HERBIE!

Reservoir check - a look at Welford

2012-01-27T17:47:00.001Z

We’ve had a bit of rain lately – hooray. Are the reservoirs filling up? If our visit yesterday to the BW reservoir at Welford is anything to go by there is still a very long way to go. Here is my picture taken yesterday.

This is taken from more or less the same spot as the photo I showed a few posts back – scroll down a couple of times and you’ll see it. That picture was taken by Rick shortly before Christmas. personally I can’t see any significant change. I reckon this reservoir is a good fifteen feet below its full level. A local man who we met there told us that he had never seen it so low in all his life. In fact he had never before seen the concrete culvert block you see here. He said Saddington reservoir nearby is no better.

There is a slight ray of hope though. There are in fact two reservoirs here, Sulby and Welford. Here you see the two of them side by side.

Sulby on the left looks a lot fuller, although according to the measuring posts it is still some two metres down. It looks as though Sulby feeds into Welford when it gets full – down the shute you can see at the bottom right of this next picture.

Maybe things will look better when Sulby fills up and tips its surplus into Welford.

The retreat of the waters leaves some strange sights, like this tree, which to me looks like some sort of camel!

Late night rescue - Herbie crew abandons ship - and Herbie's law of DiY,

2012-01-24T15:47:00.004Z

High drama on the open seas. Read about how our gallant crew was forced to abandon ship and spend the night in the seaman's mission.Well, when I say open seas I mean Crick marina, and when I say seaman's mission I mean Rick and Marilyn's house, but life and death drama nevertheless.

On Sunday we arrived to board Herbie for a few days R&R. We lit the stove and began to settle in. It was a cold night and despite our best efforts the stove wasn't getting all that hot. Then when Kath was returning from getting a fresh bucket of coal (she has her uses), she noticed a big lump of metal on the floor at the back of the stove. On closer inspection it turned out to be the circular blanking plate that seals the alternative chimney flue orifice. That explained why the stove wouldn't draw properly, there was a five inch hole in the back of it!

Further inspection revealed a broken clamp that seals the plate from inside the stove. Here you see the plate and the cracked clamp.

No fixing that in a hurry. What should we do? Soon I realised that this was dangerous. That big hole might well allow a lot of carbon monoxide to flow into the cabin, especially if we damped the fire down for the night. Extinguishing a stove, once lit, is not all that simple, and anyway it was freezing cold. ( I should perhaps point out that we do have a carbon monoxide detector but I don't know how much I wanted to trust it in this case. Incidentally Kath calls it a monosodium glutamate detector but she was never all that good at chemistry.)

The only other choices were a) risk headlines like "retired couple found dead aboard narrowboat - carbon monoxide poisoning suspected", or b) abandon ship. Had we been out somewhere in the sticks this would have been a big problem. We would have had to carefully empty the hot coals from the stove and spend the night with the Eberspacher roaring away like a jet engine or freeze to death. Remember the boat had been uninhabited for several weeks and needed a lot of warming through. Luckily Crick is only a ten minute drive from Rick and Marilyn's house so we resorted to appealing to their better nature and they offered us a bed. Thanks R&M.

A quick scan of the internet showed that a new clamp could be obtained, but not in less than 14 days. However if any one can fix something like this, it's Rick. Next morning, in about fifteen minutes, he made a substitute clamp out of an old bit of steel strip using naught but a hacksaw, a hammer and a vice. Here it is

Eagerly I retired to the boat to fit the new clamp, and it did fit! Were my troubles over? No.

To fit the clamp I had to remove the fire bricks and the flue baffle plate inside the stove. Easy. Then I had to refit them. Aah, not easy. When I removed the bricks the baffle plate fell out on its own before I could see how it fitted, and it seemed no matter what I tried, I couldn't get it back in. In the ensuing struggle, now joined by Rick, I managed to crack two of the three fire bricks. Later investigation showed that the best price for these bricks was £35 (ebay). Rats! Now I had caused more expenditure than I had saved.

Slowly our luck began to turn. Scanning the internet I eventually found a diagram showing how to fit the baffle. After three hours of failure, we found the answer and fitted the baffle plate in thirty seconds.

By now we were both very black and sooty, so once again retired to chez R&M for the night. Then, Kath somehow recalled that we saved the old firebricks from our previous stove, which was the same model. After some rummaging in the log box I found them intact this morning and to cut a long story short we are now up and running and warm and cosy. Total cost -£0. If I had to do the job again now, I could do it in a couple of minutes instead of several hours.

Which brings me to Herbie's Law of DiY.

DiY saves you money and is not too difficult, the second time you do a job. The struggle the first time is the price you pay.

There is a second law of DiY. Get a friend like Rick :-)

What is a boat worth?

2012-01-19T23:16:00.001Z

Its that time of year when I have to reinsure Herbie. Our policy is based on the “market value” of the boat. We’ve been declaring the same value ever since we bought the boat, but I suppose that is now over optimistic, and I might be able to get a lower premium if I declare a lower figure.

But how do I decide what Herbie’s market value is? I can think of a number of ways to look at it.

is it:

1. How much I might expect to get if we sold the boat. I haven’t got a clue what that would be. Boats aren’t like cars. You can’t pick up a copy of What Boat and look up the model and year and read off a price according to what mileage band you are in. They’re a bit more like houses where you need an estate agent to survey the place and set a price according to local conditions and current trends. I suspect that condition is a good part of setting a price for a boat. A broker once told me that the exterior paint job makes a big difference, closely followed by the ambience of the cabin. Apparently it’s the women that have the last word when a couple buys a boat. In any case, whatever the selling price we wouldn’t get the full amount because a broker would take his cut.

2. How much money it would take for me to part with the boat. This may well be more than it’s true market value. Herbie may well be worth more to me than the price I would get. Also, you only have to look at some of the boats for sale to realise that sellers are often over optimistic in what they will get. You often see boats advertised on brokers pages as “reduced price” as the seller is finally convinced by the broker that his original price is too high. In any case, boats are always advertised at a higher price than expected, to allow scope for a bit of haggling.

3. What would I have to pay to replace the boat if it was written off. Even harder this one, because there isn’t another boat like Herbie. Like so many narrowboats, it’s a one off.

Now you might say this is all a bit academic for insurance purposes because the chances of having the boat written off is pretty remote. I suppose it would have to be gutted by fire, or sunk, or successfully stolen. I say successfully because getting away with stealing a narrowboat isn’t easy because they move really slowly and aren’t easily hidden, and because individual boats are easily recognised. I once said to the lady at the insurers that they probably don’t often have to pay up for the whole boat and she said “You’d be surprised!”

One thing I will be doing is paying the extra tenner for legal cover. Knowing how cantankerous some boaters are I reckon the likelihood of litigation after an accident might be costly.

Keeping warm and the technology placebo effect

2012-01-18T18:53:00.001Z

Yes I am still alive. I just haven’t had much to write about lately and I wouldn’t want to waste your time dear reader with idle chit chat.

Last weekend we had one of the very rare home visit fro our son Richard who lives aboard his narrowboat Bankside near Huntingdon. Surprisingly we talked very little about toilets and batteries, but the subject of keeping warm on a boat did come up. Richard uses a squirrel for this purpose. Now for anyone who thing Richard snuggles up with an arborial rodent, let me explain the a squirrel is a popular make of solid fuel stove.

A couple of posts back I mentioned that a stove would be one of my “must haves” when choosing a boat. Talking with Richard reminded me of things I should have added.

Stove position. – if you have a 70ft boat and the stove is by the front door, it won’t keep you very warm in a rear bedroom unless the stove has a back boiler to drive radiators. The best place for a stove is as near amidships as you can get it. On Herbie we are lucky, in that our stove is bang in the middle, both fore and aft wise and side to side wise. Actually we’re in a good position to judge the relative efficacy of stoves versus central heating because on Herbie we have both. Does the central heating get the boat as warm as a stove? No way! Not by a country mile. The CH gives a gentle background heat, but the stove if well stoked up, can get you to open the windows on a frosty night!

Every now and then some unwitting soul puts a post on Canal World Forums on the Interweb asking for opinions on the efficacy of Ecofans. For the non cognoscenti, an Ecofan is a clever fan that sits of top of the stove and by fiendish electronicery converts heat into electricity to drive itself round, thus moving the hot air from the stove to further afield. For about a week after the question gets asked the forum buzzes with alternate praise and scorn for this rather expensive but fascinating device. People who have them generally believe they make a difference. People who don’t have them generally have doubts.

Well we’ve got one and Richard has one too. What do we think? In a practical sense they certainly do work, in as far as when the stove top gets hot the fan whizzes round very fast and does generate a gentle current of air. Does it help warm up the boat? Hmmm, Richard does and we feel as though it does, although that might be the placebo effect. But hey, if a placebo works, it works! Here’s an old snap of Kath with her feet up in her favourite spot by the fire. You can make out the fan whizzing round atop the stove.

I’ve lost the Ecofan instructions now, but as far as I recall,I think you’re supposed to position the fan in front ofthe chimney flue so that it daws air around the hot flue and pushes it out front. Sadly our little stove is a bit too small for us to be able to do this. Late in the evening we generally try to position it so that it wafts the warm air towards the bedroom.

Ecofans are great fun anyway, and do give an indication of the state of warmth of the stove – the hotter the faster. Richard uses his as an indicator of when to put on more coal. I use ours as an indicator of where the fire is capable of rekindling when we get up in the morning. If the fan is still slowly turning, I can generally re kindle from the embers. If the fan has stopped I usually have to relay the fire.

There are ways to keep warm on deck on cold days, including eating porridge for breakfast, keeping the hot drinks going and being dressed properly. As the old saying goes, “There’s no such thing as bad weather, only the wrong clothes”.

Good News, Bad News and a civic award

2012-01-09T16:19:00.001Z

Which do you want first? Let’s get the bad news out of the way.

Following my recent post about the dire state of the Marsworth reservoirs, it seem things are even worse than I thought. As from Wednesday BW will be closing the entire Tring summit pound, 3 miles through the lovely Tring cutting, and lowering its level by a foot. This is apparently because the surrounding land is so dry that the canal is loosing water through its bed and sides at the rate of 61 million litres a week in this stretch – that’s 220 lock fulls! As you will recall from my photo in an earlier post, the reservoirs are in no state to make up this loss, so BW have little choice.

For those who don’t know the area or the canal, this is serious. Tring is close to the middle of the Grand Union canal, effectively the equivalent of closing the M1 motorway. Worse really, as it leaves only one alternative route south from the midlands i.e. via the Oxford canal (already short of water) and the Thames, which happens to be reasonably full at the moment. So Rainman, keep getting out there. Maybe organise a game of cricket or something – that’s often good for rain.

Now a bit of better news. Although the reservoirs on the Leicester section are still very very low – Rick recently sent me this photo he took of the Welford reservoir,

it seems that recent rains have put enough water into the actual canal along the 20 mile pound between Watford and Foxton for the restrictions at Foxton locks to be suspended. So Market Harborough is no longer cut off from civilisation ( or is that vice versa).

I think we’re in for an interesting year.

Now for a totally unrelated message. Despite the Queen having strangely overlooked me yet again in the New Year’s Honours List, I have today been promoted to the rank of Senior Citizen. Yes, as of today I am officially an OAP, so I shall expect a bit more respect from my friends in future. Please speak loudly an clearly as you offer me your seat on a crowded bus and refer to me as Dear or Dearie.

Buying a Boat–Chapter 2 How we bought Herbie by instinct

2012-01-07T15:46:00.001Z

As I said yesterday, people build up check lists of what they want in a boat, and looking back over ours, some items have stayed firmly on our list and others have changed subtly with time and experience. In the end though, the check list has its limitations. At the time we were buying we rejected a couple of boats that, looking back now, might have been very good for us.

One that sometimes haunts me was a boat called Swanley which was on sale at Whilton. She was a trad stern boat with (I think) a Ruston Hornsby engine in an engine room. The hull had a very long swim (inward lateral curve) at the back, and I reckon she would have swam beautifully. She was tastefully kitted out and obviously well cared for. As far as I recall she would have cost us less than Herbie. So what put us off? Well, mainly that we didn’t feel ready for a vintage engine. The previous owner had left detailed instructions on how to start the engine, and these ran to several pages! I don’t think I would be so scared now. There was also the issue of exposed pulley belts near the corridor through the engine room and we worried that it would be dangerous for the grandchildren. Nothing that the fitting of a handrail couldn’t have sorted I suppose. I wonder where she is now?

So that’s one that didn’t fit our check list but might have suited. What about boats that did fit our list and we rejected. I suppose that I should state at the outset that we were looking at the budget end of the market. We wanted a well maintained but not fancy boat, no more than about 5 or 6 years old. The ads were full of them and on paper they looked pretty good. On paper. Many’s the mile we travelled to look at boats which looked ideal in the brochure and were very disappointing in real life. Why? Well most often that they didn’t feel cared for. Sometimes it was obvious – not clean, bodged up DIY etc. We saw one or two boats where the DIY fit out looked like a two year old had had a go at it. We couldn’t believe how bad the work was. Some other boats were sound enough but still felt bare and unloved somehow. If the bits you can see look neglected, what about the bits you can’t see?

So after looking at nigh on 50 boats, how did we end up with Herbie? She was advertised on a broker’s web site with lots of photos. Running through our checklist she had most of what we wanted and some extras too like the eberspacher and a morco water heater. So far so good. It looked a bit chintzy, but homely.

At the end of the blurb was this sentence.

This boat has been very well looked after and is exceptionally clean and tidy throughout with lots and lots of well thought out storage and systems which make it an ideal liveaboard.

Hmmm, worth a look after all the sad, tired boats we had seen. We booked a visit, and discovered that the owners were still living aboard. They were selling up to buy a bigger boat. So off we went more in hope than expectation to meet them (with the broker) on a temporary mooring at Stanstead Abbots. It was a cold frosty day, a bit foggy too. Not the kind of day for boat shopping.

I don’t think Roy and Val, the owners, would mind me referring to them as elderly. They were very welcoming and we stepped on board and were greeted by the warmth of the fire and the subtle smell of furniture polish, and of course a nice cup of tea and a piece of cake.. Even though they lived aboard with two labradors, everything was neat and tidy and wonderfully clean. Talking to Roy and Val it soon became apparent that they had lavished love and care on the boat. Roy showed me the engine bay which was tidy and spotless. He told me about the engineer he used for servicing. It looked like Roy was very particular about having stuff done right.

After a complete tour of the boat, we said our thank you’s and Kath and I retired to the nearby pub to compare notes. I think we both knew straight away that this was a boat we could like and trust. So different from the soul less boats we had seen up until then. It wasn’t just the check list, it was the homely feel of the boat and it was the trust we felt in Roy and Val.

Of course they wanted more than we could afford for Herbie so in the time honoured manner we upped our budget a bit and they came down a bit until we had a deal – subject to a short test cruise and a thorough tour of the working equipment on the boat. They also had a two year old survey report done by a well known surveyor. This suggested one or two things which needed attention, and Roy was able to demonstrate to me that he had dealt with every one.

The “sea trials” a week later were a joy, and we cruised up to Ware and back. We got on famously and Kath and I were even more confident. A couple of weeks later and Herbie was ours.

The moral of the story? We didn’t just buy an empty boat, we bought the love and care of her by the previous owners. We had the rare opportunity of seeing her in use as a home and seeing how the owners handled and managed her. I guess we were lucky. Most people move off a boat before they sell it.

In the end it all came down to a feeling of rightness.

Has Herbie turned out alright? Were out instincts justified? Yes. I still think we should have driven a harder bargain, considering she was never an expensive boat to start with, but she still has a feeling about her that people like when they come aboard. She remains a nice boat to be on, and that’s what matters.

Buying a boat. chapter 1

2012-01-06T12:02:00.001Z

Don’t panic Mr Mainwaring, I’m not buying another boat! I notice though that Halfie (John) has been looking for one, and it drew me into reminiscing about our search which ended just six years ago next week when we found Herbie.

I well recall the check list of things we wanted in our ideal boat. Apart from the obvious things like length, condition, price etc. there were things we had learned from our hiring experiences. I wonder how many of these features we would change today if we were looking again for a boat? Let’s look through our old requirements list and test some out

Semi Trad stern – would I keep it? THE big question - I’ll come to that later

Rear galley - the well known “reverse layout”. easier to make tea etc. when you are cruising along, and less muddy boots through the bedroom. We like ours, but it puts the saloon amidships. It would be nicer if the saloon was up front where we could have the doors open in the summer. Another layout wouldn’t be a show stopper for us.

A side hatch in the saloon – not in the corridor (useless, but found in some boats). I’d still insist on it if we had a saloon amidships. The bigger the better.

Toilet type - I daren’t even start on this one or we’ll be here all week. We’re reasonably happy with our cassette type but I wouldn’t now rule out a pump out.

Easy access to the weed hatch – you only know how important this is if you don’t have it. I my opinion this is the one thing that is non negotiable. I have experienced lying across a hot engine trying to lift a heavy hatch cover at arms length. I never want to do it again. Ours is lovely. I should add that it becomes even more important in urban areas (plastic bags), or in places like up the Slough Arm where the weed thrives.

Easy engine access for maintenance _ Herbie is not too bad, but an engine room would be wonderful.

A solid fuel stove. Not as clean or convenient as diesel or gas heating, but oh so cosy. I’d find it hard not to have one. We have an Eberspacher diesel heater and radiators too but hardly ever use them.

A covered cratch. Hmmm. very convenient, but I might swap for a long well deck or I definitely would for a tug front deck.

240 volt sockets and an inverter. I hate using the inverter, but to plug in to a shore line and charge the batteries is very handy. I would be unhappy about a home mooring without shore power. The main thing is to cut down on equipment that needs 240v. Definitely get a 12v telly if you want a telly at all.

What was not on our list, but would be now?

1. A slightly longer boat - 56ft instead of our 50ft, then we could fit in a dinette which I would like.

2. One or two technical things like an easy to bleed engine and perhaps an aquadrive.

3. er, not a lot else really. Obviously I would like a Russell Newbury engine and a Phil Speight paint job and a Steve Hudson shell, but we’re operating on a budget here!

So what about that stern type then? The age old question that John and Jan are struggling with. Trad, Semi Trad or cruiser.

To some folks that’s easy. Almost everyone agrees that Trad stern boats look the best and their owners will go on about how nice it is to stand on the top step in the warm whilst cruising along in the winter. I don’t think I would have a trad stern with a rear engine. It would have to have a proper engine room with an engine that goes chug chug. I confess I often yearn for such a beast. With a trad stern you can also have a proper traditional boatman’s cabin with a little stove and a drop down table and folding bed and a ticket drawer and all that. I can well see why John yearns for such a thing.

But – (there’s always a but), everything has a down side and John has posted about the issue of social space. As you cruise along, do you want to be in the company of friends? You can get a couple of people on the back of a trad but after that it gets too crowded or (if they stand out on the gunwales) too unsafe. That’s the only thing that would make me think twice about a trad stern, but of us, it’ s a big factor. One of our purposes in having a boat was to be able to share trips with friends, not as passengers tucked away up the front, but as participants.

Then there’s the good old cruiser stern, much loved by hire boat companies. Room for a whole gang on the back deck but nowhere to shelter when the rain comes in sideways. The time I envy cruiser sterners is in the summer evenings, when they have enough space for alfresco dining.

I guess it all comes down to how you want to use the boat. Living aboard, or exploring the system as a couple, I would go for a trad. Carrying friends a lot of time, I’m not so sure. Perhaps a couple of our regular passengers may care to comment. Hint hint. In fact, John and Jan, that’s what I would do – ask your passengers.

Next time I’ll have something to say about what really matters when you choose a boat.

2011 Plan A , Plan B, Plan C

2011-12-29T11:49:00.003Z

Already all those daft TV adverts for perfume have changed to ads for summer holidays. We’re already dreaming of next year’s cruising – assuming there is any water in the canal. Our main thought at the moment is to head up the Trent and Mersey, perhaps via the Soar, then from the T&M across to Chester to visit a friend, then back via the Shroppie and perhaps Brum. That sounds pretty good to put it mildly, and there are a number of alternative ways back if any part is off limits.

Meanwhile we’d really like to have a short winter cruise to Market Harborough, but because of the Foxton restrictions, we can’t get there. Very frustrating.

Yesterday we strolled into Reading along the Thames and down the Kennet. Water levels there seem fine and there’s a good current on the Kennet. As we reached the junction a narrowboat came rocketing out at a rate of knots. So maybe rivers are the answer next year. Should have bought a Gold Licence. If the Northampton flight has any water, we ought to be able to get to the Nene and then the middle levels and the Ouse down to Bedford. Do the middle levels suffer from drought? Hmm I think they might.
Plan C: Maybe we should fit some wheels on Herbie.

Eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we dry

2011-12-22T11:53:00.001Z

I didn’t drown taking this photograph on Tuesday, but I should have done. In normal times the water would have been over my head at the point where I am standing.

It’s Startops reservoir at Marsworth. The water ought to reach at least to the foot of the steps.

Every day on the Beeb for months it seems, we watch a band of rain sweeping in from the south west and every time it seems to fizzle out just as it reaches the midlands, leaving the east and south dry as a bone. I got a letter from an old friend who lives in West Wales and they have had quite a wet year. Quite a few people I have told about the water shortage seem surprised. Well, here’s the evidence.When the new Canals and Rivers Trust takes over in April it looks like they are going to run smack into an emergency on day one. Off hand I can’t think of much they can do about it. Come on Rainman, now’s the time to earn your credentials. Get out there and walk up and down the canal a bit.

P.S. True story: I once met a genuine hillbilly from the Appalachian mountains. He told me they got their water pumped up from a deep well, sealed with a concrete cap. “A bit of a problem when we gets a power cut” he told me. When I asked him how they coped he said “Well we just has to drink whiskey”.

A last minute boater’s Christmas present idea

2011-12-20T19:29:00.001Z

Don’t panic. I know what it’s like buying presents for loved ones. They’ve already got a nose hair trimmer and a battery operated golf ball washer and now you’ve run out of ideas. Well, I’ve seen the perfect boater’s present at a branch of Clas Ohlson. (stores in a dozen large towns and cities).

It’s what he/she has always longed for. A wireless meat thermometer. Here’s a link if you don’t believe me. I can’t think of how I’ve managed without one all these years. You put your joint in the oven and stick the sensor in it, then you get back to the tiller with the receiver and you know when your roast is ready without the need to go below. A snip at £19.99.

Go on, you know you need one.

I’m in the money

2011-12-19T14:38:00.001Z

And so ends the Herbie Awards for 2011. You can call a cab and take off your tuxedos and ball gowns now. Hope you enjoyed it.

As well as all the Christmas cards arriving each day now, I got a surprise letter with some good news.

In my youth I worked for an engineering company who after I left got amalgamated and taken over etc. Eventually they became part of Rolls Royce. All these years later it seems they have not forgotten me and they wrote to tell me they owe me a pension when I turn 65 next month. How they got my address I can’t tell. Anyway it seems that my money worries are over because they owe me (after tax) £3.68 a month for the rest of my life. I can now spend Christmas thinking about what to do with all the money. I don’t think I’ll get a bigger boat. Any suggestions?

Be warned – begging letters will go straight in the bin.

and the Winner of the Herbie 2011 Special Award is . . .

2011-12-16T17:40:00.001Z

Who has done something special this year and deserves an award? Something that other people can admire and be grateful for. Not just me or Kath but for other lucky boaters. Well, one couple this year (and other years too) have shown extraordinary generosity in treating other people to special boat trips. Not only do the lucky passengers get special trips, but they also get fed and watered into the bargain. So the Award this year is for Hospitality.

These are not just any old boat trips, but exciting ones, the BCN Challenge, the SPCC Tideway Cruise, and the Queens Jubilee Flotilla rehearsal to name but three.

Well, it’s easy to guess it now, so without further ado, the Herbie 2011 Special Award goes to . . . . (loud fanfair)

Sue and Richard on Nb Indigo Dream

I’m sure you’ll all agree, a well deserved and popular win. Tumultuous applause.

Note to Sue and Richard – this award, I am sad to say carries nothing but Kudos and the grateful thanks of me, Kath, and the many other lucky people you have entertained so generously this year.

A Christmas present for you

2011-12-15T15:53:00.001Z

In time honoured tradition, (well we did it last year), here's a special Christmas card as a big Thank You to all you lovely readers out there, who have kept me going with your comments throughout the year. This is to keep you going until (shortly) I will reveal who gets this year's coveted Herbie Special Award.

Last year I posted a slide show of snow scenes with a short carol played by Kath and me. No snow this year (yet), so I thought it might be nice to give you a short winter warmer show of pictures taken on summer evenings by the water.

Kath is too busy designing and making some Proper Christmas Cards this year to join me in the music so you'll have to put up with me playing a tune I wrote, called Even in the Darkest Night. I have absolutely no idea why I call it that, the tune just somehow told me to. If it had any words, that would be the first line. Anyway, the title seemed appropriate for the time of year. Call it a carol if it helps:-). Click the play button and away we go.

Disclaimer: As a result of compressing the file down to upload it, the picture quality leaves much to be desired, as does the sound recording. Any faults in the actual music and its performance are entirely due to my own incompetence.

Blow me down

2011-12-13T11:42:00.001Z

Talking of bad or scary moments, I would think a few boaters might have had them over the last day or two. Blimey, it was windy here last night. Bins blown over, washing ripped off the line. I will be surprised if the chinese hat on Herbie’s chimney is still intact. At times like this I’m quite glad the boat is safely sandwiched between two others in the marina. No trees to fall on the boat either. Mind you, Crick marina always seems to have a fair breeze down the middle anyway. It makes getting in and out of your slot very interesting at times, because as soon as you turn sideways to face the slot the wind pushes you strongly off line. A bit like trying to turn into Salter’s Lode on the middle levels. If you’ve done that, you’ll know what I mean.

As to my own worst moment this year (see last post), there’s only one of the three that I still can’t see the funny side of in retrospect, and that’s the glow plug episode. So that gets my 2011 Worst Moment Award.

Nominations for Worst Moment of 2011

2011-12-10T14:37:00.001Z

Just in case you think boating is unremittingly joyful . . .

1. Kensal Green visitor moorings in the early hours of a February morning. A howling gale and torrential rain outside. Suddenly an alarm sounds. Shriek shriek. It’s my solar panel anti theft alarm. 110 decibels. I leap out of bed and crack my shin on the step. Clad only in nightwear I leap out into the pouring rain to see – no-one. Somehow the rain had set off the alarm. To reset it you need a key. The alarm hurts my ears and I don’t suppose the neighbouring boats were happy bunnies. I’m soaking wet and shivering. The alarm shrieks on for five more minutes until at last I find the key.

2. Crouched in the engine bay. After a long struggle I get a spanner onto the last of the four glow plugs I am replacing. Such is the tangle of paraphernalia surrounding the plug that I can only move the spanner 5 degrees at a time. I can just reach the tip of the spanner with my finger tips. My neck aches from craning to try and see the plug (night on impossible), my legs are trembling from trying to hold an unbalanced position in a cramped space, and my fingers are getting cramps. Eventually the plug comes out, and the new one goes in. Then I realise I can’t get a finger on the tip of the plug to reattach the little nut that holds the cable. I try long nose pliers, but the nut keeps dropping off, taking ages to find each time. Bluetack on a stick doesn’t work. I can’t even poke a digital camera in there to take a picture to give me some idea where to aim. An hour later I manage it. One little nut, one hour. Now I can’t remember how I did it, but I won’t be doing it again for a long time!

3. Sitting in the pub at Curdworth. I feel a stabbing pain in my lower abdomen. Not for the first time, they have been getting more severe and more frequent for some days. A hernia? Grumbling appendix? Next day we have to do 27 locks up into Brum. What if I’m taken seriously ill en route? We decide I’d better go to A&E and we order a taxi to Sutton Coldfield. In then end I was fine, but not before spending half the night in hospital.

If anyone has a worse experience this year, this is an open invitation to share it!

Best Waterway 2011–a gem.

2011-12-08T22:03:00.003Z

Aaaargh! Deciding on a Best Waterway seems impossible. Each has its joys and its flaws. The (small) people’s vote gives it to the Thames, and had we cruised it in better weather I might well have enjoyed it enough to make it a winner. Also we didn’t make it to the “upper Thames” which is an area we love through our old camping days.
In the end, I ask myself the question, “Which waterway am I most looking forward to cruising again?” Maybe it’s because it was fresh and new to us, but I’m going to give the Award for Best Waterway 2011 to : . .

The River Soar

I loved it the minute we turned onto it from the River Trent. The quirky lock gates left open so you can shoot through. The cattle grazing in the water meadows.

the scary weirs,

and the meandering clear water. Lovely.

Sorry Thames. Sorry Oxford canal. The remoteness and intimacy of this river won me over.

Nominations for Best Cruising Waterway 2011

2011-12-07T13:56:00.001Z

Before we start on that, I’d better report back on the vote for Best Picture. We had 14 votes and the people’s favourite by a comfortable margin is the picture of Nb Leo taking the sploosh of the waves. I’m inclined to agree because of the drama it conveys. Thanks folks.

Now o to the main business of the day. As we have covered so much new ~~ground~~ water this year, we need a Best Cruising Waterway of 2011 category. This is bit different from Best Day’s Cruise we had earlier. Some of these waterways take several days to pass through. As ever our nominations only apply to places we went on Herbie this year. Let me remind you of where we have been.

1. River Thames – from Brentford to Eynsham

2. Oxford canal, both the southern and the northern sections

3. Coventry canal – entire length

4. Birmingham and Fazeley canal – all of it, but in two separate cruises

5. Trent and Mersey canal, only from Fradley to Shardlow

6. River Trent – only a wee bit

7. River Soar – entire navigable length

8. Grand Union canal – Leicester Arm

9. Stratford Canal – Kings Norton to Lapworth Jn

10. Grand Union main line – Lapworth to Norton Jn.

Phew! I liked them all.

Let’s just shortlist the top three.

1. Oxford canal - meandering through the countryside and passing through villages, plenty of narrow locks, what’s not to like?

If I had to put in a criticism it would be that the northern half is relatively featureless except for the Hillmorton locks. Still pretty though, like this typical stretch close to Rugby.

2. River Soar – feared by some because it can flood, we did it in benign conditions and it was lovely.

Even the stretch through Leicester had its charms.

although Loughborough wasn’t so appealing.

3. River Thames – for all it’s faults, it does have some lovely sections like Cliveden Reach and the Goring Gap,

not to mention the millionaires’ mansions at Bray.

and characterful towns like Marlow

I’d like also to give a “highly commended” to the Coventry canal which despite it’s name is almost entirely rural, and has some very scenic stretches.

Which would you vote for?

Results tomorrow.

Abundance at Crick

2011-12-06T13:33:00.001Z

One more interlude before we return to the final batch of Herbie Awards leading up to the 2011 Special Award.

We just spend the weekend going nowhere aboard Herbie. Not that we wanted to go anywhere, just to have a couple of days peace and quiet and to give the boat a good warm through.

There are plenty of good walks at Crick and while out for a Sunday morning stroll I couldn’t help marvelling at the abundance of berries still there for the birds to eat. I can’t recall, ever seeing such a good crop. A little chaffinch was having a feast.

Just over the canal bridge quite close to the marina I came across something to tempt me too.

Sloes, absolute masses of them, ans within easy reach too. In ten minutes I had picked enough for a couple of bottles of Sloe gin to add to the stock. I could have picked enough for a gallon!

Just up the hill from the bridge, just north of the marina, the good folk of Crick have planted a millennium wood, a seven and a half acre reserve with an impressive variety of tree species. I didn't know it was there till I stumbled upon it, yet as the crow flies it’s only 500 yards from our mooring. It all goes to show you don’t have to cruise up and down on your boat all the time. Often it pays to stop and explore.

The canal itself looks very low. I spoke to an angler who reckoned it was down by a foot from normal. Come on rain, we need you.

On photography

2011-12-02T14:18:00.001Z

Thanks to those who have voted so far for best photo. (see yesterday’s post if you have missed it) At the time of writing, it’s tie between No 4 on the Coventry canal and NB Leo taking the wave. I’ll leave the polls open for another day to see if we get a decider.

Mystery no 1 is solved. The reason why I couldn’t find the lock leap original on my PC is that it was never there. Kath reminds me that she took it on her phone – one of those raspberry things.

All this is doing me a bit of good because it’s making me think about what makes a good photo. First let me say that I do not in any way regard myself as a good photographe You should see the hundreds of mediocre shots I have on disc. I look at the work of our local photographic society and am immediately humbled. Canal blog photographers I admire in particular are Andrew on Granny Buttons, (his night time photos are amazing) and Captain Ahab, who pictures often impress me, like here. In spite of my limitations, I like to learn and looking back I realise that two things in particular made a contribution to the ones I shortlisted. So this is a sort of note to self.

The first is having an aim in mind of the picture you are looking for. I think they all have that in common. In most of them I knew what I wanted even before I picked up the camera – not just to record the scene, but to make a picture with a deliberate composition in mind.

Secondly, looking at the short list another obvious factor shows itself. Choosing the moment. In fact the only one of the six that didn’t require that was no 4 the current leader! In the case of 3 and 6, the sky shots, the light was right for barely half a minute. I could see it coming and waited for the right moment. A minute later the chance was gone. In the case of the Leo picture, as well as having several goes at it as the waves came in, I also took advantage of the fact that my Canon can fire off six shots per second so I had a fighting chance of getting the right instant, and it worked! I’ve since discarded some of the near misses, but here are a couple I kept.

a) using the rapid firing

b) seperate shots that missed the moment

Truth or fiction:

Halfie suspects that the Braunston church picture with that dramatic sky might not be the original or real colours. Well yes and no. People say the camera never lies. I think it very often fails to tell the truth, so sometimes you have to help it. A camera is never as good as the human eye, and all too often the image that you get is not as vibrant as what you saw with the naked eye. I well recall the vividness of the sky that evening, it was stunning. I did have to tweak up the colour saturation to bring the effect back to life in the picture. Although on this occasion I have pushed it to near the reasonable limit, I see nothing wrong in adjusting an image to convey the feeling you got when you took the picture. The other sunset picture by the way has not been tweaked at all apart from removing a couple of dust spots.

Conversely if you look at the picture of the boat through the bankside flowers, it’s obvious that the eye wouldn’t have seen that. In our brain we adjust focus as our attention flicks between the boat and the flowers, so the boat wouldn’t appear out of focus. At the same time I took another shot with the boat in focus and the flowers blurred, but it didn’t work so well. These were taken with my little Lumix compact.

These days I nearly always crop a picture afterwards to get the framing of the subject and I’m quite happy to adjust the depth of the shadows or ease down the highlights or whatever. I do all this using the standard windows 7 photo software, so nothing fancy.

Best Picture–the people’s choice

2011-12-01T14:48:00.001Z

Well done those who spotted the answer to yesterday's puzzle. It is indeed the strange, perhaps unique for all I know, lock paddle gear at the lock where the Duke’s Cut meets the Oxford canal. We were very glad to be there. Our first narrow canal lock for a couple of years, and so good to be back in the cosy scenery of the canals after the long and sometimes featureless reaches of the Thames.

Now, it has been suggested that readers should vote on my best photo of the year. I can’t really give myself an award but it would be nice to get some idea of what people like, so here below are a few of my favourites from this year. If you can be bothered, add your vote for the favourite via the comments at the foot of the post and make my day.

Apart from the first, they all look a lot better if you click on them to see them larger.

1. For some reason I can’t fathom I haver lost the original of this one, so I’m stuck with the size and low res format copied from an earlier blog post. Never mind, it is dramatic I suppose. Kath took the picture as I leapt between the lock gates at Atherstone.

2. Having said above that big reaches of the Thames aren’t my favourite, I immediately contradict myself with the shot looking back towards Canary Wharf and the Dome from downstream

3. A liquid sunset at Napton in April

4. An idyllic overnight mooring on the Coventry Canal

5. I took 20 shots to get this moment. NB Leo battles the waves near tower bridge. I was standing on the front of Indigo Dream and got a bit splashed myself!

6. Braunston Church in the evening.

You may have noticed that I have been doing quite a few wide screen crops recently. Blame my new computer monitor which has a wide screen format. It has seduced me into these. Do they give a problem on a normal screen if you click them up large?

It’s the people’s choice-over to you. You could instead nominate any picture from the Herbie Blog this year. The ones above are just ones I am pleased with.

An intermission puzzle

2011-11-30T16:38:00.001Z

While we take a brief breather from the awards ceremony and recharge our champagne glasses, here’s a teaser for you.

We don’t have an award for Most Welcome Sight, but if we did, I would have shortlisted this picture for sure.

Does anyone know what and where it is and why I was glad to see it?

Ancient Town gets modern award– Best Town Moorings 2011

2011-11-29T10:29:00.001Z

You have convinced me. The popular vote gets it*. After miles and miles of Thames cruising seeing NO MOORING, PRIVATE, NO SWIMMING, NO DIVING, NO LANDING etc what a delight it was to arrive somewhere that had good moorings with a sign saying Welcome, you can stay free for 5 days. So

the Herbie Award 2011 for Best Town Moorings goes to

Abingdon.

A well deserved and popular win, and I’m sure the pubs and shops in Abingdon reap the benefit of the town’s policy in the cruising season. Good for them.

A good time to be in Abingdon is the Saturday nearest June 19th when the residents of Ock Street hold an election for Mayor of Ock Street. By ancient tradition this “mock mayor” then has the job of poking fun at the “official” mayor and council when they make unpopular decisions. The day itself features a lot of drinking and cheering and morris dancing and general tomfoolery, with guest morris or other traditional dance sides being invited to join the Abingdon men. After the mayor is elected a four o’clock he is carried along the street on a garlanded chair and the drinking and dancing starts all over again. I took part many years ago in my dancing days and still have the commemorative medal that the guests are given. I’ve only just got rid of the hangover. Should you wish to know more, Google will provide loads of links to this event.

*PS sorry Alison. Skipton sounds wonderful, but as Herbie hasn’t been there this year, they don’t qualify.

Brickbats and Bravos, Herbie Awards Goes to Town

2011-11-28T13:34:00.001Z

So we come to the Award for Best Town Moorings 2011. This is an interesting one. Whilst many towns rejoice in their waterfront, not all of them provide a welcome for visitors arriving by water. Maybe they feel they don’t need to.

Take Windsor for example. You can’t take a boat holiday up the Thames without calling in at Windsor can you? It’s a tourist hot spot. How come then they have so few places to tie up for the night near the centre? In the summer season I suspect a lot of boaters get frustrated. We arrived out of season, in March, so we were lucky that we were able to occupy the only good free mooring near the town centre. Note – room for one narrowboat only.

Then let me remind you of the welcome sign at this place!

So you might have guessed the award is unlikely to go to Windsor on this occasion. Neither will Warwick ( and Leamington) because although they are fine towns, they seem to have turned their backs on the canal.

Of the towns we stayed at this year, the ones we liked mooring at were:

Hampton – very good moorings right outside the golden gates of Hampton Court palace. As well as the river and the palace there’s .. er.. not a lot.

Marlow – We found a quiet spot in a scenic setting below the lock, and there are some more on the other side of the town bridge. I think we would have liked it more in better weather. We like Marlow as a town too.

Wallingford – Good new moorings and a pleasant little town. You could picnic or have a barbie here easily. However, you have to pay a modest fee. £3 or £4, I can’t remember exactly.

Abingdon – A fair amount of free moorings handy for the town and an actual welcome sign! You can stay for 5 days too!

Banbury – is a place worth stopping at, - a good Saturday market - and it embraces its canal front in some style.

However the long line of moorings on the southern approach is not especially attractive and there were murmurings of oiks nearer the town centre.

Well, there’s an award winner here somewhere, but I’m not sure yet. Answer tomorrow.

Best Village Moorings

2011-11-25T18:37:00.001Z

Oooh I don’t know. In reality my shortlist all have their good and bad points. I have to separate how much I like the village from how good/convenient there moorings are.

My favourite village I think is Shardlow. However I think I should give the award to the place where I would most like to sit out on the bank at the end of the day and watch the world go by, then pop to a handy village shop and perhaps stop off at the the pub on the way back. Also it’s nice if you can hop on a bus to a nearby town or other attraction. In that case I think the winner of the Herbie Award for best Village Moorings 2011 has to be . . . (camera pans round tense faces of shortlisted contestants) . .

Alrewas

(pronounced Ol-re-wos)

loud cheers!!

Alrewas is in Staffordshire on the Trent and Mersey canal. I took the above picture a few yards behind our mooring spot. We had a comfy spot to sit out under a tree, and the village centre was a few minutes walk away. It is a pretty village with 3 pubs, a general stores and an unusually good butcher, and well worth an evening stroll.

Regular buses can take you to nearby Lichfield, or like us, you can go and see the National Memorial Arboretum – a fascinating and moving experience.

Winning Ale plus Best Village Moorings Nominations

2011-11-24T16:58:00.001Z

… and the winner of the Herbie Award for Best Pint 2011 (experienced on our travels) is

UBU from Warwickshire’s Purity Brewing Company.

Try it.

PS Kath recalls that at the Greyhound she had a pint called Innocent or Innocence from the Purity Brewery, and I think she might be right although they don’t show it on their web site. Whatever it was, it was very very good.

On with the Show

Which places on our travels provided the best overnight stopping place for their visitors. Naturally we can only comment on those we actually stopped at, and sometimes we stopped in the middle of nowhere. Here’s a map (sort of):

Cognoscenti will be able to name the different coloured waterways, but they’re not too important here. Place names in red are Cities (as if you didn’t know), in Blue are Towns, and in Grey are Villages. You can’t expect a village to provide as much as a city for moorers, so we’ll have three separate categories. Today it’s Villages.

Actually villages do pretty well- often better for moorers than towns. The ideal place would have well tended and attractive bankside, access to good local shops and good pubs, and local items of interest. Here we go clockwise from the bottom.

Sonning – nice village, poor moorings – tied to a tree, no grass

Pangbourne – lovely riverside meadow, pleasant village

Thrupp – OK moorings, good tea shop, fair pub, not a lot else

Heyford – not much there except a very close railway

Cropredy – Pretty village, good pub, handy shops

Napton – OK moorings, good pub, tiny shop (by pub)

Braunston – good moorings “round the back”, nice views, good shops (inc renowned butcher), pubs nothing special, but loads of interest for boaters

Curdworth – Moorings in tunnel cutting a bit gloomy, nice village, good pub (Beehive), shop

Hopwas – Pleasant moorings, good pubs, long walk to tiny shop

Alrewas – Pleasant moorings (pretty), shops, another renowned butcher, pubs only fair. National Memorial Arboretum nearby

Shardlow – Decent moorings, lots to see if you like canal architecture, fair pubs

Barrow on Soar – pleasant moorings, selection of shops, didn’t try the pub!!!!

Birstall (suburb of Leicester) attractive moorings, handy shops and bus to Leicester

Kilby – fair moorings, quite good pub

Foxton – plenty of mooring space, good pubs and the locks and inclined plane to look at

Welford – Attractive moorings, reasonable pub, a shop a fair walk away

Crick - disqualified because it’s our home mooring.

My long preliminary shortlist is Pangbourne, Cropredy, Braunston, Alrewas, Shardlow, Birstall and Welford. What a tough choice to get down to four!

OK let’s do it.

Cropredy

Braunston, (round the back, not yer usual view)

Alrewas,

and Shardlow.

At this stage I don’t have the faintest idea which I will pick or why. Gut feel I suspect. I will this time accept guidance!

Result tomorrow.

Awards Ceremony hit by amnesia attack, but we struggle on

2011-11-23T12:51:00.001Z

We do have a favourite beer from a canalside pub (or two) this year, but compiling a shortlist is a bit of a problem because, but I realise that we had quite a few that I can no longer remember. No, not because I drank too much of it, but because there are so many lovely ales being brewed by microbreweries these days that it’s hard to keep track. What’s worse, even the little breweries often have a range of seasonal ales that come and go month by month. About now we shall start seeing Santa’s Tipple or whatever on the pump clips. I’m suddenly reminded of a Christmas ale I had in Redditch some years ago that claimed to have Myrrh in it!

Now don’t think I am complaining about all these beers. Far from it. It’s just that they come and go and are hard to recall in detail. Still I know what I like. Apart from old favourites from established brewers – Fullers ESB, Timothy Taylors Landlord etc, I really do like some of the modern brews, especially the way they have introduced newer varieties of hops. In the old days English brewers used Goldings and Fuggles hops and not too many more. Differences in beer were more to do with how much light and dark malts etc were used. Some brewers claimed it was their water that made the difference, and that is indeed why Burton on Trent came to be a big brewing centre. Now the big Burton Breweries churn out some good and too much bad and the biggest (Coors) belongs to Americans ! It says something for the demise of Burton, that this year when we passed through there on Herbie, we didn’t even bother to stop!

Back to the little breweries – for it is from there that our 2011 winner comes. These new little breweries have experimented a lot with hop varieties. Some of the “newer” hop varieties have made a stunning difference to beers, and none more so (IMHO) than the variety known as Cascade. This seems to give a lovely elderflowery aroma to the beer and a clean refreshing taste. Cascade beers tend to be pale in colour and in my experience they are always gorgeous. My favourite favourite beer Tring Sidepocket is a cascade beer, although it can’t win this year because we didn’t see any.

Which brings us to this years favourite. Brewed in Warwickshire, so available in some pubs on the North Oxford and Coventry canals, and you can get in bottles (not so good as draft but still very nice) in Sainsbury’s. The brewer’s description says

“Using 100% English Maris Otter Malt with Challenger and Cascade hops, creates a balanced full flavoured beer that is a pleasure to drink.” I’ll drink to that.

The name of the Brewery alludes to the green credentials of their set up. One thing they do is purify all their waste water through a reed bed system, and all their other by products are recycled.

So the winner of the Herbie Award for Best Pint 2011 goes to . . .

I’ll tell you next time but you can guess if you like.

Best Pub 2011

2011-11-21T19:00:00.002Z

Following months of diligent research and hours of deliberation, mentally reliving pints, pies, and barmaids, the judging panel (Kath and I) have come to a decision. Despite some worthy competition this year there could only be one winner of the Herbie Award for Best Pub 2011 and it is . . . (annoying ten second pause like they have on Masterchef etc.)

The Greyhound at Hawkesbury Junction

(just north of Coventry)

Whether you sit inside or out, there is plenty of atmosphere and plenty of interest to look at. Next time we go there I’ll try to photograph the inside, which is comfortable and characterful, albeit fairly densely populated! They have really well kept proper beer, including local ales and the menu is considerably more ambitious than the normal now all too familiar pub menu, and the staff seem to enjoy serving you.

Well done them.

I think it might be time next to consider a favourite pint of the year. We have worked especially hard on researching that.

Herbie Awards 2011 Best Pub nominations

2011-11-20T18:26:00.001Z

Now we come to the ever popular Food and Drink section of the awards. And we’ll start with Pubs. We may well have awards for best pub meal and best pint later!

Just occasionally on our cruises we visit a public house. All in the spirit of supporting local business you understand. This year we seem to have supported quite a few of them and while some were better than others we do have a few we can recommend. In fact we have a longer than usual shortlist. But which did we like most?

We’ll present them in chronological order of our first visit- all this year of course. At most of them I was too much of a hurry to get in to stop to take a photo!

1. The Folly Inn at Napton

With his handlebar moustache and occasional bowler hat (or even a pith helmet!) the new landlord has wrought a welcome change in this well situated pub. It’s cosy, friendly, unpretentious, full of interesting nick nacks, and they try hard to please the customer. The beer is excellent ( Hook Norton) and the food tasty and reasonably priced. Following our original visit, when we stayed an extra day because it was so good, we’ve been back twice. Good moorings a short walk round the corner.

2. The Greyhound at Hawkesbury Junction

People told us we should stop there and they were right. Immediately alongside the junction bridge, you can sit outside pint in hand and watch the longer boats fail to make the turn in one go. Splendid entertainment. Inside it gets better. Bags of character, an unusual and impressive menu and staff who all seem to be able to describe the character of the ales on offer. The beer itself is kept to perfection and features the best of local brews. Just down the canal bank there is a good visitor mooring area.

3. The Foxton Locks Inn

This made the shortlist on a number of accounts although at first glance it’s not our sort of pub. Right alongside the bottom of the famous locks, this is a big pub catering for tourists. We decide to eat there and apart from the good beer (with a discount for card carrying CAMRA members), the food service was excellent despite it being very busy. Afterwards we sat in comfy sofas for another pint, and Kath managed to lose her mobile phone. On reporting this the staff took great concern and made huge efforts to try and find it. Phoning it was no good as the signal there is terrible. Kath called in next day and they had found it for her underneath the sofa! Nice to find a big busy pub with such friendly and personal service.

4. The Blue Bell Cider House on the Stratford Canal north of Lapworth.

This large and somewhat plain pub was extra friendly and so helpful in helping us get fed when we arrived after the kitchen closed. They ordered a Chinese takeaway for us and supplied the plates and cutlery when it came. The locals were very friendly and the real draft cider scrump(y)tious. They have their own small landing stage and more mooring opposite over the adjacent bridge.

5. The Tom o’ the Wood – Rowington Grand Union Canal (north of Hatton)

Sadly we only popped in for a quickie at lunchtime as we passed, but we really want to go back. Only recently reopened, this pub is smarter than the average, a bit up market, but didn’t turn a hair at our less than sartorial appearance. Comfy armchairs, very friendly and helpful staff and Old Rosie cider. The menu looked very inviting. Visitor moorings opposite.

Honourable mentions for foody pubs go to a couple of Otters, both from the Vintage Inns chain – the Otter in Kegworth on the River Soar where we moored two feet from the door, and the Tame Otter canalside in Hopwas on the Birmingham and Fazeley not far from Lichfield. Both eateries really and not very pubby but they sell good beer too. Rather too much of it at the Tame Otter where we were led astray by the Indigo Dreamers! Lastly the Beehive in Curdworth on the B&F, too far from the canal to qualify but good food, beer and service at low low prices.

We did visit a fair few more and the standard these days is often better than of yore, although we didn’t hit upon a proper little local boozer to recommend. I’m sure we missed a few. The only place to really disappoint us was a very well known canalside pub in, of all places, Braunston. I know we’re not the only ones in this respect.

Results tomorrow.

Intermission - a little known island

2011-11-19T11:37:00.000Z

And now for something completely different, but educational.

While we have an intermission in the Herbie Awards Ceremony, let me pass on a couple of facts you didn't need to know.

After a comment from Adam I had to edit my last two posts to change "Bull Creek" to "Bow Creek" - Bow Creek being the mouth of the river Lea where it meets the Thames. How did I come to mistakenly write "Bull Creek"?

It took me a few minutes to work out why, then I remembered where Bull Creek is. Long time readers of the blog may recall that I make periodic sorties to Portsmouth - mainly because I love it. I was a student there in the late 1960s. Anyway, to get into Portsmouth one is forced to cross Bull Creek, because Portsmouth is in fact . . . .an island! Not a lot of people know that, but it is shown wonderfully if you go to Google maps and turn on satellite view an zoom in at the north end of the city. (Google Maps's rather scary Terms of Use seem to prohibit me from showing you a copy here).

Interestingly, people in Portsmouth routinely refer to The Mainland when talking of anything to the north of the city, and the whole area is officially known as Portsea Island.

Portsea island of course includes Southsea which is the southern part of the island facing the sea. No idea how it got its name.

Portsmouth has a plethora of wonderful old pubs some of which I have photographed and put in a web album here.

A couple of samples:

Back to normal next time.

PS Clock still ticking.

Herbie Awards 2011 - Best Day’s Cruise on Someone Else’s Boat.

2011-11-18T22:38:00.001Z

Despite the shortlist all being great days ou,t this is a unanimous decision between me and Kath. For wide open spaces, sights rarely seen, and good company. The Herbie Award for BDCOSEB has to go to

The Eastenders Cruise.

(SPCC Tideway Cruise aboard Indigo Dream)

Why? Bow Creek - seldom navigated by narrowboats, the O2 arena, Greenwich, the Thames barrier, the HUGE docks, the aircraft, just brilliant. And of course the company. Thanks again Sue and Richard. Oh and I almost forgot, the free whiskey* at the end. Perfect day or what?

I bet you wish you'd been there.

PS. (complete non sequitur) I just got my new old clock going. Very exciting.

*No I didn't spell it wrong, it was Irish Whiskey

Herbie Awards 2011 - Nominations for Best Day’s Cruise on Someone Else’s Boat.

2011-11-17T19:15:00.002Z

This year we’ve been lucky enough to tag along for the ride on the boats of friends on three very special occasions. They should all win an award, but there is only one to spare. Which will it be?

1. January aboard Indigo Dream as guests of the ever generous Sue and Richard and other boats from the St Pancras Cruising Club on their tideway cruise to the Royal Docks. Up the Lea from Limehouse, out through Bow Lock onto Bow Creek to Greenwich and down the Thames, through the Thames barrier, dodge the Woolwich ferry and into the giant Royal Docks with the City Airport jets landing along side us. A cruise which very few narrowboats ever make. After the big winter freeze, the weather was kind to us and once we got over being terrified, it was great.

I had a rather neat idea for showing the route on the blog! I think we should call it the EastEnders Cruise

and took a million photographs. here are just a few.

Narrowboats look very small

and the Woolwich ferry looks very big

and as for the Royal Docks – blimey!- this is inside the dock

2. Next, in June, came the Braunston Historic Boat Rally where we blagged a lift with Sarah and Jim on the mighty Chertsey as part of the Saturday parade of boats. I think it would be fair to say that progress was rather slow as we took about four hours to travel a mile, but a lot of fun was had by all. Suffice it to say that there were a lot of boats in a small space.

It wouldn’t have been so difficult if boats hadn’t been coming in both directions and if that wasn’t alongside a row of moored boats. Sarah did brilliantly (including a perfect three point turn) and we didn’t sink a single other boat.

No-one expected it to take quite so long and I think it’s the only time I have been on a boat where the skipper went ashore for a pee without stopping the boat or handing over the tiller! With all the banter between boats, the passengers, and the gongoozlers, (not to mention the lovely weather) it was a day to remember.

3. Finally in September the first rehearsal of the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Thames Flotilla (narrowboat section). Once again we were hosted by Sue and Richard aboard Indigo Dream (we are indeed honoured) for another spectacular. In terms of chaos this rivalled the Braunston Rally, although we did manage to cover a good number of miles. This was our first trip past Westminster and all that and everyone’s first trip as a flotilla. As ever Richard was the epitome of calmness and Sue the perfect hostess.

Of course the event was special and the scenery legendary

The cruise was memorable in so many ways, but perhaps most of all for the scariness of the force of the tide in some parts, as demonstrated by Nb Leo

What lucky people Kath and I are. Three brilliant and special cruises in one year, all hosted by fellow bloggers. many thanks to Sue, Richard, Sarah and Jim. But which was the best? Which will win the award for Best Day’s Cruise on Someone Else’s Boat?

I feel another sleepless night coming on.

Best Day’s Cruise result

2011-11-16T19:30:00.001Z

What a difficult one. If I go on like this I’ll suffer from sleep deprivation. The problem is that the three cruises were so different from each other that it’s like comparing apples with oranges. Those kind enough to send in comments can’t agree either. Well i have made up my mind – for now at any rate.

Pause while presenter rips open golden envelope . . .

Aaaah. In the end it all boils down to sheer exhilaration. The excitement of treading new ground, of overcoming obstacles and, well, just fun. So the winner is not exactly the most restful cruise or the most scenic, but the one which felt like an adventure.

The Herbie Award for Best day’s Cruise 2011 goes to

The ascent of the Birmingham and Fazeley canal into Farmers Bridge.

Here we are moored up at the end of the climb

Now I feel disappointed for the other two nominees

Rick suggests I have a reader voted category for the best picture on the Herbie Blog this year. Fine by me but, dear reader, are you prepared to trawl back and look for a favourite? Or I could post a selection for you to choose from? Rick also suggests I could have a premium rate phone line for the vote. Now there’s an idea!

Tomorrow I’ll post the short list for Best Cruise on Someone Else’s Boat.

Herbie Awards 2011 - Best Day’s Cruise Nominations

2011-11-15T11:55:00.001Z

So we start our 2011 Awards with three nominations for Best Day’s Cruise, which in chronological order are

1. March 28th. River Thames- Brentford to Hampton Court

It was an unseasonally warm and sunny day when in the company of Rick, Marilyn, Simon and Carrie we cruised out onto the tideway at breakfast time and Herbie took us effortlessly up towards the big lock at Teddington while we were entertained by views of the posh bits of Richmond and all that. Down this end of the Thames there is plenty to see, and on the rising tide the river is calm and the going is easy. This was a first go on the tideway for R,M &C who soon overcame any fears and settled down to enjoy the day. Then after a shopping stop at Waitrose on to Kingston for a truly scrummy lunch at Riverside Vegetaria followed by tea and cakes on the river bank. Simon and Carrie had to go but the rest of us cruised gently upstream round the big bend at Hampton Court to moor up right beside the Golden Gates of the palace where we disembarked for a tour of the beautiful gardens in full spring bloom.

Good weather, good cruising, the best company, excellent lunch, a superb mooring spot at the end. A strong contender.

2. April 8th. South Oxford canal - Heyford to Banbury

A special day. The first ever visit to Herbie by my big brother Graham and sister in law Jackie and we could hardly have picked a better spot. This is arguably the prettiest stretch of this canal and there are plenty of locks including the strange lozenge shaped ones on the river stretches. Lift bridges too of course. Graham was taken with the scenery and asked “Are all canals like this?” “Oh yes” I lied. I think we did 14 locks that day so there was plenty to do, but the weather was gorgeous and we had a lovely picnic at lunchtime.

3. October 6th – Birmingham and Fazeley canal – Curdworth to Farmers Bridge

A daunting prospect beforehand, especially since I had been in A&E in Sutton Coldfield in the early hours of the morning! A mere 9 miles, but 27 locks.

Would we be molested by bandits in Aston? Would we arrive before dark? Well, I’m here to tell you it was brilliant. Rick was with us to help out as crew and we flew up the lock flights grinning from ear to ear. This trip is mostly urban and industrial but endlessly fascinating.

Coming up the Farmers Bridge flight under roads and office blocks was a great experience, plenty of gloom, but no doom. Then arriving at the top in probably the swankiest bit of Birmingham was the icing on the cake.

Three superb cruising routes, all very different. Which would you choose? The winner announced tomorrow.

The 2011 Herbie Awards begin

2011-11-14T23:52:00.001Z

As the narrowboat of destiny catches its rudder on the cill of misfortune and the windlass of fate raps the knuckles of the hand of carelessness I notice it’s time to address the issue of the Annual Herbie Awards. Yes its time to set out the ballroom for the year’s most glittering occasion and get a packet of spangled envelopes to conceal the names of the winners and snag the fingernails of the hapless presenters.

last year’s thrilling award logo

Which places, pubs, waterways, gadgets and events have most pleased the crew of Herbie in 2011 and which items have most appalled, frightened and amused us over the year?

All will be revealed over the run up to Christmas and culminate in the granting of the premier prize The Herbie Special Award for something or other. So send your gowns and tuxedos to Sketchleys and get spruced up for the big event. The final list of categories is still in preparation, but I can announce that the opening category will be . . . .

Best Day’s Cruise on Herbie.

This year we have spent 100 days aboard Herbie (not all on the move) travelling 580 miles and passing through 352 locks, so we have plenty to choose from.

Q. What makes a good day’s cruise?

A. We need to have had a Great Time – that’s all really. I suppose I ought to add that the company must be good, the waterway attractive or stimulating, and there needs to be a sense of achievement at the end of it. Also it helps a lot if the weather was nice!

Presentations for the 3 nominations are in preparation and ~~should~~ will appear in the next post. There, I’ve committed myself. Now I’ll have to be decisive and get on with it.

Stories and confessions

2011-11-12T11:27:00.001Z

You might have noticed that I have revamped the blog and put some new links on the left hand side. Well I hope you have, because I slaved over them for a few hours last night! Just old posts I thought might be useful for reference. In an act of bravery I also included confessions about things I did wrong (or didn’t do when I should have). Just to remind you how useless I sometimes am. Cautionary tales are often more instructive than success stories.

Gunsmith provides a deadly finish

2011-11-11T17:34:00.001Z

Yesterday for the first, and probably only time in my life, I visited a gunsmith’s shop and came out with something potentially lethal. You may however be relieved to know that it was not a gun, but a small tube of cream bearing the words MAYBE FATAL IF SWALLOWED. So I decided on this occasion not to swallow any, but to squirt some onto a cloth and rub it onto the newly rubbed down pendulum rod on the clock I have been restoring.

Why a gunsmith? Because this stuff is called Gun Blue and it is principally sold for people to restore that blue black finish on their gun barrels. Of course you can use it for any ferrous metal object and maybe there’s something on a boat that would look nice done this way, although at this moment I can’t think of anything. The colour produced is rather lovely, and the advantage over paint is that the coating is microscopically thin so it looks like the metal itself is blue black.

I can well believe the health warnings on the tube. After using the stuff for half an hour in our airy conservatory, (it needed about four coats to turn an even colour, although each coat dries in a couple of minutes), I had significant irritation in my nose, although I didn’t notice any fumes at the time. I wore latex gloves which I think are strongly advisable.

The clock is nearly ready to go now and is looking quite good although not nearly as pristine as Rick’s. I wouldn’t like to think how many hours I have spent with the wet & dry paper and the metal polish.

Keen observers of horology might notice that the clock has something missing. A clock face. A minor detail. I’ll get one presently. I didn’t buy the clock to tell the time, but to watch the lovely mechanism doing it's stuff.

I tried to get a good photo of the blue black finish, but so far this is the best I can do (it’s on the rod only).

Anyway, it’s been a fun thing to do while we can’t go boating. Herbie is currently sandwiched between two canal stoppages, so we won’t be cruising for a while. I’m itching for Foxton locks to re open because I want to go to Market Harborough. I can’t see that happening any time soon.

Answer revealed and reasons to take your boat to Coventry.

2011-11-09T20:54:00.000Z

I was a bit surprised not to get a correct answer to the puzzle in the last post as it is from one of Coventry's most iconic works of mid 20th century art. I thought you might spot it was engraved glass and then work out the rest for yourself. What in Coventry is world renowned for mid 20th century art? Why, the cathedral of course – ten minutes walk from the canal basin.

Our picture was a close up of part of one of the Saints and Angels engraved in the Great West Window by artist John Hutton.

Looking out through the window you see a part of the ruin of the old cathedral destroyed by incendiary bombs in WWII. As usual Kath asked me to take close ups as inspiration for her textile work.

If you have no other reason to take your boat to Coventry, the cathedral alone is worth the trip.

Add to that the truly superb transport museum (even closer to the basin) and Coventry is a must.

Add to that the chance to stop at the absolutely splendid Greyhound pub at Hawkesbury junction on the way in to Coventry and a visit to this city becomes virtually compulsory.

Urban Oddities

2011-11-08T18:10:00.001Z

After the last set of photos, something completely different. Some evocative views of true urban settings.

First in Birmingham, Kath asked me to take this picture. I suspect it will end up as a piece of textile art in due course. One building reflected in another.

Here it is un-reflected – not half so interesting.

Then for contrast, but only a short walk away, a more historic scene. We squeeze through the seven foot wide gap at Worcester bar which used to separate two canal companies and necessitated unloading one boat into another across a few yards of land. Now, thankfully, open to navigation.

Now we go to Leicester where six feet from our overnight mooring we see this.

Sadly, it appeared to be abandoned.

And lastly a puzzler for you. This picture was taken ten minutes walk from Coventry canal basin. Any idea what it is?

Nature album

2011-11-05T20:38:00.002Z

This years cruising itinerary of London, Oxford, Coventry, Leicester, Birmingham, Warwick etc sounds a bit urban when I tell friends where I’ve been. My photo album tells a different story. I don’t find it easy to get good pictures of plants and animals but a small percentage come out alright, so here’s a selection from our cruises this year.

Don't forget, clicking brings 'em up big

1 Just a mossy branch, but the light was good. This is my favourite.

2. The “other” side of mooring at Braunston

3. A visitor at Foxton Locks

4. perhaps the roses on our cans are more realistic than we think. Actually I think this butterfly looks like
an old plane ready to take off

5. Crab apple blossom I think. there was a bumper crop this autumn.

6. At last a peacock that doesn’t squawk – on the S. Oxford

7. A Richmond on Thames heron looking, as all herons do, grumpy and miserable

The people have spoken

2011-11-04T19:21:00.001Z

Back to a more normal blog view. Blogger’s new tricks didn’t find favour with you lot out there and I’m inclined to agree. We’re not quite back to how we were, but near enough for now.

Meanwhile winter draws on and it’ll soon be time for the start of the ever popular Herbie Awards season in which we consider the best and worst of the years cruising, pubs, events and all that stuff. Will there be new and exciting categories this year? There might be if you can suggest any. Also what about the Herbie Special Award for someone who deserves it for their actions this year. This year I’m inviting nominees from readers of the blog. Thinking caps on folks.

An experiment -any views on views?

2011-11-03T19:14:00.002Z

Blimey, what’s all this?
I thought I’d try out Blogger’s new Dynamic Views. There are a number to choose from and some are more startling than others. if you click on where it says Magazine on the black bar at the top, you can see the blog in all sorts of strange new formats.

Some of them do have the advantage of encouraging you to look back at older posts and perhaps browse the blog rather than just reading the latest post. I rather fancy the Flipcard view, but perhaps it might be too confusing for the casual visitor.

Sore fingers

2011-11-02T17:28:00.001Z

I’ve got really sore fingers from rubbing down. Not paint this time but brass. People who bother to polish the mushroom vents on their boat will know the feeling. For a change though, this brass has nothing to do with boats. It’s more to do with something to keep me occupied while I can’t go boating. It’s my new clock. Well, when I say new I mean 40 or 50 years old. This clock will never live on the boat. Apart from being too big, it is a pendulum clock. Imagine that trying to work while the boat rocks in the wind!

There are lots of brass sub assemblies like this

all tarnished with age and the object is to take it all to bits and using wet and dry paper and metal polish get them back to a shiny state. I have of course taken photos from every angle, otherwise I’ll never get it back together again. Just like me getting the clock in the first place, this is all entirely Rick’s fault. He has a similar clock we he has restored to spectacular condition, I suspect better than new. I will never achieve that standard, having neither the skill nor the perfectionist tendency, but I won’t be able to look him in the eye if I don’t at least give it a good clean. Incidentally since his house is full of interesting old clocks, I have been considering referring to Rick in future as The Time Lord.

Taking a clock to bits is a bit scary, but I suspect I might get it reassembled and working as the bits are nice and big and simple. By Christmas would be nice.

Dirty jobs

2011-10-31T20:02:00.001Z

I case there are any non boaters out there who think the boaters are all living in the lap of luxury, let me mention toilets. Don’t get me wrong, boat toilets are fine to use, but not being plumbed into the sewerage system, we do have to get them emptied. Those like us who have cassette type toilets have quite an intimate re-aquaintance with their contents from time to time. As if that wasn’t bad enough, some of the places BW requires you to use for this purpose are less than immaculate. Personally I prefer the outdoor ones for reasons you might guess.

Happily the facility at our marina is of the shiny stainless steel variety under cover but in the open air. In short it is very acceptable, so we are indeed fortunate. Somewhat more fortunate I fear, than the marina staff who have sometimes to attend to blockages in the facility. Today I spotted a notice there asking boaters to take great care with removable plastic items e.g sliding covers and screw on spout caps on their cassettes when emptying. It seems they recently had to remove seven such items that had jammed the pipe and in the wording of the poster – “as you imagine this was not without some difficulty.”

Heroes.

Today I shall refrain from photographic evidence. I know your limits.

Odd Jobs

2011-10-28T15:41:00.004Z

Jobs for this weekend:
1. Drive to Crick to change Herbie’s nappies
2. Drive from Crick to Halesowen to buy a clock that doesn’t tell the time

Hmm I can see that you might be excused for thinking I’ve finally lost the plot. Perhaps I should explain.

1. Herbie does indeed wear nappies. We use cheap disposables to absorb any fluids that leak into the engine sump tray. Most effective they are too, providing you pull of the elasticated edges so they lie flat. When they are saturated just pop them in a plastic bag and dispose. Herbie has had a small but persistent diesel leak from the fuel filter. I think I might now have tracked down the source and with luck can cure it by replacing a washer. Leaks are swines to cure sometimes. You fix where you think it is and then you find it’s somewhere else.

2. Now about this clock. I bought it off Ebay and I have to collect it because it is big and heavy. The literature on these clocks say they are accurate to within 8 seconds a month. Not bad for a pendulum clock. The problem is it has no face so although it keeps good time it doesn’t let you know what it is!

Have I gone completely mad?

Au contraire mes amis.

You see it is a GPO master clock as used in old telephone exchanges to time calls etc. It is capable of sending out an electrical pulse every 1,6, or 30 seconds, and these pulses work a slave clock which does have a dial. Aah, so do I have a slave clock? Well, not yet, but they do come up on ebay quite often so its only a matter of time. Which of course I can’t tell.

It’s all Rick’s fault. He has a small collection of master clocks and he made me want one.

Bang to rights.

2011-10-27T10:27:00.000Z

Once or twice on our last trip the “lads” were out on the towpath on their motor bikes. After one incident I saw this notice at a nearby BW water stop.

What is a Section 59 Warning?, you may ask. Perhaps the “lads” know, but I didn’t. However I consulted Constable Google and he provided me with the answer, and here’s what he said.

Section 59 of the Police Reform Act 2002 states that any person driving a vehicle on or off a road in a manner that causes nuisance or inconvenience to other road users or members of public will receive a warning that lasts for 12 months.

If at any point within that 12 month period you are caught driving in a similar manner then your car (or bike presumably) can be seized by the police and you'll have to pay a penalty to get it back. This is normally in the region of £200 depending how long they keep it for and what area you live in.

This power is executable by Police officers and Police Community Support Officers ONLY.

I wonder how often the lads get caught. Come to think of it, how many of them hang around BW water points reading the notices. Next time I see one of these lads I’ll politely ask him to sit and wait while I summon a Constable or a PCSO. Problem solved. I know my rights.

An unusual windlass.

2011-10-26T14:00:00.001Z

I saw a lady using this windlass on the Curdworth locks and she kindly let me photograph it. She said her husband bought it off ebay although it looks like a one off. Obviously it’s an adapted socket set ratchet, but I’ve never seen anything else like it. I omitted to photograph the handle, but it was a pretty standard cranked windlass handle. It was quite light to carry, unlike the big ratchet jobs with extending handles that some chandleries sell. I wouldn’t mind one. Anyone else seen one or know where they come from?

Calibrating Canal Planners using the stop watch you didn’t know you had.

2011-10-25T15:30:00.001Z

Sometimes you don’t even know what you’ve got when you’ve got it. I was thinking overnight about the probable inaccuracies in my CanalOmeter for the Bottom Road (see yesterday’s post) because on a good day you can zip through close flights of locks much faster than you expect. If only I had timed our ascent with a stop watch, I could check. Suddenly I realised I had an answer. Let me start from the beginning

I use data from Nick Atty’s brilliant Canalplan to calculate travelling times. Experience has shown me, and thousands of others, that it’s a pretty good guide to cruising times. I used to just take the distances and number of locks and do the rest of the calculations myself based on what speeds I expect to achieve and how long it takes to do locks locally. However since Canalplan introduced the option to show cumulative times I’ve just used those. Stupidly I forgot to adjust Canalplan’s settings to reflect the “local conditions”.

Locking times can vary enormously. Anything from 5 minutes (e.g. Northampton flight) to 35 minutes (River Nene, where you have to tie up, walk round the corner, and wind one of those bl***y wheels).

For narrow canals, Canalplan’s default settings are

Average speed 2.5 mph. Time for individual lock 12 mins, - for locks in flights 8 mins

2.5 mph might seem slow, but as an average I might accept it because of slowing down passing moored boats and any small delays. The lock times don’t seem unreasonable either, but I recalled that going up Farmers Bridge flight we seemed to be doing a lock every 5 minutes or so. If only I had timed the flight I could have compared actual times with Canalplan’s predictions.

Wait a minute. Eureka! I do have the times. Simples. Digital photos have a time stamp don’t they. In fact I have photos, hence times, for the whole trip that day, from the first lock we entered to when we emerged at Farmers Bridge.

First lock (Minworth bottom lock) 07.34 (believe you me, we don’t often start that early)

Entering Farmers bridge bottom lock (after a short tea and sandwich break) and 6 miles and 14 locks already done (phew) 11.20

Coming up through Farmers bridge top lock 12.26

So from the first lock that’s 3h 46 mins to the bottom of Farmers Bridge locks and another 1hr 6 mins to the top.

Blimey! We seem to have done 13 locks in 66 minutes, so that’s about 5 mins per lock.

Now using Canalplan’s default settings we get 5hrs 26 mins for the first part plus another 2 hrs 26 mins to the top. A total discrepancy for the whole day of precisely 3 hours. I could have had another couple of hours in bed!!

Is this Canaplan’s fault? Are CanalOmeters a waste of time? Not a bit. We should have done the settings first. We knew we had extra crew to set up locks in advance and there were very few other boats moving to delay us. There were 26 locks in all that day, so overestimates soon pile up. A minute ago I just redid the Canalplan route with more realistic settings and the answer came out within half an hour of the true figure. Not bad for a long day’s work.

The lesson for you in using Canalplan and for me in making CanalOmeters is to think hard about the default settings before you start. I may well re-do the Bottom Road CanalOmeter to reflect this. My older ones for the southern GU which did use local knowledge of speeds and locks have proven to be pretty accurate.

The Bottom Road CanalOmeterised

2011-10-24T14:21:00.001Z

Last night I was re reading bits of Idle Women – Susan Woolfit’s great book about women on the canals in WWII. At last I was able to relate to some of the canals she worked on around Birmingham, and I was interested to remember that the route to the south via Fazeley and Hawkesbury was known as The Bottom Road. According to Mrs Woolfit, the boaters didn’t like it a lot even though they got extra pay for taking that route She says the boats were sometimes sent that way because of “something to do with saving water”. I’ll need to ponder that one. Apparently the boaters objected to the very dirty condition of parts of the route, and also to the single locks. Single locks are a delight for a single boat, but for a boat towing a butty they are hard work as you have to do every lock twice and manhandle the butty into the locks.

Anyway, enough of that. All this inspired me to waste a few hours today in creating a Bottom Road CanalOmeter (with an extra bit added to get me back to Crick). I don’t like to create one of these calculators until I have first cruised the route because you have to choose which landmarks to include, but having now cruised it i felt able to go ahead. If you don’t know what a CanalOmeter is, then take a look at my CanalOmeters page which tries to explain everything. Suffice it to say they come in handy when you want to know how long it will take to get to where you are going from wherever you are en route.

In fact I did it the other way round, starting at Crick and going up to Brum, but it works either way. If you’re cruising the North Oxford or the lower half of the Coventry or the B’ham and Fazeley canal you might find it useful. One word of warning though. When it comes to long flights of locks he calculations may well be well on the pessimistic side. With a couple of extra crew and locks in your favour you can easily save a couple of hours up the Aston and Farmers Bridge flights.

I really ought to make CanalOmeters more frequently because if I don’t then I forget how to do it and it becomes a bit of a nightmare as I have to re discover all the tricks. It’s all done with Excel spreadsheet pie charts and the formatting can be a bit of a nightmare. Strangely enough, its the inner hours wheel that is the hardest to do. Anyway, despite a few more grey hairs it’s there now . Click on my CanalOmeters page if you want to down load The Bottom Road as a PDF or any of the others there. To make one all you need is a bit of card, a printer, a pair of scissors and one of those little brass paper fastener thingys.

I think the next one I’ll do will be the Stratford route.

How the other half lives.

2011-10-23T17:35:00.000Z

People speak of the North South divide as if it was all in favour of the South. Well the divide sure showed itself to us on our last boat trip, but not in that way. (Note to all real Northerners – I know that Brum is not the north*, but it’s as far north as we got, so bear with me. ) A pint of Brew XI (Brewed for the Men of the Midlands the old advert used to say) at £2.75 a pint? Give me some more of that. When we drink in pubs in the Home Counties you could easily add 75p to that.

As for food, we did eat out more than we ought, but sometimes I couldn’t believe the prices. Best was at the Beehive in Curdworth on the B’ham and Fazeley where just after the cute little 57 yard tunnel there are the last good moorings before storming the battlements of Brum. The Beehive is ten minutes walk from the canal and very unprepossessing from the outside,

but this is a pub I would gladly visit again. Inside it is friendly and comfortable and we had a rump steak with all the trimmings for £6 odd! It was good too. I just checked the menu of the Malt Shovel at Cowley, in many ways a similar pub a day’s cruise from London on the GU. Identical meal £10.45. At other pubs in the area it might cost a couple of quid more.

We might have paid about £9 or£10 at the Greyhound at Hawkesbury but the food there was of a quality that would cost £14 or more at Bugbrook or Old Linslade, or Apsley . .

I don't think Midlanders have too much to grumble about.

What about the fabled friendliness of the ~~north~~ midlands? Well of course on the canal most people are friendly, we spend the whole day waving and saying hello. But once shore we’re back to reality.

All I can do is give an example of how we were treated one night. On our way south from Brum we moored on the pontoon outside the Bluebell Cider House at Hockley Heath not far above Lapworth. That’s Warwickshire. Their on line menu showed tasty sounding meals for less than a fiver but we arrived at the moorings earlyish and decided to tidy up the boat, have a cup of tea and a shower before awarding the pub our patronage. At 7pm our hunger got the better of us and we strolled up the garden path feeling suitably famished. “Doing food tonight?” I asked. “Oh I’m sorry, on Saturdays we finish food at 7”. Imagine my delight!

Seeing our disappointment, the bar lady said she could always order a Chinese takeaway for us and found a menu from the nearest one and phoned through our order. We each had a pint of their rather splendid Black Rat cider and sat down to wait. When the Chinese food finally arrived, the pub provided us with plates and cutlery, which of course they had to wash up afterwards. Actually we hardly had time to eat because we were deep in conversation with the locals about this and that, and got so friendly with one couple that we kissed goodbye when they left.

Nuff said.

*footnote re Where is the North?

Many many years ago I was in a school in Sunderland talking to boys in their final year. Unemployment was rife up there. Prospects for these lads were very bleak. In the South East there were jobs galore. I asked one boy if he would consider moving down south if he couldn’t find work locally. “Down South?” he pondered. Then stoically, “Yes, I would” he said. I asked where. “ I dunno, York or Leeds I suppose”.

It’s all relative isn’t it.

How to print your blog

2011-10-22T09:32:00.001Z

Next time I have to fill in a form declaring my occupation I shall put “Author”, for I have finished a book. The problem is,

a) only one copy exists, and

b) you have already read quite a bit of it.

Yes, it’s this blog, printed and bound. Actually, the first three years from the nearly six years this blog has been going. Now I’m saving up for book 2, the next three years.

As quite a few of my readers are also bloggers, they may care to know how this printing was achieved. Easy. Through www.blog2print.com.

All you do is, give them the name of your blog and it’s URL, select the dates you want printed, choose a cover etc. and press a button. After a short wait, the book appears on screen and you can leaf through to look it over, then order the print and pay them quite a bit of money.

A sample page

The quality of the binding, paper and printing is very good, and there is a useful index giving the page numbers by post title.. There is just one snag. It is not cheap. Not even a bit cheap. I would be embarrassed to tell you how much my 270 pages cost, although I note that it would be a lot cheaper if I had chosen to have it in black and white. However I thought it was worth it as a keepsake, and I have enjoyed browsing through, as have the friends who have seen it.

Of course you can read it all here in the blog archives, but there is something nice about having it in a bound copy.

Kingswood Junction deciphered

2011-10-21T11:34:00.001Z

Don’t you just love quirky canal junctions? I had never been to Kingswood Junction before we did so recently. What a gem! All that lovely brickwork and the distinctive Stratford bridges with little gaps in the middle to let the horse rope slip through.

I haven’t read up on the history, but it looks like it was created as an afterthought to link the GU and Stratford canals at a point where they are only a couple of hundred yards apart. It’s a bit of a dog’s breakfast, but very attractive, although I cant work out why it is shaped like it is.

Here’s a diagram

We arrived from top left down the Lapworth flight. Here we are coming out of the lock I have marked as L1. See L3 to the left and L2 to the right.

The Stratford canal continues down to the right and the GU to the left. So far so good.

Now here we are in L3 looking back to L1.

The confusing bit is the signpost, because the arm pointing right in the picture says Grand Union Canal, and the GU is nowhere to bee seen. Then having descended L3 we pass another little turn taking the canal back to below L1.

This comes out in a pool below L2. I suspect that might have been put in later to prevent the need for boats going from Warwick to Stratford having to go up aL3 and then down again through L2. Then that makes me wonder why they bothered with L3 in the first place,as it’s redundant really. Boats coming from the Stratford to the GU could just drop down through L2 and turn right along the little alleyway towards the GU

Here’s the view looking from L2 back up to L1.

Anyway all jolly nice if a little confusing when you first arrive. There are some attractive old canal buildings around too. Worth getting out of the car for a stroll if you ever are nearby.

After leaving the junction behind I realised we hadn’t yet seen the GU coming down from Birmingham. In fact it’s another couple of minutes away along the link. Stupidly, I didn’t bother to photograph it.

Tales of the unexpected–the limitations of canal guides

2011-10-20T10:39:00.004Z

What’s this? Water pouring down some steps.

Zoom out a bit and we get this

So where is it? Knowing where we’ve been recently you might guess it’s somewhere in Birmingham.

Nope, its on the Stratford Canal somewhere north of Lapworth and right out in the sticks. Either side of this on the canal are farm pastures and wooded cuttings. Nothing else for miles! My Nicholson’s guide shows the spot as the outskirts of a small village, so you can imagine we were a bit taken aback when we cruised past. I guess it’s a very recent build.

Even when things have been unchanged for years, the maps and guides can’t really tell you what a place is like.

Take this spot on the Birmingham and Fazeley canal a few minutes south of Tamworth.

I’m not sure what I expected, but it wasn’t this:

and then the bridge you see towards the bottom of the map:

The map gives no clue as to the feel of the place, or of course the wonderful quirkiness of the footbridge, which has little spiral staircases at either end.

I love reading the guides before we cruise anywhere, but they never really tell what a place is like. And best of all, most places are better than you expect.

A magical transformation.

2011-10-16T19:16:00.004Z

A very strange thing happened to us on the Stratford canal. Above Lapworth there are three lift bridges to negotiate. One is electrically operated and the other two are hydraulic and need a bit of elbow grease and a windlass to wind them up. At the last one, I leapt off the boat and ran towards the bridge, then remembered I needed a windlass, so Kath, at the tiller, picked up my favourite one and tossed it onto the canal bank. There it gave a wiggle and a bounce and promptly jumped into the canal.

“Oh bother!” I exclaimed (well, words to that effect anyway). Even though I had a duplicate spare windlass, I was not a happy bunny. I thought I ought to at least try and retrieve it, although I don’t have one of those magnet thingies. So, without much hope, I probed around in the mud at the bottom of the canal using the boat hook.
“Wait a minute, I’ve hooked something”. Gingerly sliding the pole upwards so as not to drop whatever it was, I hoisted out of the water to reveal . . .

someone else’s windlass!!

Covered in nasty black mud and a thick crust of rust, it didn’t look much cop but I kept it anyway as further probing failed to locate my own windlass.
Next day I got very dirty scrubbing off the mud, filing away the rust, and sandpapering the “new” windlass and somewhat miraculously it came out looking more than reasonable. A good coat of fertan and job’s a goodun. In fact I have to confess, I now like it better than my old one because it has a rotating sleeve on the handle.

Old one (replica)

“New “ one

Paddling and other pastimes

2011-10-13T21:28:00.001Z

Yesterday, with a crew of 7, we had to keep stopping for a break. Not because we were tired but because we were getting towards our destination too quickly! With the efficiency of a military operation we sped through the locks between Long Itchington and Wigrams Turn. How could these big locks fill and empty so quickly? Well, there's no getting away from it, it must because of those gert big paddles I've been complaining about.

Capt Ahab commented that they weren't hydraulic as I had thought, but had within their rather massive cast iron bellies a worm gear. I suspect he is right. Apart from opening a very big hole for the water to pass through, they have another redeeming feature. Once fully raised, you can whip off the windlass and let them close themselves under gravity. Not with a rattle and a clang like normal lock gears, but with a sedate descent, doing no harm to themselves.

For those unfamiliar with these beasts, here is a picture of our lovely model Bob (Who's a pretty boy then?) posing alongside one to show the scale.

You wouldn't want one falling on your foot! No Bob is not stopping it from falling over. I'm still not sure why they are set in the ground at an angle.
Coming through Braunston today we were back to "normal" lock paddle gear, and I have to admit that the locks took twice as long to fill. In fact, thinking about it, the locks with the big paddle gubbinses probably fill as quickly as little single width locks. You can get through one in five minutes.

Having flogged yesterdays crew through a lot of these big locks and having forced them to stop regularly for tea and cake, pickled onions etc. (thanks R and M), we all got our reward with a splendid meal at the Folly at Napton. Should anyone warn you off this pub, check first if they have been there recently. The new landlord has wrought a great transformation in terms of ambience and food and the beer is good and prices very fair.

After the crew departed, leaving Kath and me in the pub to recover, we got a special treat. In the other bar a group of musicians of considerable virtuosity were holding a session.

Most people could be forgiven for not even recognising some of the the instruments, but being an anorak for these things, I can tell you that they were:

Guitar (of course.) a nice one made by Rob Armstrong ( I told you I was an anorak).
Fiddle,
Flute,
2 Piano Accordians (played a lot better than normal)
Concertina
(Now it gets interesting)
Harp
Portative organ (bellows blown with little pipes like a church organ)
Shepherd Pipes ( an English pastoral bagpipe)
Melodica
An intriguing folding xylophone

All played "real good".

We're only a day from our home mooring now, having crossed the remote plain between Napton and Braunston with its strange view of bridges to come seen across the winding hedgerows.

Passing through Braunston we found ourselves crossing paths with Nb Balmaha whose blog we often read. Quite funny really, each of us pointed the other's boat name, gave a surprised "Hello you" smiled and parted company like ships that pass in the night. Another time we'd like to say hello properly.

When we're back I have some stories saved up to tell including one about a magical windlass.

Stay tuned.

Record bid foiled.

2011-10-11T15:50:00.000Z

8.30 am. I sit here broken hearted. This morning we set off down the Hatton flight after rising at 7am so that we could get as far as possible today in order to pick up Rick and co for a ride tomorrow.

Hatton locks are tough. The hydraulic paddle gear takes some strength to wind, but we were undaunted.

Progress was good. Very good. We did the first five locks in 25 minutes. At this rate we would do all 21 by 10am. This must be a record.

Then a nice BW man appeared. "Would you mind pulling over after this lock and tying up for a bit? There are empty pounds down at the bottom, and we have to open up eight turns on the paddles in every lock to feed water down the flight. It shouldn't take more than an hour and a half."

An hour and a half? We should have been at the bottom by then. We wouldn't have minded so much but we got up at 7am!

So here we are stuck waiting and I have a chance to update the blog with memories of happier times.

Lapworth was nice. Very pretty locks

and an easy descent,

especially as we "allowed" two young boys to open and close all the gates for us. We stopped after lock 14, leaving six to do next morning when David "Rainman" was due to join us. We thought he would enjoy the narrow locks

and we knew we wouldn't get further than Hatton top as he was only arriving at lunchtime.

Kingswood junctoion where the Stratford canal meets the Grand Onion is very quirky and interesting and we got a glimpse of the first of the Stratford's famous barrel roofed cottages.

9.30. Oi up, here's the BW man again.

INTERLUDE

Now several hours and 28 locks later I am almost too tired to type. The delay at Hatton was an hour, then we set off down the flight. Those hydraulic paddle gears are flippin' 'ard work I can tell you. I feel like I've been in the gym all day.

Our first trip through Warwick and Leamington was uninspiring and you see nothing of the best side of these two towns. After that it's countryside and locks.

However, we are feeling very pleased with ourselves pleased because we've reached Long Itchington where there is a choice of pubs. Looking at the Nicholsons Guide yesterday we thought it looked out of reach. Tomorrow we have a further four crew members so we intend to drive them like slaves while we take it easy all the way to the Folly at Napton.

Invasion of the grannies. City centre draped in crimplene.

2011-10-08T17:20:00.000Z

Friday night, the clubs and bars were open just round the corner from our mooring. Would we get bovvered overnight. Early in the evening we looked out of the window to see what sort of people were out and about, fearing the sight of chavs on the rampage. No Rick to protect us, his term of service was up he had gone back home by train.

What's this? A granny. And another. And another, and another. Blimey, another! What's going on? We looked up the programme for the NIA next door to us. Daniel O'Donnell. And at the Symphony Hall round the corner "We'll meet again - wartime songs introduced by Angela Rippon". The place was awash with crimplene and the roads blocked with coaches! The chief noise was not the smashing of bottles but the squeak of wheelchaits and the clack clack of zimmer frames on the paviours.

So we were alright.

Andy Parsons at the town hall was, well, just like Andy Parsons really. 60 minutes really funny satire in a 90 minute show.

This morning we thought we would explore Ouzell Street Loop on our way out of town. Quite an interesting backwater and I suspect very quiet although only just round the corner from where it all happens.

It only took ten minutes to do the loop but it was not without incident as the exit back onto the main line requires a 320 degree blind turn out of a ten foot wide opening. I can confidently tell you that the width of the main line there is about 50ft 2 inches as we were briefly jammed across it in our 50ft Herbie!

Then on through Brindley Place

past the last of the posh city centre bits

and within minutes it all gets green again

a steady stream of joggers passes us and we head out into the sticks.

Birmingham has been really great and we'll definitely return to see more. Tonight we're well down the Stratford canal, which up until here seems to be an endless sequence of wooded cuttings.

Tomorrow the Lapworth Flight. Can't wait.

Stairway to Gas Street

2011-10-07T15:09:00.000Z

Beep beep beep. Damn that alarm clock. A long climb up into Brum and we thought we ought to make an early start. I was feeling somewhat better after spending half the night in A and E* and I wasn't going to miss what ought to be a hard day but the highlight of the cruise.

First still in the countryside and a few locks at Minworth, then increasingly industrial as we closed in on Spaghetti Junction.

It's not only the motorways that meet in a tangle here, the canals do too, right under the mighty flyovers.

It would seem that a number of boaters get in a mess here, judging by the notice in the car showroom by the canal.

Then on into bandit country, Aston Locks, scene of Brum's contribution to the recent riots. Armed to the teeth with er, windlasses, we stormed up the rather attractive 11 locks in the flight and saw no-one at all save a couple of joggers who gave us a friendly wave.

A quick bite of lunch then on up the final steep haul, the 13 Farmers Bridge locks raising us another 81 feet in half a mile. The name Farmers Bridge conjures up a bucolic image of haywains and grazing cattle. In reality it looks like this

Dark, stygian, and often subterranean. is it grim? Not the tiniest bit. One of the best day's cruising I can remember. It's great fun locking steeply up beneath the bridges and office blocks. The three of us were running a team system. Each person three locks driving, then six locks working. At a lock every 5 minutes the time flew by. So close are the locks that one office building actually had three locks beneath it with side pounds to absorb the water from the emptying locks.

We were almost sorry when we emerged at the top and saw the NIA building ahead. And loads of mooring space too. We're right outside the Arena, just round the corner from Gas Street basin and a short walk from all the city centre attractions. Brilliant.

This evening, on a whim, we've got tickets to see Andy Parsons at the Town Hall ten minutes walk away. Nothing ventured .....

*PS I'm much better now thanks.

Sleepless in Curdworth

2011-10-06T17:59:00.002Z

We didn't get a lot of sleep last night. At 2 am this morning Kath and I were in A&E at the Good Hope Hospital in Sutton Coldfield. Earlier in the evening some abdominal pains I had been getting got worse and in the end we decided I ought to get checked out at hospital. I didn't want to have appendicitis or something erupt when we were in the middle of nowhere on the boat. Such was the seriousness of our concern that I left half a pint of M&B Brew XI undrunk in the pub!!

I got interviewed twice, poked and prodded, asked to cough, and had samples of blood and pee taken. Then we had to wait, and wait, and wait while the lab deduced that my fluids were all in order and I had no infections to worry about. Kath was falling asleep on the cubicle chair and I was pacing up and down like a pregnant father.

In the end they can't be sure what it is but it is probably muscular (me - muscular!?!, my six pack has long since turned into a Party 7*.) spasms and not anything to be immediately scared of. So we got a taxi back to our mooring at Curdworth., stumbled along the dark towpath and collapsed exhausted into bed. Rick was boat minding while we were away and not getting a lot of sleep either.

Then after what seemed like 5 minutes in bed the 7am alarm woke us to get us up and out to face the 27 lock summit climb into Brum. And it was GREAT. Tell you next time.

Yaaaawn.

*For the youngsters amongst you, the Party 7 was a rotund 7 pint can full of fizzy weak beer.

Summit bid briefing

2011-10-05T16:47:00.002Z

OK chaps, gather round. Here's the plan for the tomorrow's assault on the summit ~~of Everest~~ the Birmingham and Fazeley canal

State of play: we're safely through ~~the icefall~~ Curdworth locks, and resting at camp three ~~on the Lhotse face~~ near the White Horse.

In the Icefall

Rick has recovered from his bout of acute mountain sickness and been brought up from ~~Khatmandu~~ Long Buckby to join us by Sherpa Marilyn. Good to have you with us Rick. The wind is pretty damn ferocious out there as we found on our short trek today, and the forecast for tomorrow is not good so we'll need to rope up tightly.

Base Camp

Early start tomorrow. We need to reach ~~the south col~~ Aston locks by early afternoon or we're doomed. Take care not to miss the path at ~~the Geneva Spur~~ Spaghetti Junction or you'll end up ~~on the Nuptse ridge~~ in Perry Barr. Remember to watch out for signs of altitude sickness and keep up the fluid intake. We'll have to push forward to make our summit bid up the ~~Hilary Step~~ Farmers Bridge flight before dark. There'll be no time to make a descent, so we'll have to bivvy on the summit. Dangerous but we have no option.

This time tomorrow lads we'll be ~~on top of the world~~ outside the National Indoor Arena. Then a day's rest and we'll make our descent down the ~~SouthWest Face~~ Stratford canal.

Anybody brought a flag?

Yellow Jack strikes crew

2011-10-03T21:09:00.000Z

You can't get the staff . Rick, who should be with us on board tonight ready for the rigours of the long climb into Birmingham, is instead having his fevered brow mopped by Marilyn back home in Long Buckby. A dose of the yellow jack or some such. GWS Rick. Too many Bunnage salads.

On hearing the sad news we thought we ought to put some miles under the belt today to make life easier tomorrow, so now we are at Drayton on the Birmingham and Fazeley where there is water under the boat. Yes, after days of slow progress and inaccessible bank sides, we descended Glascote Locks to discover where all the water has dropped down to. Not only from the Coventry canal but from the lofty heights of Birmingham. Suddenly the channel seems full and the boat speeds along on less revs.

Today it has been Really Windy. Our passage past the bijou back gardens of the good people of Tamworth was only achieved without a multiple pile up beause there were hardly any other boats moving.

I suspect that we may have seen the last of this amazing heatwave we've been ~~suffering~~ enjoying. According to the met office our arrival in the city centre on Wednesday is likely to be a moist one and somewhat cooler, and our rest / tourism day on Thursday will be properly wet.. This could be construed to be a Good Thing as I have now run out of clean T shirts and have only warm long sleeved shirts left.

I'm a lucky guy.

Scary stuff -shallow waters and mighty leaps

2011-10-02T19:59:00.000Z

The bottom of this canal is getting perliously near the top. Every mile, it seems to get worse and we see little beaches on the offside. Sitting here tonight alongside a wood north of Polesworth, Herbie rests gently on the bottom. I hope we can get her off again tomorrow. I dare say all this hot weather has caused a lot of evaporation to make the water situation worse. At this rate it can't be long until the canal is un-navigable.

Coming down the 11 locks at Atherstone was ok despite the restrictions. There was a nice bit of up and down passing during the first half, but then it just seemed to go dead and hardly any boats were moving. We did have to turn one lock after a long wait but one out of eleven ain't bad.

More scary stuff. I've been practicing my dare devil leaps across open bottom gates to save walking round. Kath kindly snapped me on her fancy new phone -what I call her raspberry. Here I am in full flight.

Drum roll. . . .

Loud applause (please).

Tomorrow we stay put and await the arrival of Rick. I shall use the time polishing the starboard cabin side - if I can get the boat near enough to the bank - and until my dwindling supplies of wax polish run out.

Murder on the canal? The delights of Coventry.

2011-10-01T16:48:00.000Z

Leaving Hawkesbury a couple of other boaters asked us where we were heading. When we told them Coventry they visibly blanched and acted as though we had said Afghanistan! These people have never ben to Brentford.

However we began to wonder if they were right when a towpath walker hailed us saying that we might not make it to the basin because a body had been found in or near the canal and police were cordoning it off. Gulp!!

We had no choice but to press on towards the city centre because there was nowhere to turn round. Eventually we saw a policeman and a barrier, but the barrier was only across the towpath and we were able to pass without hindrance, although under the gaze of the copper I couldn't help looking shifty and I expect he was mentally putting us on the suspect list.

Coventry has a fair bit not to like, but like the curate's egg it is very good in parts. We took Peter round the cathedral, and on the way back to the boat did a quick turn around the Transport Museum which was surprisingly good. We'll definately go back there and take a longer look -and its free! In the evening we met up with Peter's old university pals Matthew and Sally. Matthew steered us (on foot) past the Theatre and the Award Winning Car Park (only Coventry could have one of them) to a very fine pub called the Gatehouse where beer is cheap and delicious, food is cheap and cheerful and the staff are enthusiastic. It is also apparently one of the few pubs in Coventry that has a garden, which was a good thing as it was still scarily warm for the time of year. We kept glimpsing signs to Medieval Spon Street which we will have to save for another visit.

I particularly like this old canal side power station converted into something or other.

The numbers on the side represent tthe number of electricity subscribers each year when the station was first opened, rising slowly at first and then exponentially.

I also like how they have kept other reminders of its past function.

and perhaps most of all, how the lettering across the building leaps through space and ends up on the side of the adjacent (alarmingly thin) block of flats.

The previous night we dined at the Greyhound in Hawkesbury and had the best food I can remember in a long long time. Someone there can really cook. A strong contender for this year's Herbie Awards.

After a week of dining out, Peter has now left us and we are back to cooking for ourselves out in the sticks north of Nuneaton. Which brings me to Peter's suggestion of a good blog headline.

CANNIBALS ATTACK CONVENT - NUNEATON!

Autumn Days Cruise - days 3 and 4

2011-09-29T17:54:00.001Z

Here we are at Hawkesbury junction, somewhat knackered after a long day at the tiller under the burning sun. Somehow it seems more tiring when there are no locks to do. We just had the three Hilmorton locks first thing this morning. In spite of the restrictions we got down the locks without any significant delays.

Yesterday, coming North from Braunston we came upon our old friend Leon on Nb The Old Bovine, the fist time we had seen him since his lovely wife Ray (Rae?) died six months ago. He is bearing up well and it will come as no surprise to anyone who has met him that he is still putting his heart and soul into renovating the boat. Inside it is nothing short of wonderful. Traditional fittings, gleaming brassware and perfect traditional decoration everywhere. It's a real showpiece. Not only all that but the boat has been lengthened (again!) and is now the full 70ft. Wait - There's more! The OB now has a new engine. Not just any old engine but a brand spanking new Russel Newbury!!! (for those who don't know RNs are something of a Rolls Royce, being hand built today in the style of the old boat engines.) I suspect this is Leon's present to himself after the terrible loss of Rae- and why not.

Badsey's cafe was good. Food actually cooked for you and not just warmed up. After I told them I was born in Badsey they showed me a book about the village containing an old picure of the 1892 Badsey Rangers football team with my grandad in the front row! They very kindly ran me off a photcopy of the picture.

The Greyhound beckons, so I'll conclude with a few pics from today.

Fist, Herbie in the psychedelic Newbold tunnel

Next a picture of Badsey outside the cafe. She has been repainted in post war austerity colours following her previous paint job being damaged by a spray of hydraulic fluid!

Finally a snap of one of the few places where we stayed cool today!

Autumn days cruise days 1 and 2

2011-09-28T09:17:00.000Z

That Mr Berners Lee seems to have forgotten Warwickshire when he invented the internet. The signal here is awful, so no pics today. I'll try and paint a word picture for you.

Looking out of the window this morning at across the canal at Napton I can see the customary gang of mallards, mostly still asleep, half a dozen wagtails wagging their tails, a few magpies, some unidentifiable seagulls, probably albatross or gannet I expect, some rooks above the trees up by the windmill giving grief to a poor buzzard looking for rabbits, and a bunch a shaggy looking ponies.

The sun is shining and the sky is blue. I'm going to complain to the met office. I've spent all this money on waterproofs and packed bags full of jumpers and warm shirts and now they do this to me. Yesterday my scalp got sunburnt. I've noticed that since they moved their HQ from Bracknell to Exeter, the weather has gone very wierd. They seem to have lost all control. Were it not for the hedgerows bursting with haws and the leaves turning gold, you would think it was a June morning.

Our trip so far has gone completely to plan!! Better in fact, since we arrived at Watford locks and went straight down without having to queue. Not that our descent was rapid, for we were following a hotel boat and butty. The butty had to be manhandled through all the locks. Well, woman handled actually. The poor girls pushing and shoving were looking knackered. I expect they had to rush in and cook lunch for the customers as soon as they got down the flight.

Evening no1 saw us above Braunston locks having had a scary trip through the tunnel. We met no less than six boats coming the other way, some of them on the bendy bits where you haven't a clue where the sides are what with the oncoming boats blinding you with their spotlights. Rick will be delighted to know that as we passed one of them their was a loud crack and their skipper shouted "There goes another fender".

Dinner at The Admiral Nelson was disappointing and the beer was no better. Such a pity for a pub in such a great lockside location.

Yesterday we descended Braunston locks (no keepers in sight) paired up with a hire boat and it all went very quickly. There were pairs coming up the other way so no water was wasted save that from some very leaky gates.

A quick walk up to the village for supplies at the shop, then a bite of lunch and on in the hot sun towards Napton. Lots of boats moored up on the way with their crews sitting out sunbathing. Can this really be the end of September?

Dinner last night at the Folly was lovely, as was the beer. Such a nice atmosphere too. That's how to run a canalside pub.

How I saved two shillings

2011-09-23T13:43:00.004Z

In pursuance of His majesty’s Order in Council dated the sixteenth day of November 1804, We do hereby Impower and Direct you to impress, or cause to be impressed, so many Seamen, Seafaring Men and persons whose Occupations and Callings are to work in Vessels and Boats upon Rivers, as shall be necessary to Man His Majesty’s Ship under your Command, giving unto each Man so Impressed One Shilling for Prest Money.

So says a press warrant issued to a ship’s captain in 1809.

Well we have a lot of locks to do, so I thought an investment of two bob was worth it and sneaked up on Rick and Rainman. But they were not Impressed. As luck would have it, they made the mistake of Volunteering, so saving them the indignity of having a shilling coin slipped into their beer mug. In Rainman’s case it might have been a bit of a problem because he only drinks Coke.

There is a downside. After further historical research I now find that as they volunteered, I am bound to protect them from their creditors if their debts are less than £20. It’s a risky business being a boat skipper.
Now after even more historical research I find that they were exempt anyway, being either under 18 or over 55 years of age. Probably the latter. Actually it was appropriate then that when I sneaked up on them I fooled them by describing the voyage as an “Autumn Days” cruise on behalf of Help the Aged. After all I am fairly aged and could do with a bit of help.

Rick will be crewing us up the Birmingham and Fazeley into the city centre and Rainman the Grand Union section including the Hatton flight.

“One volunteer is worth three pressed men” they say, and I’m sure they’re right. The cruise is now fully booked, especially as we are likely to have further guests (Bob and Margaret) at the closing stage.

Now, where did I put those hard tack biscuits?

PS I just re registered with the UK Waterways Ranking site (having somehow lost the link before) and now I start again from the bottom of the list.

Undeferred Gratification (or deferred penalty)

2011-09-21T14:59:00.001Z

It’s a good idea on a cruise to get all the hard work out of the way near the beginning. Not this time! We’ve ignored all the rule again and put together a cruise which is a doddle at the beginning and tough going towards the end. We never learn do we?

Our Autumn cruise starts next Monday and if we don’t chicken out or miss any turns it should take us to the middle of Birmingham and back. We’ve never got lost on a canal yet, but maps of canals in Brum make me think it’s possible!

Here’s our route, starting and ending at Crick.

As I mentioned the other day, we will detour to Napton and Coventry on the way out. We’ll be going along the blue lines, not the grey ones. Thin lines are canals with narrow locks and vice versa.

We should be able to do the whole thing inside 3 weeks without killing ourselves so long as we don’t get held up by restrictions or the Great British Weather.

Up as far as Tamworth (Fazeley junction), it’s a doddle. A leisurely wander through the countryside mostly. About 30 locks I think. Then it starts to get tougher. 38 locks in 2 days to the National Indoor Arena in the centre of the great metrollops. Then the route back home is 79 locks, including the Hatton 21 as we descend towards Warwick.

As far as Tamworth, we know the route because we did it as part of the Leicester ring this summer. Brum and the homeward route is unknown to us though. As you can see we had a choice of routes south. I had no idea which to choose, so I posted a question on Canal World Forums and within an hour I got lost of helpful replies. Well, helpful except for the fact that as usual no one can agree. It seems it’s horses for courses. Anyway, as we like doing narrow locks, we chose the Stratford canal route.

Journey planning to find the slowest route because of a village name

2011-09-20T11:34:00.004Z

At the weekend we're off on our early autumn cruise. I love trip planning, but this time I have an unusual problem because we want to keep going but go slow. The reason is that for week one, our son Peter will be with us. He will want us to do some boating each day, but we don't want to get too far too fast because:

a) we are planning to drop him off at Coventry at the end of the week and Coventry is realistically only three shortish days cruise from Crick, and
b) we are very keen to visit Badsey's cafe at Hillmorton ( only one and a half days out) and they don't open until Wednesday.

"What's so special about Badsey's?" I hear you ask.

Well for a daft reason really, although they do have a very good reputation for food. You see I was born and brought up in the village of Badsey in the Vale of Evesham, and in a roundabout way the cafe is named after the village.

Actually the cafe is named after Badsey the old working boat moored outside. But the old boat, built in 1936 is a GUCCC Town Class boat, which means it's one of a series of boats named after towns and villages. I read somewhere that in order to find place names they looked at railway station names, which is a bit odd because our station was named " Littleton and Badsey" as we shared it with another village. I can remember as a child lying in bed at night listening to the clang and clink of the goods wagons as they were marshalled in the goods yard a mile away, loaded with fruit and veg from the local growers. All a bit academic now as that nasty Dr Beeching did away with the station a long time ago.

Incidentally, I am proud to say that Badsey has probably the best village web site in the whole of the UK and has won awards for it. The local history society has built a massive database of all the buildings, people, trades and events in the village going back hundreds of years. When we are doing our genealogy, Kath is green with envy because the Badsey society has saved me months of digging. Take a look at www.badsey.net. You'll be impressed. For especial delight, I can recommend the pages on Asum Grammar - the local dialect in which I am still fluent! A prize for anyone who can translate Thee sist that chippa guz-gogs dussunt?

Anyway, I digress. How do we start at the weekend and delay our arrival at Hillmorton until Wednesday?

Firstly by not leaving until Monday, because Peter has not yet been to Crick so we can spend Sunday showing him around the marina and the village. Secondly by doing a detour down to Napton en route. Peter like his mum and dad has been known to enjoy the odd pint, and the Folly at Napton sells a particularly good one.

Sorted.

On optimism

2011-09-19T09:59:00.001Z

I like to think of myself as an optimist, but some people leave me in the dust in the optimisms stakes.

On Saturday we took Grace to the Foxton Locks Festival. She had a great time because a large percentage of the entertainment was for kids. Fairground rides, bouncy castle slide, pets corner and all that stuff. There was a sizeable craft fair too. Lots of people were there and I dare say that the Foxton Inclined Plane Trust made a few bob out of it.

What the trust wants to do of course is to restore the old inclined plane, abandoned in 1928, so that it can lift boats, sideways in a rolling tank, up and down the steep hill. It should look something like this.

Scary stuff if you ask me! You can see the currently operating staircase locks and their side ponds in the background.

Well after spending a £3m lottery grant it now looks like this:

In at the top

Down the plane (or what is left of the old concrete foundations)

and out at the bottom.

Er, still a bit to do then.

Don’t get me wrong. I can well imagine how much work it has taken to get this far. The place used to be overgrown with trees, the bottom arm had no landing stage, the top arm was derelict, and they have spent a fair bit on creating the excellent on site museum. What worries me is that (if I have understood the documents correctly) they are looking for another £11m to finish the job. I don’t know about you but if it has cost £3m to get this far, is another £11m going to be enough to rebuild the tracks and the machinery and all that? The way costs usually escalate in these schemes, I reckon they’ll need a great deal more..

Everybody these days seems to be looking for another Falkirk Wheel (that cost £17.5 m by the way). Is this the one? Can they do it?

Only an idiot would say yes. But then, only an idiot like Tom Rolt thought that England’s derelict canal network in the 1940s could be restored, and here we are cruising about on it. Idiots all over the country are bringing bits of waterway back to life.

I think I wish them well, although personally speaking, I just love going up the staircase locks.

Helping the Thames breathe

2011-09-14T11:40:00.000Z

Poor old David Walliams had a tough time swimming the Thames didn't he? Although the Thames is supposed to be clean these days, it was clear from his experience that there is still enough pollution around to make you ill if you fall in. Pollution and low water oxygen levels go hand in hand, so it was interesting to see this boat when we were on the tideway last week.

They tell me it's an oxygenating barge. I never knew such things existed, but it looks to be a serious piece of kit. Apparently this has been going on since 1989. A quick check on Google reveals that they have two of these boats. This one, Thames Vitality, plus another called Thames Bubbler. That might give a clue to how they work, presumably by blowing oxygen bubbles into the water. It seems that these boats are deployed as needed in order to protect fish and other marine life when oxygen levels reach low levels.

By the way, following my scary picture of Nb Leo's bow dipping into the water last week I heard from her skipper Kathryn who revealed as I suspected, that standing 60ft away on the stern she had no idea how dodgy things were up front. If she had, she might have closed the front doors!

Here's another photo taken at the time. I guess she faced at least twenty such waves.

Leo, who Kathryn tells me was built by Orion, has lovely lines and I reckon that although the bow and gunnels are low to the water, the good shaping of the bow kept the water away from the well deck as I think this photo shows.

Inside an ignition switch–(anoraks only)

2011-09-13T12:47:00.001Z

Well that title ought to put off most readers, but if you are still with me and have an interest in such things, then read on.

I pulled apart Herbie’s faulty ignition switch to see what was wrong with it. Don’t do this yourself unless you are replacing the switch because the first thing that happens when you prise off the back is that a few little springs and ball bearings shoot out, and you’ll never get them back in the right place!

If you have a boat with a BMC or Beta etc engine then you may well have a similar switch. Its a Lucas one but our replacement although identical was made by Durite.

Here’s the back plate

Flip it over and you see this

Note the cam like notches in the centre of the plastic which looks like they might hold the fixed switch positions against the little springs and bearings. Practically no wear on the contact discs though.

Looking inside the body of the switch we see this

You can just make out the wear on the 3rd and 4th stud contacts. Not much, but apparently enough to stop the glow plugs from working. It gives the impression that in some positions, the switch hasn’t been turned far enough. Do you see what I mean? It looks like it has only been contacting the edge of the stud.

Anyway, the new switch was easy to get and at £16, not too dear, and fitting it took a couple of minutes. Herbie’s starting is transformed.

Oh lucky man

2011-09-12T09:40:00.000Z

After a free ride up the Thames with Indigo Dream, then a good evening ( and a tasty chilli) on Briar Rose hosted by Adam and Adrian on Saturday evening at Norton junction, we ought to be due a downturn in our weekend luck, but not yet it seems.

Yesterday (Sunday) was yet another good day. We are up at Crick aboard Herbie. At 9am Rick arrived ready for us to attempt to find the fault in Herbie's glow plugs circuit. In the event it took us only a few minutes to deduce that the ignition switch was at fault. The full current to the glow plugs wasn't getting switched through. So we jumped in the car and drove 15 minutes to Wharf House chandlers at Braunston where we got a replacement switch for £16. Within the hour we had the new switch in and the plugs were working. Job's a goodun! That left us time to replace a fuse box which had a broken piece. A fiddly job with all the wiring in a small space, but it worked.

This was very good news because we were in time to drive over to Rick's house where Marilyn made us BLT baguettes and we watched the Monza Grand Prix. Then returning to the boat I rigged up our new telly aerial and that worked fine too. What's more, after a very very windy night it still looks very solid.

I'm getting nervous now. Something has to go wrong soon.

At this point I was going to show you photos of the inside of the ignition switch because I found the design a bit surprising. However, the network here is too s,low for uploading pics at the moment, so I'll do it when we get home.

Toodle pip.

A picture show of a rare and special cruise

2011-09-10T10:22:00.005Z

Roll up, roll up. See twenty narrowboats in a pickle, one nearly going under, a rather fine picture of the backside of Richard (skipper of Indigo Dream), and some HUGE lock gates.

Q. What’s the difference between herding cats and organising a formation cruise of narrowboats?
A. Not a lot

I don’t think the Red Arrows have anything to fear from competition from narrowboaters. Yesterday’s mini rehearsal for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Thames flotilla showed how hard it’ll be. 21 boats formed the flotilla. I’m now told it’ll be 1000 next year!!!

I think the Red Arrows have it easy. They have

Identical machines that tend not to break down,
pilots who are trained and know what they are supposed to do,
regular practice,
no weird obstacles or traffic in their way,
no tidal currents to negotiate

The boaters have

a motley collection of craft, some twice as powerful as others
a motley collection of skippers, some more experienced than others, but all never having done it before
a complicated succession of bridges each with different rules about which arch to go through
other craft getting in their way
sudden vicious tidal pulls near large immovable objects in the water

It was of course great fun.

We entered the Thames from Limehouse lock in groups of 3 or 4. Limehouse lock gates are not what narrowboaters are used to. They just open ‘em up and let the water find its level. Hang on to those ropes!

And no, these are not the big ones I referred to in the intro. No where near!

Anyway, what could go wrong with Richard at the helm. We were quietly confident.

Conditions were benign and even wash from the Thames Clippers didn’t seem too bad
.

Under Tower Bridge (they didn’t need to open it for us. Pity!), and on to Westminster where I had the privilege of steering us past the mother of parliaments

Then supposedly off up the river to our rendezvous point at Barn Elms.

Problem 1, a Port of London Authority (PLA) boat arrived to say that the tide wasn’t yet deep enough at Barn Elms and ordered us to tie up to a big barge in mid stream and await further instructions. Turning round to face the tidal current, we suddenly realised how strong it was. When you are going with it is seems gentle, but when you face it, it’s scary. We lashed up tight and waited nervously at the barge for quite a while before we were allowed to move on.

Arriving at Barn Elms we met problem number 2. We were supposed to moor up alongside a wall, but at our designated spot there nothing much to tie up to except a tree growing out of the wall. How many boats carry a pruning saw? Well Richard’s does! He set to work chopping off the tree while we enjoyed taking embarassing pictures of his backside, and we tied up to a rusty old bold sticking out of the stone work.

At last came the moment to set off in formation. The leading boats shot off leaving the stragglers struggling to catch up, but eventually we got into some sort of shape.

Then came problem 3. How do you go four abreast through a bridge when the arches aren’t wide enough. Mild panic ensued whilst people made their choice of arch and the formation went to pot. It wasn't exactly helped when one of the boats lost power while approaching the bridge pier. The choppy conditions had stirred up the muck in his fuel tank and blocked his filters.

Getting back in shape wasn’t easy and sometimes the boats alongside us didn’t belong to our row. There was a a fair bit of bunching and stretching just like on a motorway. Coming towards central London we occasionally looked fairly ship shape. Then we hit the traffic.

The skipper of the Clipper (it rhymes!) was OK but the City Cruises boat on the right cut right across our path. I believe he was due to get a telephone bollocking from the PLA last night. The formation went even more pear shaped after that incident and it was all a bit confusing, not helped by vicious cross currents around some bridge piers and large metal buoys. There were a couple of near misses.

On through central London where we began to notice it was getting somewhat choppy.

Just how choppy it got you can see here! How NB Leo with her lovely sleek low bow kept afloat is a mystery to me.

Mercifully, no one sank but we were beginning to feel queasy!

Under Tower bridge where the flotilla looked reasonably in order and gongoozlers waved

and on to Limehouse reach where the leading half of the flotilla was released whilst the rear half practiced an emergency stop under the guidance of the PLA boat Impulse who had escorted us throughout.

The idea was to assume that there was a bomb on a bridge or a big boat sideways on in front. On the signal we all stopped and (most of us) turned back upstream. Quite what would have happened with a thousand boats coming down behind us with their view obscured by flags and bunting, I’m not sure, but the PLA seemed happy enough.

And so on to our destination. The mighty West India dock at Canary Wharf. As lock entrances go, this one takes some beating. in the picture you can just make out a boat going in under the white bridge.

The lock gates are pretty big too.

Here we are, safe in the dock.

Quite a day eh?

Many many thanks to Sue and Richard for their hospitality and for bringing us back alive. Today they do it all again but with a lot more boats. It might get on the telly or in the papers, so look out for it

Treats in store

2011-09-08T11:54:00.001Z

First the bad news. Tomorrow we have to rise at 5am !!!!!!!

Well you might too if you had the promise of a narrowboat Thames cruise from Limehouse to Wandsworth and back. Sue and Richard on Indigo Dream are participating in a rehearsal for next years Queens Jubillee flotilla of 500(?) boats and with typical generosity have invited us to join them. How nice is that? Only 26 narrowboats will be going out tomorrow, and a larger group of allsorts on Saturday. We’re just going for the Friday

We have to be at Limehouse soon after 8 pm and that means an early train for us. The strange thing is that to make a day of it, and avoid the tube which Kath hates, we plan get down river from Waterloo station by using the Thames Clipper boats. Which means that before we start the narrowboat trip we will have already done a lot of it by Clipper. Is that daft? No, no at all. Zooming down the Thames at speed in a 200 seater speedboat is entirely different from standing on the back of a narrowboat at 5mph. Wandsworth is well upstream of Westminster so we’ll get to have a good long view of all the sights both out and back. And there’s something special about being in a flotilla of 26 narrowboats. Apparently we will be returning downstream in formation and going into West India docks. Brilliant. Must charge up the camera batteries.

Then more treats. We plan on Saturday to go up to Herbie at Crick for a few days. We’re hoping to meet up with Adam and Adrian of Nb Briar Rose for a drink on Saturday night, then on Sunday Rick and I hope to play with the glow plug wiring to get them working. My cup runneth over!

TV aerials

2011-09-05T17:12:00.001Z

At home we have a place where things pile up ready to take out to Herbie on our next visit. Currently it contains some bedding and a couple of new toys. These are a shiny new socket set with lots of extension bars in the hope that some impossible jobs become a bit less impossible, and a new TV aerial which arrived today.

As recommended for boaters by the very wonderful http://www.aerialsandtv.com/ which I blogged about some time ago, it is a log periodic aerial which looks like this

(yet another picture of our landing carpet). You can see how it has two rows of sticky outy bits (SOB’s) one above the other, and that the SOB’s are staggered. I don’t have a clue how this works as you may gather from my technical description. Anyway when we get out to the boat, hopefully next weekend, I’ll stick it up and give it a go then report back.

PS you may or may not know that depending whether you are pointing your aerial at a main transmitter or a relay, the aerial should be mounted so that the SOB’s should be either horizontal or vertical accordingly.

I just remembered. SOB’s are probably called elements. I think.

By popular demand

2011-09-04T13:44:00.001Z

A comment has flooded in from a Mr Trellis of Brinklow marina complaining that I had not posted a photograph of myself “back in the day”. Those of a nervous disposition look away now.

You see, there was no need. I haven’t changed at all.

Much.

O.K. I have put on a bit of weight since

What do you do with a wife who likes rust?

2011-09-03T17:46:00.001Z

Kath is amassing a collection of bits of rusty iron, supposedly for some rust dyeing process for her textile work. Bits of farm gates found on a walk in Shropshire, a bolt from a broken groyne on a beach at Folkestone, and so it goes on. Not only that but we keep having to stop the boat to take photos of rusty old boats with dodgy paintwork we she uses for “inspiration” for her designs. Here’s a typical one.

Up the Coventry canal she was really taken with Charity Dock- right up her street

Actually it did have some lovely quirky bits

It’d be nice to have a stroll round. I bet the elfin safety people would have a fit.

Although Kath sometimes drives me nuts, I must like something about her because tomorrow we will have been married for 35 years. Here she is back in the day, as they say.

Oooh, er... Aaah

2011-09-02T14:27:00.000Z

I just got all excited. Aldi is selling this

for £2.99. Neat idea, a magnetic brush holder. " I must tell everyone" I thought. Then I thought for a minute. Most good quality brushes have the metal bit made out of stainless steel. And most stainless steel is non magnetic. Maybe I'll get one anyway because cheap stainless may be magnetic so it might work.

Rick the confessor

2011-09-01T21:23:00.001Z

I know the secrets of the confessional are supposed to be sacrosanct, but hey, I need something to blog about.

Herbie rests tonight back home in Crick, having been under the command of Rick since Monday for a short trip down past Braunston and back. This evening Rick rang me up to confess in anxious tones to the list of damages inflicted. Nothing serious at all, just normal boating scrapes, but he and (especially) Marilyn, feel the weight of remorse. Listen Rick and Marilyn, I worry much more about you stressing than I do about the loss of a fender and a small easily patchable scrape of the shoulder of the cratch cover. These happened in Braunston tunnel where they met another boat coming the other way at the point where the tunnel makes a dog leg.

As to the demolition of the end of our mooring pontoon at the marina I just wish I had been there to see it. Actually I exaggerate, he merely dislodged a couple of the batons which make up the end of the footway. Rick kindly went to the harbourmaster Gary and nervously informed him of the damage, and all Gary did was say it happens all the time and not to worry, he would send someone out with a hammer and nails to replace them.

Lastly on the matter of the destruction of an over bridge and four lock gates at Watford . . . alright, I made that bit up..

Having hired many a boat in the past I can recall rather more serious misdemeanours, especially on Broads sailing boats. Broken bowsprits, lots of scrapes, and a spectacularly broken mast when towing a dinghy under a Ludham bridge. We lowered the mast on the main boat but quite forgot the little sailing dinghy we were towing. I can still hear the crack now! I think that over a number of years we have lost our damage deposit more often than not. Rick has already paid in advance his Herbie damage deposit over the years, mostly in jars of his matchless pickled onions.

Apparently my shiny new glow plugs aren’t working. Well that is to say I think they are OK, but the wiring to them is not. I’m not entirely surprised as although I replaced them recently ( they were on special offer at Calcutt) I suspected there might be other reasons for the old ones not functioning. I’m quite looking forward to playing with my multimeter over that one. It sounds tricky but inexpensive.

Beware the future

2011-08-28T17:16:00.001Z

This is about canals, but not yet.

First what is this place?

A car park? A van showroom? No a Campsite. At least it purports to be. It is the Folkestone site of the Camping and Caravanning Club.

For over 20 years we have been members of this august institution, but I’m feeling less and less a part of it because it has become over run with people who don’t want to touch grass. This camp site is one of the very few that doesn’t permit caravans, but even then it is becoming overwhelmed with motor homes. In deference to them the club has put in all those hard standings you see in the picture. How do you hammer a tent peg into that lot?

How long before some bright spark suggests that they concrete over the whole lot to save people getting their feet wet walking to the operating theatre clean toilets? Maybe then they could think of putting a roof over it to keep out the rain. The monthly glossy club magazine devotes about four times a many pages to reviews of tow cars as it does to tents.

There is one advantage. After about 8 pm it’s lovely and quiet because the others are all inside watching telly or DVDs. So we can sit outside and watch the sunset in peace. No ball games or frisbees though – not allowed.

We like to consider ourselves to be superior beings because we have tents. Quite a few tents actually, a two person, a three person, a four person, - and another two person I had forgotten. Well they are cheap and we like them. This year we camped for the Cambridge Beer Festival in one of the two person tents, the sort you have to crawl into. Last summer a week in Shropshire in our very unfashionable 4 man tent made of good old cotton canvass.

I have to confess though that we also have something which is not really a tent but a sort of shed on wheels. This to us is as a luxurious as we ever want to get and we even feel guilty about having gone this far. Meet our trusty 15 year old Dandy folding camper modelled by Grace on her first ever camping trip last week.

Note that we are on the grass. The “Holiday Site Manager” (they used to be called Wardens), offered us a hard standing. I nearly spat, but he was quite a nice man.

“What has all this to do with canals?” you ask. Well it’s the creeping luxurification and sterilisation of what is essentially an outdoor pursuit. If you read the boating mags now you’d think boating was all about luxury kitchens and wet rooms, underfloor wine stores and electrical gadgets. Its hardly likely to attract people who appreciate wildlife and industrial archaeology and just messing about on the water. This will inexorably lead to people demanding more gentrification and sanitisation of the canalscape.. Already there are people complaining about trees along the towpath. It’s the thin end of the wedge.

PS should you see Herbie out and about around Braunston this week, shout “Hello Rick /Marilyn” for they will be in charge while we rest at home.

More on rain

2011-08-27T11:07:00.001Z

Re yesterday’s post, Rick points out that reservoirs might receive a lot of their supply from feeders over a wideish catchment area. I suspect he is right, although another thing puzzles me, and that is that most canal reservoirs are on high ground i.e near canal summits, so they are at a natural disadvantage in catching rain from feeders. The more I think about it, the more I realise I don’t know anything. Maybe I should read up on it.

Last night as I had finished posting we were in a big thunderstorm. Water was spilling over the gutters and the rain was really hammering on the roof. With all the thunder and lightning I thought I had better switch off the computer, but I had a quick look at the met office site before so doing. According to them we were in a sunny interval. Well they can’t be right all of the time.

Water water, but not everywhere

2011-08-26T17:23:00.003Z

It’s not often I want it to rain over the holiday period, but we could do with a lot right now. Herbie is in danger of being isolated in a few weeks time unless the reservoirs that feed the canals around the Leicester arm get some serious topping up. We had planned a trip down to Oxford in September but that too looks under threat as things stand.

We are getting messages from BW talking about what their hydrologist is telling them. I used to have a friend who was a hydrologist, and his job sounded great. Each week he would beetle off to Thetford Forest, where he would live in a hut for a few days and take regular trips round the forest in a Land Rover collecting little bottles of water from the trees and the forest floor. They were trying to establish how much of the rain that fell over the area actually made it to the ground and then into watercourses. I suppose a lot of it got absorbed by the leaves, a lot of it just evaporated, then much of the rest of it got drank by the tree roots. I don’t think a lot of it got into streams and rivers.

Last week I got to thinking about how much rain we might need to rescue my canal trip plans, and did a few simple sums. I suspect these are grossly over simplified but it gives some idea.

Take a theoretical ten mile length of canal with a dozen single boat width locks and assume that it is fed by a reservoir a quarter of a mile square. How many boats would be able to pass through on the proceeds of one inch of rain? Have a guess now then let’s do the sums.

We’ll forget about extra feeder streams, water lost by evaporation and all that, so this won’t be spot on but it might give us a rough idea.

As a boat passes through the area it will take with it the volume of water used by the deepest lock in the passage. Lets say 8 ft deep . So that’s about 70ft x 7ft x 8ft = 3920 cu ft.

The reservoir at 1320 feet x 1320 feet (quarter of a mile each way) has a surface area of 1742400 sq ft (phew!). Multiply by 1/12 to give us the volume added by an inch of rain falling on its surface. That gives us 145200 cu ft. Divide that by the lock capacity of 3920 and we get 37. That’s 37 boats that can now pass through. Not many on a canal like the Oxford. Barely a day’s worth.

Of course rain falls on the canal too. 10 miles x say 30ft wide gives us 10x 5280x30 = 158400 sq ft of surface. x 1/12 for an inch of rain gives us 132000 cu ft added. Divide by 3920 = 33.6 lockfulls, so another 33 boats.

So altogether an inch of rain would allow the passage of 70 boats.

Put another way, if we only get an inch of rain in a fortnight over the area, that would only provide for 5 boats a day! And that assumes every lock is set ready for the boat, or a one up one down policy strictly enforced.
Don’t quote me on any of this because this is very rough and ready and takes no account of possible feeder streams into the reservoir or canal, evaporation, back pumping and all that. But it does show that the odd shower of rain won’t do much to help.

Am I anywhere near right?

PS after my disaster last week I am writing this in Windows Live Writer before posting. It does have an undo button. Thanks Skippy for the tip. Now let’s see if it will post to the blog.

An unpost

2011-08-23T11:31:00.000Z

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr!! I spent over half an hour composing a post for you about water supply for the canal, and doing some sums to work out how many/ few extra boat passages could be permitted in a given area if we had an inch of rain. Very interesting it was, then I pressed some unknown button and lost the lot. Blogger seems to have no undo button.

I will do it for you again but I'm just off out of the door for a few days taking Grace on her first ever camping holiday, (wish us luck) and we're already late, so it'll have to wait until we get back.

Now where did I put the buckets and spades.

DiY come-uppance

2011-08-20T11:29:00.000Z

Not long ago I did a post boasting about how easy it was to repack the stern gland and said that I would probably find that some supposedly simple job next time would turn out to be really difficult. Well I didn't have to wait long folks.

I decided to install new heater (glow) plugs in the engine as it was beginning to take a long time on the button before the engine would start. These look pretty much like a spark plug in your car. I bought a new set on special offer from Calcutt and set aside half an hour to put them in. I mean how hard could it be? Just take off the wires, unscrew the old plugs with a spanner, screw in the new ones, replace the wires and job's a goodun.

Four hours it took me! Four hours, and I nearly gave up a couple of times. Admittedly the old plugs were in tight and took a bit of force, but that wasn't the problem. It was the sheer inaccessibility of the flippin things.

I suppose when they build the engines it's easy. They just screw in the plugs and then later add all the injector pipes, then bolt on the alternator and connect up the throttle cable etc. All on their nice work bench no doubt. The trouble is that all that extra stuff blocks off any access to the heater plugs.

The last plug was the worst -right up the alternator end of the block. There it is, that shiny thing just underneath the curving bit of injector pipe. This one took over an hour. There is nowhere to get a spanner on the nut and turn it by more than five degrees. It took me ten attempts to get this photo, because only at a very narrow angle can you see the plug.. And of course this is down in the engine bay where only a midget can operate in comfort. Using a socket set and an extension (thanks Rick) I was able to just turn the socket by inserting the extension bar at an angle into the square hole at the end of the socket. So the extension bar wasn't really engaged and kept slipping out but could just turn the plug a millimeter at a time.

Worse still was the little nut that holds the wire onto the tip of the plug. There was nowhere to get two fingers at the plug to start the nut. The handles of my long nose pliers were to bulky to get past all the bits of pipe.

I went off to try and cadge a bit of blu-tak from a boater nearby to see if I could stick the nut to the end of a pencil and somehow work the nut on. He didn't have any, but his pliers were more slender than mine and in the end allowed me by some miracle to screw on the nut.

There was another way of course. I could have removed the alternator and the injector pipes, but who knows what a mess I would have got into.

Next day it rained so I thought I'd do a nice easy indoor job. Replace the radio aerial. The old one had got rusted up at its base and not earthing properly to the inside of the boat roof. Radio reception had got very poor.

There is a little cover plate in the saloon ceiling to give access to the underneath of the aerial. Just whip that off, unscrew the old aerial, screw on the new one, reconnect the cable and Bob's your uncle. How long did it take? Four hours again. The problem this time was getting at the cable to reconnect the new aerial. I had to remove the lighting board behind which are all the cables, and to do that I had to remove a lot of other hardwood trim. These all fit together like a jigsaw and I had to remove several seemingly unrelated pieces in order to get he lighting board down. I had a huge pile of brass screws in a little pot by the time I had it all to bits. Herbie hides its cables very neatly, but behind the trim is a jungle.

Anyway it's done now and the radio is a lot better.

I am pleased to say that other jobs went a lot more sweetly. I replaced the fuel filter which had been leaking (split rubber seals), and even managed to bleed the fuel system without too much drama. Then I wired up my starter battery to the Smartgauge so I could get a more accurate reading on its voltage. It turns out that the analogue voltmeter on the instrument panel is worse than useless and miles out in its readings. Don't trust 'em folks.

Then just for fun at the end I put another bit of packing in the stern gland. Just to get my confidence back. It was easy.

Now I have only another twelve jobs on my to do list. Deep joy.

Huge explosions near the canal

2011-08-16T12:35:00.000Z

If you like fireworks, see if you can get along to Stanford Hall near Lutterworth next August. They put on a firework competition each year and it's only a fifteen minute drive from our moorings at Crick so this year we went along. You would have been able to hear the displays from much of the canal between Crick and Welford and possibly see it too from some places.

Four professional fireworks companies each put on a display, set to music of their choice. The first three displays are in competition and the fourth is just for the organising company to show off. The audience of umpteen thousand people votes by text at the end of the displays.

Interestingly the winner collected 70% of the votes, but amongst our group of 5, we had votes for all three, so it shows they were all very good. I suspect the winners got the votes for their timing to the music, which was amazingly good.

I took lots of pictures but my timing wasn't so hot. These pictures are about the best of the bunch.

Having returned from our camping holiday, I'm planning to go out to Herbie tomorrow for a few days DiY. I've got a long list of small jobs.

Too shallow for boating next week

2011-08-05T17:51:00.001Z

While all you boaters are scraping the bottom next week, we'll be in even shallower waters. Here.

Mmm you say, that does look fairly shallow. Where is it? The tent is a bit of a giveaway, yes we're camping. To get a better ideal follow Kath over this style just to the right of the ford - mind the sheep

on up this steep path (this is also the way to the shops believe it or not!)

and after quite a walk you can look back down at the campsite we'll be staying at

Yes, but where is it? Well if we look to our right from where the above picture is taken we see this

Pretty but still not very helpful. Lets look from the same spot, but back over our shoulder

Still don't know?

It's Shropshire, the Stretton Hills. Is it any wonder we keep going back every year. And I have only shown you a tiny part of it.

We'll be stopping off at Herbie on the way to watch a huge firework display. Should I get any decent photos I'll show you when we get back.

Have a nice week.

The answer to water shortages

2011-08-03T20:34:00.000Z

"Allo Alf, flippin' 'ot ain't it. Pint? I see waterways is puttin' restrictions on locking up the Leicester Arm then. Runnin' out of water apparently."

"Allo Bert. Yeah make mine a pint of best. They 'aven't got a bloody clue 'ave they. It's the same down the Oxford. I just writ to 'im about it."

"Writ to who?"

"'im at waterways of course. Not a bloody clue they aven't got, when the answers starin' 'em in the face"

"Wass that then?"

Well, it's easy 'ennit. There's a couple of fings what they could be doin'. First they could get some bloody dredgers out there and dig the canals a bit deeper. Dig the bottom away from the top like, so they'll be deeper. Then, and this is my big idea I writ to 'im about, - they could make some new rules about all them people out on 'oliday cruises."

New rules?"

"Yeah, it's dead simple. What you gotta do is this. You knows 'ow a boat takes a lock full of water with it when it goes through?"

"Er, yeah"

"Big waste of water that. Well if you makes a rule that all these 'oliday boats has to do a ring instead of an out and back, they'll bring the water all round wiv 'em won't they. So you won't lose any 'cos it'll all get back where it started. Simple."

"You can't argue wiv that. Brilliant. I'll 'ave another and a packet of crisps, ta"

Choosing a front end design.

2011-07-31T15:25:00.001Z

Three super boats to look at, but what do they all have in common?

The design on the sides of the bow of course. I reckon that more than half of the narrowboats out there have this design.

I'm itching to have a go at painting a design on the front the front of Herbie, but it would be nice to think up something a bit different.

Another "traditional" design is the FMC logo seen on the front of President here.

I like it, but although I'm not a strict traditionalist I would feel a bit of a cheat putting it on a modern boat like Herbie.

Then there's the diamond idea, shown here in a neat combination with the "standard" on Humbug, our old neighbour at Iver.

The commonest other type is the name panel shown here with an interesting variation on Halfie's Shadow

(Also note the winner of the Braunston 2011 nobbly knees competition.)

and now for a couple of things in a different vein. I especially like this first one

There's nothing wrong with any of the above, and all would be better than Herbie's present plain white panel, but I still can't find one to win me over. Can anyone point me to other examples?

The most useless tool on a boat

2011-07-30T10:06:00.000Z

There is a commonly used DiY tool that is worse than useless on a boat. If you have one, throw it away now. What is it?

Some clues:

It is a common hand tool - no electricity involved

The problem it causes is not a safety issue

Worse than useless. If you did use it you would cause big problems - do NOT use one on a boat

It is very commonly used by chippies, kitchen fitters, plumbers, etc since time immemorial

Someone fitting out a boat on dry land might find it OK to use, but I doubt it. Once the boat is in the water it would lead to serious errors in fitting out.

A last cryptic clue - Would a confused viper sell it?

Essential tools for boat DiY

2011-07-29T09:03:00.000Z

"No posts, what's he been up to?" I hear you all ask. Well, just because I'm not posting doesn't mean I'm not doing stuff. Quite the reverse in fact. One of my periodic assaults on the garden at home (machetes, flame throwers, pick axes - that sort of thing), research into my Grandad's activities in WW1 at the National Archives, and stuff like that.

I've also been doing tiny bits of DIY, fixing things that don't work or are broken, and that brings me to today's subject. Tools.

The problem with owning a boat and a house is that whatever tool you need it's always in the other place. Some things are cheap enough to have one at home and one on the boat (e.g screwdrivers), but others like power tools have to be shared. Larger items like my trusty old workmate (no not Rick, I mean the Black and Decker thingy) have to live at home and be temporarily moved out to the boat when I need it there. (Although that could still apply to Rick I suppose). And then there's all that stuff on the shelves in the shed. Boxes of screws, tins of paint, etc. they can't all live on the boat all the time.

For anyone contemplating spending a lot of time on a boat, here is my list of essential, useful, and useless tools, starting with the most used and most essential.

1. This first item has had a great deal of use, although it is shortly to be obsolete because of a move from analogue to digital. It's a plastic tube with a brass point at one end with a tiny ball at the tip. Can you guess?OK, it's a pen for signing cheques. From now on a debit card. This can solve most mechanical problems, and is even necessary in DiY work to pay for all the parts, materials and other tools you need.

2. A lot of screwdrivers. In my experience you need at least two of every sort because they can disappear in seconds. You put it down to find a screw and then five seconds later, it's vanished.

3. A lot of spanners. They don't disappear quite so often, but every time you want to undo a nut, you need a different type. I can never understand why half the nuts on Herbie's engine need AF spanners and the other half need metric.

4. Things to mop up unpleasant fluids. Despite my best efforts, the engine bay floor seems to periodically need ghastly stuff mopping up. Rainwater mixed with canal water from the stern gland mixed with grease from the stern gland, or oil and (lately) diesel dripping into the engine tray. ( Reminder , I must reseat the fuel filter which is leaking diesel.). These fluids are slimy and smelly and spread too thinly across the floor to be pumped out. Solutions are a) cheap disposable nappies, b) cat litter (messy and bitty), c) a mop or sponge-ruined forever in ten seconds, d) rags. Whichever you use have a plastic bag ready to drop the disgusting thing into. Also remember to wear really old clothes.

5. A voltmeter. This is really a social tool to give you a source of conversation with other boaters. Unlike at home where everything is 230 volts or something like that, voltages on boats go up and down like yo yo's according to the state of charge of the battery, how many appliances are in use, how long or how thick cables are. Sticking a voltmeter across stuff will give you some numbers. Of course you may not know what they mean, but it'll be an endless opportunity for discourse with boating pals. It might even help you to refrain from ruining your expensive batteries. Remember though that analogue voltmeters that you may have on your instrument panel are vague indicators of the presence of some volts. Forget any numbers on the dial, they are only there for show. You might as well think of a number at random.

These are the essential tools which you will definately need. After that collect what you like, but understand that whenever you come to do a job, even if you have a hundred tools, the one you need won't be there. The same goes for screws, no matter how many different sorts you collect, you never have the right one. Then it's off to Wickes or B&Q with Number 1 above.

Now for the most useless tool on a boat. Can you guess what it is? Answer tomorrow.

Waterways face banking crisis

2011-07-22T09:11:00.001Z

No, not banks, I mean banks.

People get concerned about the backlog of maintenance that the new waterways charity will face, and they tend to think of dredging, locks, bridges and towpaths. However on our recent trip I really began to notice another growing problem. Bank side encroachment.

It's hard for me to complain about this because I love reeds and rushes and meadow sweet and bushes and all that, but I also need some water to cruise on. In places the canal looks like it could soon be choked with plant life. I also like the paintwork on my boat, but if the trees grow any further out they'll scratch it off. I could understand this on remote arms of the system, but when it comes to, say, the Leicester line of the Grand Union Canal, which I would expect to be a main thoroughfare, it is a bit worrying. We saw miles and miles of stuff like this

at least half the canal's width is taken up by vegetation and there are very long stretches where a boat couldn't get near the bank. Look at this next photo - the towpath is somewhere on the left

This bit below looks lovely now, but in five or ten years it could easily be half the width. What then?

I suspect that there maybe hundreds of miles of canal that need attention in this way.

This is going to be a tough problem to crack in the coming years. There will be the understandable concerns of the wildlife lobby on one hand, ( the middle picture above is in the middle of a SSSI) and the need for boats to have bank access and a through route on the other hand. As to the cost of doing something about it, it would be enormous.

I suppose the first step would be to work out a new policy for the compromise between nature and navigation. From what I remember of our trip down the river Wey navigation, it's owners the National Trust seemed to have struck quite a good balance between vegetation and navigability. At the time I complained that it all looked a bit "managed", but I'm beginning to think they might be the ones to show how it should be done.

Cruise report part 2 - the Urban Experience

2011-07-19T14:45:00.001Z

Where's this? Coventry. Well, sort of. It's a detail from a sculpture in the still stunning Coventry Cathedral, all 1960's contemporary art but still looking great.

Only a two hour detour from Hawkesbury junction where the North Oxford canal ends and meets the Coventry canal,

it seemed churlish to miss it out, although many people do apparently. We heard the usual tales of supermarket trolleys in the canal and gangs of marauding youths, and went anyway. No youths emerged, and the canal was a lot less junk filled than, say, Brentford. Quite pleasant in fact, and plenty of interest.

All along the arm you follow a sculpture trail. One of the first things you see is this

which seems very odd until you realise it's a map of the canal and its bridges. The fork shaped bit at the end shows the shape of the canal basin (not to scale).

There is a sense of humour to some of the sculpture, as in this concrete sofa. Pity about the graffiti though.

I showed a peek of the basin yesterday. Here is another view showing dear old James Brindley studying his plans or maps.

The Coventry canal is one of his, which to aficionados explains why the canal wiggles around all over the place as he was prone to follow the contours of the land to avoid too many locks, cuttings and embankments. Compare with Telford's canals which have monumental earthworks and often go straight as a die. Brindley didn't really need a map it seems because there's a handy signpost next to him.

I'm told there is a really good transport museum in Coventry, so one day we'll return to take a look. Otherwise the city centre is not terribly appealing apart from the cathedral.

One interesting thing you pass on the way in is this building, known as Cash's top shops

Like me you may well have gone to school with a woven label bearing your name sewn into your uniform and games kit. If so, it was more than likely made here. The brothers Cash built this place in 1857. It features a row of weavers cottages on the ground floor, and workshops above powered by a beam engine. I don't know about the engine, but they were still weaving there until the early 1990s. The company is still in business today, although they have relocated to a new computerised factory elsewhere in Coventry.

Two weeks later we visited Leicester which again seems to have an undeserved reputation for rubbish and youths. We liked it. To my mind the city centre is more appealing than Coventry's, having lots of pedestrianised lanes to wander round, and a good covered market. It also has a very modest but atmospheric cathedral.

By chance we arrived on the day of the Mela a big South Asian and Indian cultural festival held annually in the city centre. The streets were packed and noisy but good humoured and there was music everywhere which, although clearly Asian, was very 21st century.

Strangely, it all finished at 6pm, after which we wandered off to find some "different" Asian food i.e. stuff you don't get in your local Indian restaurant. Up Belgrave road there are loads of such restaurants, many vegetarian, with not a rogan josh, a jalfrezi, or a korma in sight. We had to ask what things were on the menu where we ate. It helps if you like chick peas.

So that was our urban experience on the Leicester ring. I wouldn't want to do all my boating in cities, but I think all the people who avoid them are missing out.

Cruise report part 1 pics and stats

2011-07-18T17:32:00.000Z

A reminder of where we went, using my freehand, not to scale map.

The red blobs show where we stopped overnight, or in some cases more than one night. Here are some of the places we stopped.

Night 1 just before Norton Junction

Nights 2 to 6 at Braunston

Night 9 at Coventry

Night 11 I think, somewhere on the Coventry canal

Night (oh I'm losing count now) 17 perhaps. At Shardlow

Night 20 ish at Leicester

A few nights later (now I've really lost count) at Foxton

Anyway, you get the picture. This Leicester ring is mostly rural, but there are interesting towns and (mostly) villages to stop at. You can see from the map that some days we went a long way, and others we just moved on to the next interesting place. Sometimes a six hour day, sometimes only two or three.

Of course we spent some time in tunnels, adding up to over three miles all told. Some were dry and some were wet. I love this photo taken after we exited Husbands Bosworth tunnel. The drips on the gunwale make it look like we've gone all posh and had Herbie covered in faux rivets. I suppose I could work out the frequency of the drips assuming I knew the boat speed.

Boring stats follow for anoraks

I reckon we averaged about 2 miles an hour, so you could have walked it a lot quicker. Of course there is the small matter of 103 locks done on the way. According to my new diesel dipstick which I made and calibrated before we started off, we used 110 litres of diesel which works out to something around 1.3 litres an hour. I think this is typical for a BMC engine like ours.

Glandular Fever

2011-07-15T15:06:00.001Z

I'll ignore Simon's facetious comment to yesterday's post and instead congratulate Carrie and Halfie upon their accurate guess that I had attempted to repack Herbie's stern gland.

This is the point where the propellor shaft exits through the hull, and where water can get in and sink the boat. Packing the gaps with stuff called, er, packing is what you have to do. Here's where it all happens.

I had visions of me in a scene from a world war 2 submarine movie, gallantly battling to close a hatch against huge pressures of water gushing in. I bought the packing two years ago, but until now never had the nerve to try, but the daily ingress of water past the old worn packing was getting messy.

After forcing as much grease as poss into the gland and wiping the area clean, I laid out my spanners and some rags. Rick was there to give moral support, although because the space is so cramped no-one else could do anything practical once I had started. To put off the job for a final few minutes I tested the bilge pump to make sure it was working. It was.

Nothing for it, I had to go ahead. Here goes. Gingerly I removed the two nuts from each side and slid the collar back along the shaft and waited for the gush. There was none. None! Not a drop. Probably still sealed by the old packing I thought. When I dig that out I'll be drowned. Using a gimlet I dug out first one and then two more old squashed bits of packing. Still not a drop. Not a single drop! Just the grease was enough to keep the flood at bay. What an anti climax. Two years angst and procrastination and not a drop of water came in. You have to laugh.

Inserting the new packing was much easier than I had thought too. The whole job was done in five minutes.

After a brief run next day I had to retighten the gland as the new packing settled in, and Bob's your uncle. Job's a goodun.

Sod's law being what it is, next time I do something really simple like changing a light bulb it'll take two hours and blow all the fuses. Boats are like that.

Schadenfreude and unschadenfreude

2011-07-14T21:49:00.000Z

Schadenfreude - "the malicious enjoyment of another's misfortunes" was what Rick and I experienced yesterday while talking to the lock keeper at Foxton. I am reminded of this by Adam's comment on yesterday's post. He says a boat got sideways on to the locks in the short pound betwen the two Foxton staircases. How a boat can get sideways on in such a short space is hard to imagine.

Anyway Rick and I were talking to the lock keeper about where all the water went to from the little overspill gullies in this pound - I suppose about 70ft square. "It might look calm on the surface" said the lockie, "but it's a maelstrom underneath. Look at this boat coming now, all in control. When it gets here (coming downhill into the top of the second staircase) it'll whack into the stone shoulder of the lock entrance."

We couldn't se why it should. It was a very good boat - a Hudson I think- with a competent looking crew heading straight toward the open lock. Then quick as a flash it veered off course and whacked hard straight into the stone shoulder, then rebounded with a bang onto the other lock wall. Crash bang wallop! The crew's embarrassment wasn't helped by our laughing, but we weren't laughing at them, only at the fact that the lockie's prediction had been so accurate.

Why are people always there when you mess it up?

Today when we arrived back at home in Crick, I steered into the marina entrance on a perfect line, swung over to the first pontoon on the left where Kath leapt off. She then ran round to our pontoon ready to catch a rope. I did a perfect turn and reverse and backed into our narrow space without even needing Kath's help.

I imagine I will never execute such a perfect manoeuvre again in my boating career.

Who was watching this? Nobody!!

In yesterday's post I mentioned I had had a go at the scariest boat maintenance job. Details tomorrow, but before then can anyone guess what it was?

The icing on the cake

2011-07-13T21:38:00.001Z

What a treat! The penultimate day of our cruise and one of the very best, because today we ascended Foxton locks. Boaters will know all about these, but for those who don't, here they are

10 locks in two staircases of five, all neatly maintained and in a lovely setting. After waiting our turn for about an hour and a half, we shot up the ten locks in forty minutes. Rick came along to join in the fun and we had unexpected extra help in the form of a little Australian boy gongoozling with his mum and sister. We encouraged him to help us with the gates and you'd think all his birthdays had come at once. He was tearing from lock to lock, pushing and pulling and grinning from ear to ear.

Driving the boat into through the staircase is easy. Once you are in, you just move forward into the next chamber everytime the gate opens, no real need to steer, as the boat is held snug in the chambers.

The gates in front do look alarmingly high though.

I can't think of another flight of locks that are nearly such fun to do, and they are all light and easy to operate. The staircase system of using side ponds to empty and fill locks takes a bit of getting your head round, but here they make it easy with the coloured paddle ratchet posts. "Red before white and you'll be alright".

After all that excitement we tootled on to Welford where we are spending the night in the cosy little canal basin. Here I did a maintenance job that I have been putting off for well over a year because I have been quite scared of attempting it. But I'll tell you all about that another day in case you get over excited right now.

2011-07-11T17:55:00.000Z

Fortune favours the brave. Now I can assure you that bravery is not one of my best features, but we did have to ignore a few warnings over the last few days. First all those people who say watch out for dangerous conditions on the Soar and all the all the flood warning signs

then the comments from people who think that Leicester is a dangerous or nasty place. In fact it turned out to be somewhat overstated. I'm told that the big hire boat company, Son of Canaltime or whatever they are called these days, in Sawley charges and extra £500 deposit for any hirers going down the Soar, and that they forbid any mooring in Leicester.

Well ya booh to them. We found the Soar a delight all the way

and as for Leicester, we rather liked it, both on the way in, and the way out.

The plastic bag and shopping trolley count here is way way below other places I could mention.

Since I last posted on the blog we have moored at Barrow upon Soar, Birstall ( a pleasant suburb of Leicester), and right in the centre of Leicester at Castle Gardens where they have a good mooring pontoon with a locked entrance into a park, which is also locked at night. All very secure and actually quite attractive. No one peicestered us at all (sorry). Here we are just arriving. The city centre is 5 minutes stroll away.

So don't listen to the doom and gloom mongers. Come on in, the water's lovely.

Now we're back out in the sticks at Kilby and if I write any more I'll be late for the pub, so see you soon.

Further adventures . . .

2011-07-07T16:10:00.000Z

. . . in which we are once again undone by our musical tastes, we see a favourite granny, Kath goes in for the wet T-shirt competition, Herbie breaks her lock speed record, and lots of good stuff to see.

Where was I? Oh yes Alrewas. Well that was a while ago and our dongle signal has been poor, so now I have a backlog of stuff to tell. I'll just stick to the good bits.

We pressed on to Willington which was 'er, alright. In the pub quiz at the Dragon, we were doing quite well until it came to the music round, then the generation gap got us. Somewhere near there we passed the famous Granny Buttons at its moorings. Andrew Denny was nowhere to be seen, probably out hacking boater's phones to find tit bits to write in Waterways World. (Sorry Andrew, I'm sure you wouldn't. Well fairly sure anyway.)

Then on through Burton on Trent. Yes, through the most well known brewery town in the UK without stopping! Well, it didn't look all that appealing.

Then Shardlow. Ooooh Shardlow, you little cracker! What a great place if you like old wharves and warehouses. This is the start of the Trent and Mersey Canal, and bears it well. It oozes canal history.

Just a few pics to give you a flavour . .

Our entrance to Shardlow was one we'll remember. Kath did her impression of an entrant to the wet T-shirt photo competition as she got caught in a sudden downpour whilst off looking for places to moor. I might have photographed her for you but I am unable to as I have a strange aversion to having my nose punched!

Then today, out onto the mighty Trent through Sawley from where what seems like a thousand hire boats emerge onto the canal on a daily basis.

and finally the right turn into the River Soar, our water for the next few days. This river features the worlds fastest locks. We did two of them each in ten seconds! Well' it's not hard when the gates are open at both ends and you shoot straight through.

In times of flood, they operate like a normal lock.

So far, I like the Soar a lot

Except that some of the locks are scarily deep like this one at Kegworth. Not surprisingly it bears the name Kegworth Deep Lock. How do they think them up?

For tonight we are moored up literally six inches from a pub called the Otter. If I took a photo out of the boat window, you would just see a plank six inches away. So I won't. If we were any closer we would be evicted at closing time.

I'm soarly tempted to use up some of the many easy puns about the Soar, but I'll give it a miss.