The scariest moment, my favourite canal quote, and Herbie’s blacking

Well going through Braunston tunnel without lights was not my idea of fun, but I wasn’t that scared, although if you ask Rick, he was very scared of doing (more) damage to Herbie as he was at the tiller.  No, my scariest moment was the other Braunston tunnel trip.  I was already scared that we would have a breakdown, but in the tunnel, with a current flowing, it doesn’t bear thinking about.  I had visions of a fire in the engine compartment and us being trapped.  So that gets the 2012 prize for scariest moment.

While I was composing yesterday’s blog I was listening to BBC radio iplayer and catching up with Mark Steel’s in Town.  If you haven’t heard it, try to ‘cos it’s great.  This time Mark was in Handsworth Birmingham and of course Brum’s canals had to have a mention. 

“ People always tell you that there are more miles of canals in Birmingham than in Venice. Which I have to say I think misses the point slightly, as with canals it’s quality rather than quantity.

You might as well boast that there’s more paint in a warehouse in Luton than on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.”  .

Tee Hee.  A fair point.  It might be lovely around Gas Street but some other bits are less salubrious.



We do love Brum though.  We can’t wait to go back. 

While have been busy entertaining you with Awards this week (a few more to come)  Noel at Crick marina has been busy blacking Herbie’s hull.  He started early last weekend to beat the cold weather, but then it froze hard so I think the final coats might only just be finishing.  At Crick you get a pressure wash, then a coat of rust treatment, then three, yes three, coats of blacking.  Good eh?  And I didn’t even have to go to deliver the boat. They just picked it up from our pontoon and took her over to the dry dock themselves.  Noel did promise me he wouldn’t take the boat back across the marina while there was ice on the water.  It would be upsetting to put it mildly to have the brand new blacking scratched off.

Noel rang on Monday after the washing and first coats, to report on the hull and stern gear.  Just to say it was all sound.  What really pleased me though was that he commented (unprompted) on how smooth Herbie’s engine was.  Imagine my delight after all that work we had done on her this year to find that someone impartial agrees that it was all worth it.

The winner of this year’s Herbie Special Award is blissfully unaware of his or her impending good fortune.  Stay tuned in the coming days to find out who it is.

Posh nosh winners and nominations for Best Canal Event.

An anonymous contributor called Rick rang me up to complain we’d gone all gastro with our best meal nominees and we’re losing our street cred as boaters.  He’s probably right, I’ve been watching too much Masterchef.  Nevertheless our nominees are who they are, and their food was every bit as good as a meat pie and chips.   Mmmm meat pie and chips. I’m salivating.

We can only have one winner, so the 2012 best canalside meal goes to  . .

The Boot at Lapworth

Never mind the Porsches and the Audis ( and according to Crusty the helicopters!!!), the staff are friendly, the beer is good and the meal we had was brill – well pork actually. And we got second helpings of bread and roast new spuds.  I’ll go there again.

Vipen at Quisine does deserve a very special mention though, but he’s not a pub and not canal side, although a few boat bloggers seem to have found their way there.

Only a few awards now remain to be dished out.  The next is for Best Canal Event.

This year we got to three. In chronological order

1. The Cavalcade at Little Venice.

As nutty as ever, – I’ve just noticed the ravens on this boat

and as colourful as ever

and a chance for a drink with Simon and Carrie in their usual ringside seat on Tortoise in Brownings Pool.

2. Braunston Historic Boat Rally

Another good gathering of the clans, with rather more boating and entertainment than Little Venice.  The bloggers we met are just too numerous to mention, but it’s all very sociable,and once again we got the chance to do the slow motion Braunston Grand Prix aboard Chertsey.  Thanks Sarah and Jim.  I suppose I shouldn’t really show this pic of Sarah getting it wrong swinging into the marina, but she did do a lovely three point turn up at the junction.

You can once again play spot the duck in this photo.

Braunston really is a fun event and there are masses of lovely boats to see and they have Day Star Theatre on the Thursday night who are always good.  I wonder if Herbie will ever be historic?  According to canal world forums her BMC engine is in the Vintage category so we must be half way there!

3. Banbury Canal Day

We only attended this because I had to catch a train to Pershore that day and we needed to be moored in Banbury!  We didn’t know what to expect, but it was quite a surprise.  Not as many boats attended as for the other two above, but it was still full up.  The onshore events though easily eclipsed the other two because of the huge food and craft market, the live music and  nutters like this strolling about:-

What’s more, the locals turned out in their thousands and were reminded they had a nice canal and friendly boaters.  That does no harm.

I think though that the thing we enjoyed most was being moored in the centre and having other blogging friends round for tea.  I’d certainly like to go back next year.

Three rather different events – a bit like comparing apples and pears, but someone deserves to win. Find out who tomorrow. 

Best Pub Award and a picture quiz.

So many pubs and so little time.  Still we’re doing our best.  The winner this year of the Herbie Award for Best Pub gets the prize because we always look forward to going there, not just for the beer and the grub, but because it’s sociable and comfortable and the landlord is a fine fellow. In fact we often make it a destination in its own right and have been known to detour off our main route to go there.  It’s  . . .

The Folly at Napton

Er, the Folly isn’t actually on this picture but if I had pointed the camera a bit to the right, it would have been.

Hooray! When we first started singing its praises some folks who had been there in the old days looked askance, but I notice that quite a few have rediscovered it now so I’m guessing it’ll be a fairly popular winner.

Now before you tire of all these awards, we’ll have a little diversion over the weekend.  It’s the Herbie Christmas Picture Quiz. Part one today with 3 questions.

1.  Geese and ducks

It’s easy to spot the geese in this photo.  White geese of this type are often known as Embdens.  But can you spot and name the duck in this next picture?:-

2. What next?

I’m all for a bit of child labour.  Here is Grace earning her keep.

What does she have to do next so as to be “alright”?

3. Where is this?

Keep the answers to yourselves if you know them.  I’ll accept bids in comments as to how many you think you know, and you can mark your own papers when I give answers tomorrow.