we remembered the article in Canal Boat (Sept 07) describing Paul’s new 54 foot narrowboat.

There was no mention of the dog but you certainly know she’s onboard when you get too close. Woof!

And so to a quiet weekend at Wistow.
I’m about to start dismantling the stern door to fit the new lock when “Hello Balmaha” echos across the water. Looking out who do we find but nb.Windsong with Pip and Roger on the stern.
Fresh from their launch they’re exploring the system in their brand new boat and bumping into bloggers at every turn.

Find a space up the cut and come and have some tea, we said. Jobs were put on hold, the lock was stuck back in its box and we waited, and waited. We guessed what had happened, the only moorings for miles were full and to make matters worse the heavens opened.

Sorry it didn’t happen but we’ll catch up with you another time.

Saturday and Sunday were hot and humid, terrible for working outdoors, but the lock wouldn’t wait and now we are the proud owners of a shutter lock. It’s all about shoving metal rods upwards and downwards through metal door edges into metal door frames. That way no one can jemmy the doors open without making a lot of noise. We had one fitted to the bow doors during boat build but when it came to having one at t’other end we’d run out of time.
But it’s done now.

It’s been a week for spillages. A can of WD40 squirted itself dry under our top step when a windlass rested on it and a bottle of apple juice emptied itself under the side hatch steps. So what with the weather we are very sticky.

Next week we shall more than likely be heading into south Leicester to do shops, see people and celebrate yet another birthday, whoopee.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Somerton to Leics Line

2009-06-22T15:20:21+02:00

Monday 15th to Sunday 21st June 2009

From the peace and quiet of Somerton’s meadows, if you forget about the cow problems, we cruised to just above Kings Sutton Lock.

While I studied the deckhead for a few minutes V disappeared down the towpath and came back with two icecreams, a perfect end to a warm pollen blighted day. Hayfever has erupted with a vengeance and I could use some rain to clear the air. Hardly made my wish when thick black clouds headed our way from Banbury bringing thunder and lightning.

It wasn’t long before the show started and as we dived for cover from the rain and hail the sky around us lit up with spectacular flashes accompanied by deafening big bass drums.

Seconds before the rain arrived the crew from the boat behind us were shouting their approval with “Oooohs” and “Aaahhhs” as the sky lit up, before they too ran for cover. Brilliant.

Tuesday was dry which made things a lot easier for a shopping expedition to Morrisons at Banbury. Further on we were surprised to see nb.Shindig on her way back south after her Bristol to Sharpness adventure, there hardly seems enough time to do the circuit since we saw them on the K&A. Well done you guys.

Our moorings below Slat Mill lock saw the shears in action again, the weeds along the bank were over ninety feet tall. I cut more than we needed because a little bird told us Sarah-Kate was coming in to land. And so she did, with Mike and Jo who we’d said goodbye to at least once before, but it was lovely to see them again and lovely to empty their drinks cupboard once more.

Bourton Lock, I think it was, is in a state and I almost wept for the overgrown garden. High with grass and weeds you’d have a job to see the former beauty of this place. A notice on the house says it’s in new hands and being worked on but with so much to do the garden must fend for itself. It would be a shame if the owners didn’t swing a bill-hook now and again and an even greater shame if no one picks the fruit bushes next to the lock.

Wednesday we were away early but immediately fell into a queue for locks. Cropredy was choked with boats and not the place to hang around when everyone’s going silly on the water.
We pulled over far short of our intended bridge 124 because the clouds started dropping wet stuff and, anyway, we’d had enough for one day.
I panicked at one stage during the day when I noticed the green lamp on the engine monitor panel was off. As V steered I peered into the darkness below decks and found all fan belts whirring around as usual, the start battery was charging and when I stopped and started the engine all worked as expected so I assumed the lamp had given up the ghost. Sure enough my diagnosis was correct though I have to say I’ve never known one to blow on a boat or a car before.
Just to be thoroughly modern I replaced the filament with an LED.

On Thursday we pottered off to the top of Napton Locks and fell in behind the slowest boat in the world.
We stopped half way down for a brew, something we never do but it did no good because half an hour wasn’t enough to put a single lock between us. V tried helping them through but they wouldn’t have it any other way so we smiled and wandered down in twice the time it normally takes. We were so slow that Sarah-Kate, even after stopping at Claydon’s Bygones Museum, caught up with us.
By the way we didn’t appreciate how extensive and fascinating this museum is, looking at Jo’s photos has given me a real need visit next time we go down the Oxford Canal.
Opening hours are 10.30 to 4.30 Wednesday to Sunday, April to October (phone 01295 690258). It’s only £2.50 admission with concessions for the terribly old and the terribly young like me.

We were pleased to see that BW had planted poppies on the lock landings to cheer us up. And very nice they are too.

I have to say I do like the bollard humour on the Oxford Canal. Perhaps BW could raise money by offering sponsorship of the lock bollards. By that I mean we could show our appreciation by sponsoring bollards that are in the right place.

The day ended between bridges 102 and 103 on the GU between Wiggies Turn and Braunston and finished with us eating our last supper with Mike and Jo. I say last supper because tomorrow we turn right and they turn left.

Friday was farewell Sarah-Kate and how do you do Moore 2 Life. Chas and Ann were moored (Moored – get it?) just round the corner so we stopped for a cuppa and a natter. After admiring the new cupboards and getting some exercise trying to take a stick off Molly, we said our goodbyes for the time being and wandered off to Braunston.

Rumours are confirmed, the old working boats, or ‘projects’ as one called itself, have gone. No burnt out shell or sunken boats on the run up to Braunston because CRS are doing a spring clean. When was the last time you saw the canal bank along here? It’s the end of an era.

Uhh-ooh, notices up outside Braunston Marina, we’re not welcome this week. Boat-fest next weekend says we’d better not stop. Not only that but the loo dump was choked again so we shall have to take our ‘stuff’ elsewhere.

I later read in Willawaw’s blog that Mark was in town on the same day but how we didn’t bump into each other I just don’t know.

Some good news – The Admiral Nelson is open again on the Braunston Flight. It was sad to see the shutters up earlier this year and notices posted in town saying regretfully the business wasn’t there to keep it open but it looks like someone is giving it another try.

Isn’t Braunston tunnel busy on Fridays? We passed four going t’other way, the first one stopped dead as we reached him which is usually fatal. I spent my time watching the other side, keeping the gunnels an inch off the wall so when he bounced off us I knew that he had wandered across to the middle of the tunnel. Boing he went and crash went something else as his starboard side whalloped the wall. He muttered something about us not helping things by going too fast but at little more than tick-over it’s the slowest I dare go. Does anyone else come to a dead stop in the tunnel in the hope that nothing will happen?

Hanging a left at Norton Junction we spotted a great big shiny boat. Ahhh, it’s Derwent 6 taking a nap. Nope, they’re obviously taking a walk because we couldn’t raise Del and Al with the horn.
Catch up with you guys somewhere I’m sure. And we still haven’t done the guided tour.

Watford locks has its own special welcome for us, it’s where we started to feel at home back in January 2006 when we braved snow and ice to get Balmaha onto familiar waters. We don’t care how long it takes going up the flight, there’s always a smile here and often time for a chat. Further on, mooring opposite the sheep and within earshot of the M1 (where isn’t?), we shut down for the night.

Saturday’s plan was to clear Crick and settle down for a couple of days. Tunnel traffic was all going our way, which was nice, and after a thorough soaking we emerged to find the place buzzing with boats. No spaces meant we hoved-to where we shouldn’t and while V did the Co-op run I prepared to argue for mooring opposite the new marina entrance. Signage is ambiguous anyway so one has an excuse for the little time it takes to get bread and milk from up the road.

Aiming for just short of the Welford Arm we pottered along in half decent weather. One fella poked his head out of his side hatch and commented on our engine, saying “Your engine is quieter than my fridge”. It’s nice to know the hospital silencer is still doing its job.

Looks like the rumours of a marina at Yelvertoft have substance. There’s a scar across the fields and a mountain of topsoil that says something’s going on. Just before the old BW dredging dump there are notices telling us to keep out as I presume they don’t want us playing on their machines, spoilsports.

Emerging from bridge 27 we spotted vacant moorings right next to the wooden seat. I shouted “full ahead” to ensure we got there first and then “full astern”, followed by “finished with engines” as we secured to rings while our bow wave cut loose and disappeared up the cut without us.

I was just putting my feet up when V reported a non flushing cassette loo. Not being able to find my ‘urgent and important’ jobs list I decided to tackle it without delay. Lying on my back in the corridor with my arm up inside the gubbins I pressed the wrong thing and got deluged by water from the bowl. When will I learn, always take the fuse out before messing with water solenoids.
It works again and I put it down to an infestation of limescale and I mentally booked a complete overhaul sometime in 2012. That should keep my mind off the Olympics.

Our (my) joy was complete as the barbeque worked its magic again on the stern deck. You can’t beat sausages and skewered pork I always say, washed down with something red, white or brown and fizzy.
It’s lovely being back on the Leicester Line, there’s nothing particularly special about the water, its brown like other canals but it is quieter than the main lines from the south or those from the west, especially in winter. The blue shirts up here are the best in the country, always friendly and ready to help, unlike all but one we met on the K&A.

Sunday brought out the usual marina traffic, they potter up the cut for lunch then potter back at closing time. Added to these are boats from up north because the River Soar is open and of course there are the hire boats doing the Leicester Ring. But we are getting treats with seeing working boats making their way to Braunston for the ‘show’ next weekend.
Here’s one that came through earlier.

Father’s Day didn’t pass without a call from the kids and as it’s a sunny day we shall cook on the barbeque and open a special bottle that came my way recently. Being an orphan I have to put up with getting gifts and receiving lavish attention, it didn’t used to be easy for me but I have recently found the grace to do it well.

It’s a special day for Mike on Sarah-Kate, his birthday – again. Not quite the oldest man on earth but he is doing quite well with his bus pass collection. Happy Birthday Mike.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Tyle Mill to Somerton

2009-06-14T17:15:31+02:00

Monday 8th to Sunday 14th June 2009

Monday is our last day of cruising on the Kennet & Avon for tomorrow we shall leave it behind and start climbing northwards to the Midlands.

Turf sided and scallop locks are just two oddities that will be discussed when we’re out of here. Actually now that the paint on the side of the boat has all gone I can definitely say that scallop locks are much better than flat sided brick and stone locks, they’re great for stopping in a straight line. This is handy when there’s another boat coming in beside you. There must be something else to compliment them but I’m out of ideas for the moment.

The day brightened as we reached the straight bit before Fobney Lock. Shears came in handy as the undergrowth had turned into overgrowth and stinging nettles reached my armpits. Needless to say the towpath was brilliant, a yard wide, gravelled, flat and perfect for cyclists. The verges were different, I doubt most towpath walkers could see the canal through the dense forest of green that used to be cut in the good old days of the ‘veg-pledge’.
I’d recommend a long handled machete or an industrial strimmer for those planning a cruise on this canal in the next few days. It’s either that or tunnelling equipment, if you want to get ashore.

Tuesday.
We found Reading’s upper lock (County Lock) very much as we left it, in need of some urgent repairs to its floating walkway approaches. Someone has taken the trouble to hang Defra rash and danger tape on it but those over 12 stone or anyone with a high centre of gravity better not attempt the walk without a life jacket.

Out the other side of the lock Mike pressed the river’s traffic lights button. When the light turned green we set off together and cruised through town. Little in the way of water flow meant a quiet passage downstream unlike those poor souls last year when a raging torrent meant risking contact with the concrete walls.

Finally Blake’s lock dropped us to the same level as the River Thames. There’s nothing much to say about the last few hundred yards of the K&A, no goodbye signs, no walkers waving, no certificate or plaque to collect from the last lock keeper. We left as quietly as we’d entered and so closed another chapter in our book.

Rounding the corner where the K&A joins the Thames we noticed a drop in speed as we headed upstream but we managed 3.5 mph which would get us most places.
Tesco missed out on two visitors because they’re charging £4.80 to moor through the summer, from April onwards. Pity because we had time and money to do a half decent shop.

Now that we’re back on the Thames we need to pay the toll.
I’m not saying where but when asked how long a licence I required I replied one day.
Oh, so you’ll be off by midnight tonight?
No, I’ll be off by midnight tomorrow.
Then you’ll actually want a two-day licence.
No, I want a one day licence because what’s left of today is not chargeable so I want to pay for one day and that will cover tomorrow.
No, you want a two day pass, for which we only charge one day.
Oh really?
Yes, that will be £35 for a 60 foot long by 6 foot ten inches wide boat, thank you.

I can only think of one reason to charge one day for a two day licence and that’s because it leaves open the possibility of calling it a reduced charge which could be changed to a full charge at some time in the future. I wonder if anyone can explain things to me.

The first thing I noticed about the Thames was how lovely it was. It’s deep and wide and is lined with interesting houses, boats and notices saying clear-off.
I’ve probably photographed this boat a couple of times before but isn’t it nice to see it again.

One day, maybe she will be mine, sigh….

Then there’s the boat houses, amazing places to house a boat. I’ve posted a picture of this before but isn’t it lovely.

V asks “Why do you have to take a picture of that again? You’re filling the computer with pictures of the same thing”. I know, I just can’t help it.

Mike pointed out a hobby sitting in the branches of a dead tree beside the river. He’s got eyes like a hawk, Mike and the hobby.

Talking about sitting in branches, we laughed when we saw a plastic garden chair sitting in the shelter of an upturned tree on its own little island on the Thames. Perhaps EA use it to spot licence dodgers on the river.

After a long day, 12 hours by my engine records, we pulled over for the night at Abingdon.
The towpath side was full, some boats doubling up for the night, so we took to the park moorings next to a bunch of noisy lads doing what they do in the evenings when parents aren’t around. Mike looked doubtful but I assured him they would all go and leave us in peace. We’ve seen it before and you’ve only got to look at the untouched spindly trees and undamaged park furniture to know they mean no harm.
Sure enough the park went quiet and the only noise in the night came from the other side where three Anglo-Welsh hire boats played music and talked loudly at some unearthly hour.

Wednesday. Still rubbing eyes we hit the road, well the water. I miss the Thames with its electric locks and cheerful lock keepers, always ready with a story to tell. One guy held my attention as he described his cruises up and down the Severn between Sharpness and Bristol in the days before the K&A was restored. These days he’s busy doing the English Channel.

Thinking I was clever I told one keeper that I’d noticed the river was down a foot in places and guessed they were lowering the weir sluices in expectation of heavy rain. Oh no, said he, we’re running out of water, we’re desperate for more rain. Bong!!

Bumped into Iain and Myra on nb.Martlet at one Thames lock. Only had a few moments to talk as the top gates opened but Iain was pressing the right buttons for me when he mentioned the Pass of Balmaha and her sister ship Pass of Brander, both tankers in coastal waters during the 1970s and early 80s. Must catch up with them another day and find out more.

Rounding the corners on the wiggly bit above Oxford as we approached King’s Lock I could see the cows, or maybe bullocks (I can’t tell without seeing the dangly bits) paddling in the shallows well below their knees. I can say knees can’t I?

Talking of shallow water we have discovered an announcement following the stranding of a Dutch barge near Bull’s Lock east of Newbury. BW state the maximum draft in the vicinity is 0.8m, far less than what we’d expected on the K&A considering how many deep drafted boats use the canal. Those planning such a journey please be warned.

Seeing as how I’d let a slow hireboat go ahead of us at the previous lock, wrongly thinking they’d bought their two day licence to cruise up to Lechlade, I told Mike by walky-talky that we might be better off slowing down to a crawl so that he could clear the next Thames lock before we arrived. In that way he’d be long gone when we arrived at Duke’s Cut. Some Thames locks are too small for three narrowboats together so rather than get split up and have to wait for each other we’d hang back until we were on our own again.
But I didn’t reckon on the efficiency of the Thames lock keeper’s telegraph. Well overdue after dawdling for fifteen minutes we rounded the last corner and there was the same hireboat sitting in the lock with the gates wide open waiting for one of us.

Our lockie explained that they all knew how many boats are on the river at any one time, and she put it down to lock keeper’s ESP. Now we know why they have a phone glued to their ears all day long.

And so our second day on the Thames was over and we were back onto canals again.

We ended up next to ironwork on the quiet side of Kidlington Green. Well kept canals do have their uses when it comes to uncomplicated moorings.

Thursday.
Back on familiar ground we studied a few back gardens in Kidlington. I wonder if residents realise how many boaters appreciate their gardening efforts. One garden has sprouted chickens since we were here last. No ‘Eggs for sale’ signs so we didn’t stop.

Today would have seen us make an appointment with Mark Paris at Thrupp for a boat safety inspection but he’s off doing other things on the day we pass through.

We met Mark P and Mortimer Bones outside Annie’s Tea Rooms, across the lift bridge at Thrupp and over tea and cake we discussed, as you do, the merits of mole’s claws. None of us had studied moles that closely so Bones’ specimen received close scrutiny and prompted questions like why would a mole need a tail?

As if this wasn’t enough nature for one day, Mark padded off in his net curtains to deal with swarming bees. Thrupp always seems to have something going on when we stop here, there’s never a dull moment.

Making this a convenient end to our adventure with Mike and Jo on Sarah-Kate we celebrated with a glass of bubbly before dining out at The Boat.
We had a splendid meal with smashing company (no reference to breaking bones and computers) and I made a note in Balmaha’s diary to fix another joint cruise before too long.

We have thoroughly enjoyed their company and through them our knowledge of canals and nature have come on in leaps and bounds since we joined up 2 months ago. We shall miss the company and the socialising and I just hope we don’t get hung up on a cill again without them.

Friday saw us separate from Sarah-Kate at the water point at Thrupp. Chugging up the Oxford we passed Dusty on his coal boat (diesel 66p) and moored near Somerton overlooking open fields of cows and bulls and with the odd duck or moorhen for feathered company.
On the way we came across this recently fixed bollard at a lock which tells its own story.

Sited somewhat below ground level this handy rope anchor will soon be overtaken by mud and grass and become useless except for breaking toes or tripping the unwary.

Saturday brought sunshine and Sarah-Kate. Mooring behind us on this excellent countryside vista Mike and Jo joined us at barbeque in spite of the drooling jaws of cows and the roar of bulls across the canal.

A quiet night passed with the occasional padding of feet across the roof and the sun arose on yet another promising dry day. Departing at 7.30 Mike and Jo set off for new pastures leaving us to enjoy the sunshine, the walkers and the inevitable weekend boats.

From here we shall head off back to Leicester hopefully spotting Chas and Ann on Moore-2-Life somewhere along the way and where we shall no doubt drink tea and natter.

At Leicester we shall open the summer cruising diary where someone has written “River Trent and the North”.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Wootton Rivers to Tyle Mill

2009-06-08T20:01:53+02:00

Monday 1st to Sunday 7th June 2009
Monday
The start of our journey this week took us from Wootton Rivers to Great Bedwyn. Remembering what happened to us last time we were here we were extra careful not to slip, trip or fall, we hadn’t time for broken bones.

On the way we saw some fabulous stretches of woods and water and when the light was right it was a pleasure to snap away with the old Brownie camera.

The sun has brought out the water weeds since we passed through here in April. Great wadges of the stuff looking like carpet underlay floated just below the surface looking for boat propellers.
Making the most of the sunshine we ate out on deck, sampling bottles of this and that and eating cinders from the barbeque. Discovered that apple skins float but melon skins sink.

Sitting there taking in the surroundings I marvelled at how clean and green nature was and how utterly filthy our boat had become. Guilt prompted an attack with a bucket and sponge but a four foot section of roof was enough to tell me this would take hours. I left it at that and vowed to do better another day.

Tuesday
Putting Gt.Bedwyn lock behind us we motored towards Hungerford at a steady pace.
Pitching tents above the town’s lock we set off on foot for the new Tesco’s in the centre of town. Not impressed, the car park is too big, the shop is too small and low on product range and the prices are the highest we’ve seen in a long time. I still think the little high street Co-op could give them a run for their money if they really wanted to. On the bright side it shone like never before and we cooked outside again. V and Jo did us proud with the food and I managed to shrink the meat on the BBQ without turning everything black.
Can’t help noticing there are fewer boats on the move these days. We occasionally meet a boat at a lock but there are very few travelling t’other way and that’s one of the reasons I’ve marked the K&A highly as a good cruise. Of course that may change in a month’s time when the silly season starts but I’d recommend spring and early summer for no stress, to see things at their best.
Here’s something you don’t see every day, it’s a swing road-bridge over a lock.

Wednesday gave us a later start than usual because we weren’t going far. Kintbury is a lovely place to stop and as it happens we were treated to the sights of a horse drawn boat. There’s no sound apart from a steady clip-clop as Neddy pulls his boat of sightseers a mile or two up then back again.

On the way down to Kintbury V spotted a water vole sitting at the water’s edge, my first sighting in 3+ years. As if that wasn’t exciting enough we watched a crayfish play on a lock gate behind us as the water dropped through the bottom paddles.

We’ve heard so much about these creatures so it was lovely to see one out for a stroll. We’ve also heard that they are responsible for wrecking the canal bank by burrowing below the water line and I’m amazed at the quantity of holes in some parts where the river joins and leaves the canal sections, sometimes as frequent as every six inches along several yards of the mud bank.
Oh, we also saw nuthatches running up and down the trees. Mike says they might have been tree creepers except TCs don’t run down trees, only up, that’s how you know the difference. I’m certainly learning stuff this year, but how long I can remember it is anyone’s guess, V says I’ve only got an attention span of 5 minutes.
Something that did get my attention was a group of portrait painters setting up camp at Dunn Mill lock. How shall I paint you, asked one lady, but all I had on my mind was how many old ladies would I knock over if I had to jump on the bank with my ropes.

Had another go at washing the boat and managed to do one whole side this time. Slapped on the baby oil to keep away the wrinkles and got it to shine like a new pin.

Thursday took us to Newbury and my obligatory walk around town. There was a small market which could have been the same one we’d seen in Hungerford in April, just books, bird food and jewellery.

Bought a Willie Nelson CD for two-fifty and discovered I already had most of the songs on the other CD back at the boat, dooohhh. At least it wasn’t a con – like being full of Russ Conway.
If you have a spare minute in Newbury then visit the museum because that’s all you’ll need. There’s more floor space given to the reception area than the exhibits. Perhaps there’s a proper museum somewhere in town but I didn’t see any directions.

Mike and Jo invited us round for evening drinky-poos. Got the Rummikub game out and most of us won a game before the stars rose in the sky and we all began nodding off.
The trick is to be discrete about picking up ‘dropped’ tiles at the end of the game otherwise some players take your winning very badly.

Friday saw us sneak out of town before curtains were drawn. It felt naughty going through the lock and under the bridges with no one looking.

Apart from one old lady feeding the ducks and an office worker in a smart suit no one saw us go.

We pulled in at Greenham Canal Service for diesel (77p, self declared split) and I would have taken a bag of coal but it cost over £11 a bag. When I declined I was warned that prices will rise 30% in July. What? 30% on top of £11 something? Then we shall mostly be burning wood or go cold next winter.

Progress was slow after Newbury, two Dutch barges clogged the way, one still sat firmly on the mud under the railway bridge while blue shirts tugged ropes and shouted. Seeing a gap appear on one side of the boat we dashed past before she swung back across the canal.

We later heard that the owners were most unimpressed with the Kennet & Avon and wouldn’t be returning. I wouldn’t be here with a boat that big either, as long as it stayed a ‘remainder’ waterway.

We were the first boats at Thatcham so we tucked ourselves tidily at one end of the moorings, as far from the level crossing lights and klaxon as we could get. But they soon started piling in and by 4pm we were full with boats. One came in lashed to another and was dumped on the side for repairs. I’m afraid I got involved because I just happened to have an adjustable spanner but it was a case of the blind leading the blind as three of us tried to find the diesel blockage on a Shanks engine.
It got dark and it rained so we threw in the towel and disappeared into the dry, muttering something about returning tomorrow if anyone had any good ideas.

Saturday morning, early, we were creeping away from the mooring when heads appeared on the broken boat. Darn it, we’ve been spotted. Using vague sign language and silently mouthing words to convey our apologies we were quickly swept along by the river and disappeared out of sight under the bridge. Thinking that was it we relaxed believing we’d never see them again but they caught us up and we were relieved to see smiles and a thumbs up. Passing each other again and again as you do, we found we had become good friends as we hurled greetings back and forth, always sorry that the river carried us away so quickly.
Woolhampton was our destination and both boats managed to fit the last stretch of empty moorings above the lock.
Visitors came, in the shape of Roger and Babs, and after talking boats for an hour we joined Mike and Jo where we talked boats some more. It’s amazing how much there is to say about boats. I guess it’s like women visiting antenatal classes, babies, babies and more babies. Boats and babies have similarities too, they both need washing, they demand attention, and they both ruin your finances.
Because we’d been travelling every day we decided to have an early night and a lie-in. I drifted off to sleep thinking about a cup of tea in bed, a cooked breakfast and a lazy day catching up on boat jobs.

Sunday 7th June 2009
There was a knock knock on the boat at 7.20am. Who could that be, we’ve paid our licence haven’t we?
It’s Mike from Sarah-Kate – “Didn’t know whether to wake you or not but the water level is so low we might not be able to move, there might be a breach”.

I can tell you I was out like a shot, engine started and ropes cut, pushing Balmaha off the sticky mud into the narrow channel of water left in the centre of the canal. Someone had reported they’d seen water flowing back towards the lock above so we could soon be dry and stuck for who knows how long. Heads popped up from one or two other boats as we slithered down to the lock and shut the gates behind us. One guy with his boat pointing the wrong way looked distinctly worried about his fate but being third in line all he could do was reverse to the lock and wait his turn. We were out and free, pulses returning to normal as we joined the river below and swerved past the open swing bridge next to the pub. Unnerved, unwashed and unfed we were terribly relieved to be back in deep water.

At Aldermaston we passed on the bad news to a hire boat instructor taking his clients through their first lock but he didn’t seem the slightest perturbed, it’s a regular thing, said he, anglers fill their fishing lakes twice a month from the canal and BW come out to ‘rescue’ the stranded boaters by filling the pound from the lock above. It’s a nuisance but no one seems to have worked out a simple cure, like let water in as it’s going out. I suppose the anglers are desperate to keep fishing during the close season and if their gravel pits lose water they must fill them, never mind what it does to boats.

A short cruise downstream we pulled over at the field above Tyle Mill Lock.
More visitors in the shape of daughters for both boats. Cows came along and frightened the girls, which was fun, but otherwise it was a calm sunny day.

We fed Kass and caught up on her news, some of it very interesting, and released her when she looked like she’d stopped talking.

I slept with one eye open, focussed on the water level outside but nothing went wrong this time.

Almost three quarters of our way back to the start of the K&A this is beginning to feel like the end of the adventure. We’ve thoroughly enjoyed it, apart from a few breakages, and we’ve been blessed with brilliant company in Mike and Jo on Sarah-Kate. Two boats together have made things easier but I can’t say the water or the locks have been at all off-putting. Sure, there are many broken bits, more than you’d see on non-remainder waterways, but the towpath along the whole length is the best I’ve ever seen. I have been surprised at how few boats there are, not counting Bradford on Avon to Bath, but that could be due to the time of year. The scenery is as others have told us, stunning, well worth the journey from Leicester.
Now all that lies ahead is a couple of mornings cruising into the sun and to find the way out.

Would I do it again? You bet. But next time I might start at Sharpness and travel one way, from west to east.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Bath to Wootton Rivers

2009-06-03T12:48:42+02:00

Monday 25th to Sunday 31st May 2009.

Monday has slipped my mind, apart from blog prep and uploading, so we’ll start with Tuesday.
The weather is noticeably warmer and there are signs of temperatures settling down to a gradual rise instead of the customary ups and downs that call for the occasional fire at night. We’re down to the remains of our last bag of coal but there are a couple of logs on the roof if I can be bothered to get them down and hit them with the axe.

The chimney cleaning that was done several weeks ago is all undone and you wouldn’t know we had brass bands on the sticky-up bit on the roof. I knew it at the time but felt obliged to scrape off the winter’s corrosion, now it all needs doing again. I can see why some people chuck the thing away after three years and buy new.

Today‘s a moving day and we’re off to Bradford on Avon. This is our final cruise of the K&A as we say goodbye to the West Country and hello again to the River Thames and a return to the north. It will be good to see the edge of the glacier again as we head up country with the sun on our backs. All this greenery is getting too much for me, the wide open spaces of the Kennet & Avon have shrunk terribly as the trees on the offside reach over to the reeds of the towpath. They appear to be racing each other to see who can reach the middle of the navigation first.

It’s also goodbye to those little pockets of permies that line the towpaths, the ‘interesting’ wooden boats with plywood extensions, some draped in tarpaulins and stacked high with cane furniture, twisted tree branches and aluminium poles that once served to support TV aerials.

Here’s something you don’t see in town very often, a ferret out for a walk.

The oil change is overdue but rain put a stop to that so I busied myself with scanning photos while V wandered off to the shop.

Wednesday started early for Mike and Jo on Sarah-Kate because they had an early appointment at the hospital for physio’ on Jo’s mended arm. Their early return meant we could get going while the weather behaved itself. Hilperton Marina came in useful for boaty bits, though I felt miffed when I was told that the Rock mineral oil I’d bought was actually a synthetic oil. On our previous visit I’d been told it was an all singing all dancing mineral oil that fitted every category of viscosity.

But I was still smiling, not because of this purchase but because of the antics of a few lads living inside a nearby road bridge over the canal. Mike was first to pass underneath it and gesticulated to us that something was going on at the bridge. “Hello mate” said voices as we passed underneath, “how are you today?”
Up between the concrete beams were lads lying on the horizontal sections, peering down and greeting boaters who were completely unaware of them until they spoke. Asking them to show themselves they dropped their heads and laughed. I’m afraid I laughed too and couldn’t bring myself to tell them off. As a part of the entertainment they dropped their legs below the bridge and waggled them to make us laugh even more.

Further on it was our turn to entertain others. A family followed us between the locks and while we negotiated the chambers the mother gave the two boys a thorough explanation of the workings. Just as I was following Sarah-Kate into the next lock our prop snagged on rubbish and I lost control of the boat. Letting her drift I dived into the weedhatch and pulled on a tangle of carpet, rope and polythene to the accompaniment of mum’s commentary to her lads along with gasp and oooohhhs as bits came up through the hole in the stern. I think the prop job was more interesting to them than the locks and I can imagine bath time at home won’t be the same again with string and polythene wrapped around toy boat propellers.

It being half-term there were hoards of families walking or riding bikes beside the canal. The children of one family on a B&B cycling holiday were so fascinated by boats and locks that the father was heard to remark “I guess I know what sort of holiday we’ll be having next year”.

Thursday we arrived in Devizes and took the last two places on the 72s. We nearly had Paul and Christine again to help us through the Caen Hill flight but other commitments and our early start meant it wouldn’t have been worth the journey from home. But we thought of them and we were grateful for their offer.

There are some funny people about aren’t there. Some come for miles to stand next to the locks and all they do is watch. They don’t talk, they just watch and watch and watch. Mike and I did our bit to bring smiles to faces by playing loud music and miming on air guitars but it had limited appeal and we didn’t raise a penny when the hat was passed round. In his final bid to get a laugh Mike did his Botox impression next to one of the signs on the flight.

Why do frogs leave the side ponds and dive into the locks? Mike pointed out one heading for the propeller so I did my bit for nature and scooped him out before the water went red.

After 29 locks we were understandable tired and under an almost cloudless sky we flopped onto the towpath and ate out a-la-BBQ.

In the cool of the day we were joined by blog readers Tony and Pam. It was three against one that she was Pam and not Pat but apologies if we have that wrong. T&P are just a couple of weeks away from taking on a new narrowboat and were understandably excited about the details of boats and canals.
Remembering our first experiences I have to say I am jolly glad we took Balmaha off the builder’s hands in the middle of winter. We had the place to ourselves and no one to see our (my) worst steering blunders. We wish T&P a quiet few weeks to get the hang of it and many years of problem free cruising.

If you’re up there in the west Midlands look out for ‘Time will Tell’ and give them a wave.

Friday was hot. Everyone had things to do and it was my turn to crawl into the engine hole to swap oil and filter. Funny how you notice a dozen other jobs to do when you lift the stern boards and my half hour’s job turned into two before I was back on deck. It didn’t stop there because the paint brushes hit the dinks on the boat’s side and the chimney was consigned to a poly bag in the cratch. I got told off for working out in the sun without a hat and had my comeuppance at bedtime when my head started throbbing.

Grandmother’s words came to mind when she first learned I was joining the navy. Don’t forget to wear your pith helmet in the tropics, she said. You might think you look stupid but it will stop you getting sun stroke.

Saturday was an epic cruising day. The sun shone like mad but we didn’t stop for 7 hours, including a water and icecream stop.
Rounding a bend we saw the usual “Slow down for moored boats” sign but seeing no boats I only half complied with the request. A bit further on I saw the outline of boats and this time a different sign, one that made me laugh and put the engine into tick-over.

We reached Wootton Rivers by 4.30pm and found space on a short stretch of steel piling above the first two locks.
Having missed two sets of cygnets with the camera I managed to get half a picture of the Canada geese family before they fled to the security of the bushes.

So much has changed since we were here mid April, the reeds have gone wild, bushes and trees have sprouted branches and there’s just so little room for boats. Wide beam hire boats and trip boats mess things up when you want to get on, they completely fill some stretches of canal and how two of them manage to pass without lots of reversing I’ll never know. I’m glad we came down here early enough to appreciate an ‘empty’ canal.

Having said that there are some lovely bits to see when there’s no one coming the other way. Huge oak trees touch tops across the canal to compete with any cathedral for beauty and the bird music from the branches above more than match little boys singing in the choir stalls.

Talking of little boys, a call from number one son on his last birthday in his twenties revealed a holiday in progress down Cornwall way. Bet the sun is hot and the water freezing cold. Many years spent down there when the children were small taught us not to expect warm seas on the north coast until much later in the year.
Narrowboats don’t do the Bristol Channel or we’d be down there, wouldn’t we V?

Jo cooked a smashing skewered curry and rice that we ate outside under the trees after our cruise.
Mike’s a dab hand at birds so we made him name the sounds above us and for the first time in my life I think I can tell you what a willow warbler sounds like and identify a wren’s warning ‘click’. But for butterflies we turned to Jo for identification and I can describe a Painted Lady but still haven’t a clue what they sound like.

Sunday 31st May 2009.
It’s been declared a day off from cruising so I was looking forward to playing with transmitters and aerials. No joy with that so I turned to the Blog, and to follow that we might go looking for Elderflowers to make cordial. Mike’s doing one of his progresses. I liken it to QE1 on her travels around the country except Mike does it all on his own, no horse, no servants, no nothing, just him and nature. I guess he takes a map because he always finds his way back again. No, I've been told he does it all from memory, looks at map, puts map away and starts walking. Mike used to be a scout for the Brits when they invaded Africa centuries ago.
I’d do progresses too but the hayfever season has just started and there’s no horse that could carry my stack of handkerchiefs, eye drops, nose spray and tablets.

Apologies in advance for late posting, there’s no T-Mobile signal here and the prospects are poor for the next couple of days. But as soon as the little lights appear on the modem I shall upload the current drivel.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Bathampton to Bristol

2009-05-25T16:41:08+02:00

Monday 18th to Sunday 24th May 2009.
It’s been an exciting week by our standards, plenty of adrenalin and many moments of reflection. The one I’d like to remember occurred on Wednesday, at Bristol, when tide and weather fitted perfectly for a jaunt down the River Avon under the suspension bridge.
The one I’d rather forget occurred on Monday part way down Bath locks where we nearly lost our home by getting caught on the cill.

Leaving Bathampton Monday morning we were pleased to be on the move again. It’s a slow journey from here to Bath but once we were through the tiny tunnel and into Bath locks all the frustrations of the summit were forgotten. In fact everything was forgotten and during one descent I was too busy nattering to Mike on Sarah-Kate to notice the concrete cill emerging under my feet. I put it down to the new notices stuck on the upper lock beams telling us to keep away from the cill. There’s a perfectly good white mark on the walls but they had to go too far and stick up notices and of course it’s only natural for boats to be attracted to them.

Can’t remember what we were talking about but the tiller arm slowly went stiff and as I pondered this my eyes spotted the white line on the wall. Oh dear, we’re in trouble.
Yelling dementedly for the lower paddles to be dropped I watched in horror as Balmaha tilted forward and then sideways and leant on Sarah-Kate for support.

It was all over in minutes, Mike and I were up at the top paddles letting in water as the ladies stopped the vital fluids draining away below us.

She floated again and all that remained was to get the rudder back into its bottom cup on the skeg.

Needless to say there were ‘looks’ from V so I kept my head suitably lowered in a contrite manner until smiles returned.

A week later, after many helpful reminders to pay attention I’m back in form, nattering to Mike and missing dangers by inches instead of miles.

Turning right from Bath’s bottom lock we visited the weir at Pulteney Bridge before calling it a day opposite the flats and offices not far from the station.

Tuesday came with showers every half hour. Undeterred by the weather we cruised downhill through beautiful scenery, across open valleys, between wooded hills, through Hanham lock, past V’s childhood playground (a huge steel sewer pipe beside the river) and into Bristol docks.

The old Fry’s chocolate factory brought back memories of goody bags filled with broken or malformed chocolate bars brought home by the workers. Many Bristolians in the 1960s worked at or knew someone who worked at either Frys or Wills’ ciggy factory and brought home cheap samples. Some worked at the brewery but I don’t recall any similar benefits.

We paid our dues at Netham lock where we found the lock keeper most helpful with advice on where to go and what to do. He told us to treat our boat as a taxi and the whole floating harbour as our home but looked quite disappointed when we said we weren’t going to Sharpness and even offered to take us up the Severn himself.

Bristol was a home-coming for us after 30 years away and what a change!! The place has had a face-lift and a good tidy-up since the post war and post commercial days of our childhood. It was good to see ships, yachts, dinghies and narrowboats and, most of all, plenty of empty moorings.
We passed under bridges that we’d walked or driven across and past concrete office blocks that replaced the derelict stone buildings we left behind in the 70s. Some factory walls have been retained for inclusion in new offices and overall we found the modernisation quite acceptable.

But the biggest surprise was the floating harbour with its new image.
Remnants of dock buildings, railways and cranes have been cleaned, painted and arranged in spaces between new offices and apartments.

The odd working boat can be seen amongst the new cruisers and converted barges but they look strange and out of place on this waterscape dedicated to leisure.

Walking the dock side near the town centre I found it hard to understand the mind of the architect who designed the buildings and paved open spaces with seemingly random objects plopped here and there.

Are these designed to raise questions or provide answers, I wonder.

And are they worth the price that the residents paid?

In contrast it was nice to see some of the old dives near Queens Square left untouched, places like The Old Duke and Llandoger Trow in King Street where you drink as you sway to the music.

It wouldn’t be right to visit Bristol without seeing Bristolians so we hosted Chris and Graham Tuesday evening, doing a mini cruise of the harbour (overtaking the sailing ship “Matthew”) before eating.

V knew Chris from school but I first met Chris at what we called Pigsty Hill Youth Club in Bishopston in the 1960s where Andy, my best man years later, and I did our best to ruin the snooker table.
In fact that was where I first saw V, but that’s another story.

Wednesday brought an unexpected highlight of the week. Enquiries at the Harbour Master’s office led us to believe we could arrange a locking out to sea, covered by the price of our ticket to Bristol City Docks. High tide was at 16.38 and as long as we were back before the tide turned we could take a jolly down the river. So we contacted the Dock Master as he came on watch three hours before high tide and he agreed to let thousands of gallons of water out of the docks just so we could cruise the salty river.

With Mike and Jo aboard as crew, advisers and necessary extra floatation should we sink, we slipped through the massive Entrance Lock onto the River Avon.

Passing beneath Brunel’s Suspension Bridge we pushed against the tide to our half way point at Sea Mills.

Returning with the tide was easier and we were back inside the safety of the lock in just over an hour. Having called the Dock Master as we passed the bridge on the way back upstream we found him waiting with a relieved look that turned into smiles when we reported all had gone according to plan.

I would recommend it to anyone reaching Bristol by boat, providing the tide is at a reasonable time of day. Locking outwards is up to three hours before high water and the last inward locking is 15 minutes before the tide turns. The Dock Master was just as keen for us to go, can’t think why, and was very helpful with advice on what to do and how to do it.
I’m led to believe that opening the lock allows them to scour the mud from the harbour so maybe we’re doing each other a favour.

A visit to Bristol wouldn’t be complete without pictures of the ss.Great Britain and the Matthew, a replica of Cabot’s little sailing boat that crossed oceans many years ago.

If it looks like the sky is about to erupt then that’s just how it was. The weather changed every five minutes so you took your chances when cutting loose from the side.

We felt good paying 55p for diesel at Bristol Marina until we heard the price had dropped to 50p elsewhere. But at least we could declare our own propulsion/power split, there being no pressure to comply with a fixed ratio.

So much happened in those three days down to the city and back that it would take too long to relate but in summary we all agreed it was worth doing. We would have stayed longer and gone back another day if the daily rate was more reasonable and judging by the empty moorings others feel the same.

Thursday and Friday saw us return to Bath and canal life. It had been good to clear the soot from the exhaust but it’s pootling time again.

Fine weather at Bitton’s railway station meant walkies and I mean walkies, it was at least two miles. But I made it back on a hotdog and chips from the station restaurant and the promise of a barbeque beneath the bridge over the river, our first this year.

Something else has been added to my ‘want list’. Actually several things but all under the title wide beam Dutch barge. We saw so many on the river and around Bristol’s city centre that my wants are fast turning into needs. I know it spells doom to cruising the narrow canals up north but just think of the fun on rivers and around the coast. Imagine pulling up on the sand at Weston Super Mare for an icecream.

Friday’s arrival in Bath was marked by fireworks. This presumably was the launch of Bath’s music weekend where everybody and his dog turned out onto the streets to watch live bands and acoustic musicians play for free. Apart from the locals there were representatives from every nation east of Margate, mostly sitting on tour buses or dragging suitcases between hotel and train.

Bank holiday weekend was best spent sitting tight, holding onto a mooring because anyone who wasn’t walking or cycling was floating past our veranda.

A call from Ter to say “it had started” reminded me that today’s itchy eye is tomorrow’s hayfever. Everything went mad when the sun came out, flies popped out of the water into the boat, mostly into the bedroom, and pollen wafted in on the slightest breeze.
I guess winter’s over, summer’s begun and it’s time to look out those shorts and tee shirts.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Still east of Bath

2009-05-18T17:14:47+02:00

Monday 11th to Sunday 17th May 2009.

Monday
The plank came in useful this morning when John and Joan from V’s coach trip to Scotland called in to see us. Lovely couple, live between Shaftesbury and Shepton Mallet, on the road we used to travel when visiting the in-laws.

Walked to Bath for the shops, wallet was just as heavy when we got back, fruitless visits to hardware shops and nothing but tired legs to show for hours waiting outside fitting rooms.

Nattered to a BW man just before we departed for Bathampton and he told us there was a regular ‘patrol’ in this neck of the woods every Monday or Tuesday. Too regular if you ask me because all the naughty ones move up to Bradford on Avon on Monday night, swapping places with their cousins who come down here.

Tuesday
Used the plank again. John and Beth called in to see us. Haven’t seen these guys for a while and there’s always so much to catch up on like kids, hobbies and people we knew from yesteryear. Links go back to 1972 when house sharing was in vogue and finding parties at weekends was helped by knowing where nurses lived.

Wednesday.
Pottered up to Bradford on Avon with Mike and Jo on Sarah-Kate. V was desperate for the shops, the groceries kind, and we were getting low on the wet stuff, both kinds.
Got reminded that the washing machine’s drying function doesn’t work, I’d forgotten all about it and made a note on the second sheet of A4 to have a look at it (one day). It won’t be easy because the machine is built in and I’ll have to use a jemmy to get the jolly thing out.

Thursday
A sunny day, hooray. We all agreed to wander down town, Bradford’ that is, and sample the Bridge tea rooms coffee and nibbles. Terribly nice fella served us, apologised for not wearing his pinny.

Nice place, not huge but then you don’t get a lot of space in hundred year old buildings.
Outside we wandered across to the hardware and clothes shops, usual routine, she finds nothing that fits, and we go to the museum. You’ve got to go there if you’re in town, there’s a complete pharmacy as it was millions of years ago, you remember the sort of place, where you could buy bits for chemistry experiments at home.

More culture came our way as Mike and Jo led us up to the Saxon church of St.Laurence, then down again to the tithe barn.

These are places not to be missed, but unlike the museum you didn’t get the old fella’s explanation so it’s up to you to read the blurb and spot the features. I’m a lazy sightseer and prefer to rely on tour guides for my input.

But we can’t be hanging around Bradford’ all day so we tied up to Sarah-Kate and did a pirouette in the boat basin before entering the lock to go back down to Avoncliffe for the night.
We did a lovely spin with props in forward and reverse but there was no one to notice.

It rained, again, but nothing too bad or I would have stayed indoors. I walked V around the aqueduct and pondered the ‘request-stop’ railway station until a train came along and picked up the lady who stuck out her hand. How civilised is that.

Tomorrow morning Mike and Jo will catch the train here for another hospital visit. This is the biggy, the plaster is coming off. We joked about her putting her red plastered arm out to stop the train and damaging the driver’s cab.

The view from the aqueduct answered some of my questions about the River Avon. It’s not just getting wider but the flow is picking up, preparing for its take-over of the canal at Bath.

V cooked for the four of us on Thursday night and we ate faggots and peas, faggots from the market stall in Bradford’.
Tasted lovely but did terrible things a couple of hours later.

Friday
It was a pain getting caught on the submerged concrete every time a boat passed so we pushed off and left Sarah-Kate behind. Mike and Jo managed the request-stop train both ways and, returning later in the day, cruised west to meet us at Dundas.

We met an interesting fella here as we sheltered under a tree during a rain storm. Noticing several boats sporting the latest boater’s accessory, the black and white Patrol Notice, we received an explanation for boats behaving in their own particular way.

Perhaps because they have been squeezed out of their customary moorings they are now showing a sense of community and preparing to face their goliath together.

Invited to join their discussions at a favourite watering hole we declined but maybe one day, when those licence fees finally become too much to bear we will seek out the boaters of “Sunset Strip”, as he called it, and join the battle.

This boat reminds me of the ingenuity of boaters who personalise their craft. On many of them the window frames, doors and furniture show some amazing wood working talent.

Between showers we wandered the paths around the Dundas Aqueduct and found ourselves in Brassknocker Basin. What a delightful place this is with its charming name and historical connections with the coal fields to the east.
It might be a tiny canal stuck on the side of the Kennet and Avon but it’s not short of a hire boat or two.

Ladies can hire boats too you know, and we just happened to meet a few preparing for the weekend. But not all was as it seemed, a few deep voices aroused suspicions but their smiles were genuine even if nothing else was.

Saturday
We’re off again. Pausing for water and other things at the service point we agreed movements with Mike and Jo. They’ll kill a couple of hours at Claverton’s pump while we sniff out the moorings at Bathampton.
Jo’s arm looked odd with its puffy wrist and wasted forearm where the plaster had been but exercises should put things right in time. She wasn’t best pleased with the restriction on wrist movement and the pain showed in her face when she attempted the praying hands pose.

This was to be another day of April showers, just when you think it’s all over another gale hits the boat.

But it’s good news, we can eat properly again, Rob and Jan are visiting for dinner. Known this couple since I don’t know when. V was at school with Jan and I suppose I met Rob a few years later when we moved to Pucklechurch (don’t laugh, that’s a real place).
Rob was in the Merch’ like me so I was understandably keen to get stuck into the photo albums they’d brought along. Pictures of rough seas and very, very, large crude carriers (supertankers to you) and stories of people met and places been in the 1970s brought back many happy memories.

Sunday 17th May 2009.
Weather wasn’t brilliant but the food was. It was Ter and Claire’s turn to visit so we got the best plates out and had proper food again.

Lunch was followed by a sleep in the chair, last night was catching up on me I’m afraid.
Don’t forget the Blog V said, zzzzzzzz said I.
I’ll do it tomorrow.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Bath again

2009-05-10T21:29:50+02:00

Monday 4th to Sunday 10th May 2009

The Editor is back. Now life can return to normal, no more getting up at an unearthly hour (8.30) and going to bed late (8.30), no more eating drinking and breathing sawdust and varnish.

V returned Sunday morning, clutching bags, photographs and stories to make my hair curl of coach travel and hotels in jolly bonnie Scotland.

As for me, I started a jobs list the day she left but by midweek I’d given up recording which bit of wood got scraped, sanded and varnished. Who cares? Fortunately for me she could see something different on her return. Here’s a tip for other boaters, wiping turps over the shelves certainly gives the appearance of new varnish and the smell will convince anyone that work has been done. Only joking. That idea didn’t come to mind until just now and by then it was too late.

There are advantages to being on one’s own but I wouldn’t like to do it all the time, the thought of waiting at swing bridges for someone else to come along scares me silly, what if nobody comes along for weeks? Thinking about it one night, half way through a bottle of milk (not) I got quite maudlin and pondered my chances of staying a socialite in a narrowboat on my own. In reality I’d probably turn into a hermit and do what the youngsters down here do – just sit and sit and sit until the ‘notice’ appears on the boat, then move a mile up the canal and start sitting all over again.

I’d become an old age drop-out, partial to a glass but having to resort to the ‘apple juice’ rather than my current favourite, mother’s ruin. Mind you, I’d have to change my wardrobe if I lived down here, my colours don’t fit the scene at all, it’s all oranges, reds, browns and yellows along this bit of the Kennet & Avon.
To completely fit in I’d have to cover the roof in logs, no not logs – branches with the twigs still attached and plastic toys and battered bicycles and a trailer for those little trips to the water tap.

Talking of which, there’s a favourite watering place just along from me. It’s a land drain sticking out of the field which takes the run-off from a sheep pasture and deposits water into the canal. Now you have to imagine a clay pipe, about 3” diameter protruding a few inches from the earth, underneath it is wet clay and a couple of feet away is the canal. The water seems to run continuously and has attracted the ‘permies’ as I like to call them, who walk over the little footbridge with their plastic containers to top up with water.
One boat tied up at the bridge for three hours and by using a funnel and pipe put this field water straight into the boat’s water tank. Now how inventive is that? Absolutely brilliant. Someone must have come along and tested the water and declared it safe for consumption and word spread along the canal.
No, you won’t catch me doing it, I have a delicate tummy and I’d have to imbibe mother’s ruin to sterilise it which would cause me to fall over, again.

Enough, I’ve wandered far enough in my thoughts on that subject, it’s time to return to serious boating stuff.

Fortunately for my sanity Mike and Jo caught me up in Sarah-Kate and provided much needed distractions. But there’s a down side to that, someone is always there to note the days that I don’t get out of bed.

As V took the camera with her to the Outer Hebrides or wherever it was (Orkneys, she reminds me) there are no pictures to show from this week’s canalside activities, that is apart from one. Some background first. Vic on No Problem made some excellent vented windows for his boat comprising wooden frame covered with a fine fly-proof netting that lets in the breeze but keeps out the flies. This week I made two of these babies for Balmaha and have to say they work quite well.
All I do is take out the removable semi-circular glass unit and insert my new device which allows a flow of air but keeps out the flies.

First trials didn’t go quite to plan because I found flies on the inside of the unit, they’d come through the back doors and stuck themselves on the mesh while trying to get out through the porthole. But I can see how it might work in the middle of summer, from about 5pm when the mozzies pop out of the water and go crazy trying to get into the bedroom to wait for us. Thanks Vic for that idea, what have you invented this year?

Finally, I must apologise for the lack of anything interesting to report but I’ve done much the same thing every day and I haven’t had the benefit of V to make my days exciting.
Apart from Mike and Jo who, have been brilliant friends ever since the cruise began, my only close companions this week have been two ducks who appear every hour at the side doors where they quack until they’re fed. These ducks have taken it upon themselves to look after me by floating outside the windows with those “I’m starving” eyes during the day and by flip-flapping up and down the roof all night as if to keep my nightmares away. Did you know that ducks love cheese?

But for those who, like me, don’t know where Scotland is, here are a couple of pictures of the place.
The first one is all to do with affordable housing at Skara Brae on the Orkneys.

The last one is something to do with Italian POWs building a chapel during WW2 and having to make do with a Nissen hut. That’s nothing to do with Nissan cars (is it?).
It might look like stone and plasterwork but it’s all a trick with clever painting, a bit like me last week in this boat.

As for the future, we’re hanging around east of Bath for another week then doing the Bristol run, possibly stopping two nights in the harbour.

Spurred on by the “Who’s doing diesel at what price” and “Where to get your laundry done” I’m preparing a booklet called “Floaters or sinkers”. It’s all about what floats and what doesn’t so we know what we can chuck overboard without getting into trouble.
For example - potato peelings sink, so they’re alright, whilst apple peelings float, so they’re not alright.
Everyone is invited to contribute to the booklet so let me know your experiences, ‘though nothing too ghoulish please.

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Narrowboat Balmaha – Bath

2009-05-03T17:29:59+02:00

Monday 27th April to Sunday 3rd May 2009

Rain was forecast and rain was what we got. It wasn’t warm but neither was it cold so although we didn’t use the central heating (spoilt or what?) we kept the fire going overnight.
We’re out in the country, somewhere near Seend (no that’s not a spelling mistake). One sees the occasional boat or two but there’s plenty of space between them and the cruising is up to standard.

By evening we’re listing again. Someone’s pinched the water. Yesterday we were robbed in the morning, today we’re robbed in the evening. This canal certainly takes some getting used to.

We’re approaching Hilperton marina so V and I take a walk (it really isn’t far, she said) and there I finger all the shiny bits in the chandlery and the icecreams. Not a bad shop I have to say, there’s things in there that I haven’t seen anywhere else on the system, reels of 6mm copper tube for my winter project and boat main fuses of all shapes and sizes up to 750 amps. I bought two giant fuse links at £3.10 each, compare that with Midland Chandlers if you will.

The following day we stopped at Hilperton Wharf’s services and did a rubbish drop. There’s no point buying diesel here, they will only sell with a propulsion/power split of 60/40, and no, I haven’t got that the wrong way round. At 60p a litre plus 46p extra duty we would be £63.60 worse off on a full tank of diesel.

Leaving Hilperton we continued towards Bradford on Avon. No sooner had we started than we stopped under a bridge to admire dozens of mason’s marks. There be stone bridges in these parts and Jo and me snapped away with cameras until we’d recorded everything. Even an approaching narrowboat didn’t deter us, he fought his way through the bridge hole while we loitered in it scanning stones for these unusual markings.

At Bradford Lock we halted for a shopping trip to dear old Sainsburys. Might as well take a walk into town while we’re there, she said, and we found it much as we’d left it 35 years ago.

In fact it’s much as we’d have left it hundreds of years ago.

The Bridge has been branded UK’s Top Tea Room 2009, topping the Ritz and all London’s top hotels and even Bath’s Pump Rooms, so the sign says.

What a lovely place to find near the Kennet & Avon canal, well worth the ½ mile walk from the boat.

Smashing place, nice people and a lovely accent is developing as we get closer to our old haunt of Bristol.

And then we spotted it – my relatives – Granny Mo’s, right there next to the lock.

Couldn’t go any further without sitting outside Granny’s sipping good coffee and watching the boats go by. This might even beat the Bridge because of its unique setting and it’s a darn sight kinder on the pocket.

We stayed the night (at the moorings, not at Granny Mo’s) and on Thursday joined the queue for the water tap before descending the lock. All went well as we waited our turn for the tap but unfortunately we met Mrs Grump on a hireboat coming the other way who couldn’t handle queues and let off steam about us and the system and probably life in general so we dumped rubbish, declined water and pulled away from the conflict. It didn’t stop then, she told her husband who yelled some more so I smiled, which didn’t help. Granny Mo’s owner came out to see what the fuss was all about and commented on how it provided wonderful entertainment for the locals.

Back out into the countryside we relaxed and enjoyed the cruise to the Dundas Aqueduct, built in 1804 across the Avon valley, and where we waited an hour for water.

The wide beam in front must have been 90% water tank, 10% accommodation. The owner has two of these which he hires out and we compared notes on central heating systems and engines. He’s getting a new 50hp Beta engine which will leave him with a spare Italian engine to dispose of. I got the impression he wasn’t asking much for it but I declined.

Made a note to cruise the Somerset Coal Canal until I looked in the book and discovered its only ¼ mile long now, the rest was abandoned many years ago.

Mike and Jo have popped home for an important birthday so we’re on our own for a day or two.
By the time we reached Bathampton we were cruising the canal equivalent of the M25. Wall to wall residents left little space for visitors so we pushed on in the hope of finding something in Bath.

A space on the 72’s and on rings was more than we could have expected and judging by the last few miles this is a rare find.
What’s even better was the bridge ahead of us was plastered with mason’s marks, just wait til I tell Jo.
Despite the weather we walked down town, following the locks, to see what the River Avon offered boaters. Moorings are scattered between the locks, sometimes in twos or threes, and we mentally booked our space on the public moorings below the weir in town, even if it’s going to cost us money. But that’s another day.

Friday arrived along with the population of Bath, all eager to tread the gravel path beside the canal.
I was given two lists by V, one summarised boat jobs while the other listed food in the fridge. Why? Because she’s doing a runner.

No, nothing like that, she’s going as carer/companion with a couple of ladies on a coach to the frozen north. Somewhere beyond the mainland, somewhere over the sea to a remote paradise, or it would be if the sun ever shone there, for a week. Meanwhile I get to indulge myself with cooking, washing, cleaning and attacking that long list of jobs.

But first I have to turn the boat and find a mooring that won’t attract attention from the blue-shirts. Remembering the check list, like fit the tiller arm and start the engine before casting off, I make it through bridges and tunnel to the winding hole above Bath locks. There’s a friendly fella with a boat at the ‘hole who chats to me as I turn around and has nasty things to say about sea gulls that drop fish onto his boat and forget to collect them. He held up his trophies that looked a bit like piranhas to me.
Back in the other direction I crawled along looking for a space to stop for a week and taking advice from a hireboat crew stopped as far from a suspicious looking floating wood pile as I could. Needn’t have bothered because another one turned up later and plonked himself right next to me.

Saturday 2nd May
Full of beans, well bacon and eggs, I was pleased to see the jolly old sun was out again. Time to find the two lists.

First open doors and windows, second lift the furniture, third sandpaper the floor.

And then slap on the varnish.

Great?

No, not exactly. It’s dandelion weather, gorgeous yellows have been replaced by fluffy whites which at the chime of mid-day float away on the breeze. I’m not sure how they steer but they’re very good at finding portholes and gaps in the doors and they collect in bunches in every corner of the boat. They particularly look for their favourite landing places - cups of coffee and glasses of wine, but worst of all they seem attracted to fresh varnish, open tins and sticky paint brushes.

So while the varnish dries I sit at the other end of the boat trying not to suffocate because I have to keep the windows and doors closed.

There’s another downside to sanding and varnishing wood, dust gets everywhere. But the good news is that you can only see it when you move something. The trick is to put things back in the same place and that’s made easier by dust leaving a shape the same as the object.

I kept the fire in overnight, it helped to dry the varnish which smelt a tad nasty and it helped to dry my socks which also smelt a tad nasty. I’d soaked them in a bucket with phosphate free (terribly high in nitrates) soap and couldn’t believe the colour after I’d rinsed them. Why don’t I do this more often I wondered.
Being close to Bath it’s terribly busy on the canal, boats pass every five minutes and many of them seem to be in a desperate hurry.
It’s not a pleasant experience being on pins at the end of long ropes outside reeds and balancing on submerged concrete beams that line the canal. I wonder if the concrete was higher than the water level at one time and served the purpose of a wall to rest alongside?

Perhaps the water level has been raised to save dredging and now the concrete is lying at base plate level so that waves from passing boats lift us onto it with an unpleasant bang and a scraping noise. Some clever boaters have dropped car tyres down the side to ease the scuffing but guess who didn’t bring any?

No, give me deserted canals and rivers any day.

Not that I’ve anything against the scruffs that line the bank in these parts, I’m getting to know them one by one and have found them, so far, to be a friendly lot. I think I’m getting to like them.

Some of the boats down here look very interesting, if only we could stop and talk and get to see inside them, I’d find them fascinating, I’m sure. There must be great stories to tell. I wonder if any keep blogs.

The towpath is wider here than we’ve seen it in the east, it needs to be wide to handle the traffic. Every day it’s the same, joggers first then dog walkers by the thousand and then cyclists by the million. There’s no way I’m going to be able to chop wood on the towpath. But there’s one good point worth mentioning, there are no anglers, no 30 foot perch poles, no fold up seats and no umbrellas to negotiate on the towpath.

Sunday 3rd May 2009
Sanding and varnishing continues. I’m doing the water stained bits that you think you’ve cured until the varnish goes on and the stains all reappear like magic.

Boats continue to whiz up and down so I’ve stuck a couple of notices outside. The first one I’ve used before on the Trent & Mersey, to good effect, it says “Please Slow Down, we’re almost out of china”. This usually gets a smile and often has the desired effect.
The other is “Go Slow – canal humps ahead”.

If neither work, as happens with hireboats, then just as the steerer passes the open side doors I drop a few empty tins on the floor and let out a yell, that usually gets their attention and their reaction makes me laugh.

Two pirate boats left for Bathampton this morning, must be a stag do, they were three parts jolly and having a real good time. A wide beam trip boat goes one way in the morning and returns later with rows of smiling faces and the sounds of a turkey farm.
The only thing that slows the trip boat is the narrow bridge hole a few feet away. As he applies the brakes his boat sends a small tsunami down the canal which treats us all to a free Alton Towers experience.

Hurry up V, I’m all for getting outta here.

Addendum
Any nonsense, grammar or spelling mistakes that mya occur are due to the absence of my editor.

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