alafloat : Who Said Canals Were Boring???

Sorry its been just a week but we have been a little bust and have had trouble with the electric so we have been conserving it and unfortunately you lot are a long way down on the priority list I am afraid if the choice is a light on and reading in bed or the blog then you dip out.

I hope now I have solved the problem with the power we were loosing a lot of power overnight from the batteries, we awoke in the morning with no 240v but as very little works on 240v except for the fridge and freezer and they were fine for the few hours it was off anyway we are managing and trying some ideas out if we still cannot fix it then it looks like new batteries (another hole in the budget)

So from Coventry to Hawksbury was quite uneventful, as we arrived to make the awkward turn off the Coventry canal onto the Oxford canal it became very busy it must have been pub throwing out time after we had sorted everyone out into an ordely queue we eventually got through the little stop lock and decided that was enough for one day. The trip from there to Rugby again went well arriving at bridge 58 in time for a few beers in the Aquaduct This is a great mooring for all your shopping as its a short walk to Tesco and a precinct that has Halfords were I managed to get everything I wanted to set up my car radio. A hire boat moored opposite that had a crew of 5 American ladies seemed to having trouble understanding a canal map They seeing two obviously intelligent ask were the next locks were John explained that they were just around the corner about three miles, as they had never done a lock before they were wondering the best time of to do them, we said if you wait until morning they could go along with us and we (meaning Kath and Noreen) would show them the ropes. That was agreed However 30 mins later I noticed that they had left and were now stranded on our side of the canal in a very precarious position. Personally they exits from the canal and we had to find the Grand union and avoid taking I would have let them sort themselves out but they did wave and ASK our help John and I arrived at the boat to find one lady up to here neck in the weed hatch trying to extract some kind of netting that had attached itself to the prop thereby crippling the boat and with one other lady trying to hold the boat in from drifting across and blocking the canal, There explanation was they decided to go early as they were very slow and they would be at the lock ready for us arriving in the morning?????? Within 10 mins the whole thing was sorted then to get them off from were they were grounded, John took the tiller I took the pole we got them back in deeper water However the canal at this point had nowhere to get off so we were marooned on a boat with five American ladies, neither of us were happy about this so we manoeuvred the boat as near to a likey space and we took a leap of faith into the bushes we both arrived on dry land with a much relieved sigh. The Ladies went merrily on there way, after all that when we arrived at the lock the following morning a couple of CRT volunteers had arrived and they said they would put them through the lock; we gladly gave up all responsibility for them and went happily on our way.

At Braunston we left the Oxford canal and joined the Grand Union here now becomes a nightmare Braunston Tunnel It is noted that this tunnel is a two way with ample room for two craft to pass in the tunnel however this rule was made by old working boats that had not had a £4000 paint job (This applies to everything around the Braunston area everything is for working boats if you are a pleasure craft you are not worth putting into a calculation) anyhow I met two boats coming the other way one has put a deep scratch to my stern but I was ready for the second boat I hit him before He hit me (a tactic I learnt many years ago) I agree that you can get two boats through but NOT without touching. After that it was just a short hop to Gayton Junc where we turned off onto the Northampton Branch. I had read up on this stretch and listened to many stories but Nothing prepared me for he following, we charted that from Gayton Marina to lock 17 Northampton it is 5 miles and 17 locks total 6 hrs we departed 08.00 hrs and moored up in Northampton at 17.30 hrs 9½hours?????????????

The Northampton arm is quite nice with locks that are easy to open, we did notice that the further on we went the shallower it became but always the optimist we battled on literally. Have now scraped along the bottom for 6 locks it all came to a head at WOOTTON lock number 1 when first but could not get out of the lock I was well and truly grounded we tried everything, no mater how much water we sent down the distance between lock 14 and 15 was about a mile now that takes an awful lot of water. Whilst pondering our problem we obviously had the passer by giving all the usual advice ( most if not all was in part from the ridiculous to the sublime, I always accept politely and say thank you for those pearls of wisdom. All our efforts of moving the boat had left her in the centre of the canal with no one onboard you may consider that careless I just say, you had to be there, we still had the centre line and stern line so when eventually we did get some water in the canal we would be able to retrieve the boat We were then joined by another boat wanting to get past He proceeded to tell me his tail of woe that there was no water in the canal and he had only just made it this far. I explained my predicament and then it started as he was in charge of a bloody great dirty old working Boat (remember what I said before about them, this emphases my point he proceeded to tell me what to do with my boat so he could get past and into the lock being the kind chap I am I listened and heeded but as I explained I had tried all that for the last two hours things got to the stage of me having to point out that one more condescending word out of his mouth and his next sentence would be coming from his bum as that’s where his teeth would be. I think he got the message that just because he had a historic wooden working boat it did not entitle him to ant more of the canal than I have. As it looked like that we were not getting any help from the Canal owners it seemed to John and I that there was only one thing that could help and that was for me to get back on my boat and force her through what water we had So emptying my pockets of phone, keys and all other valuables I waded in to the canal as I said it wasn't very deep having now climbed up onto Buggerlugs it was my turn to do the pushing getting back on Buggerlugs also put me in punching distance of the now cowering, supercilious, bighead on the working boat and after Noreen giving his wife a good talking to she had disappeared below which made things a little quieter. I keyed Buggerlugs into life and asked her to behave slowly at first with the gravel bed grating on the hull she inched forward, I could fell her starting to go I had had worked it with John as soon as I started to move he would flood the lock behind me and would float out on that surge of water. It worked and soon I was along side the offending boat whose skipper was looking very perplexed as this adapted strategy was not in his book. Buggerlugs could now feel that she was now in charge as she pushed forward heaving the hulk of the working boat to the side of the canal, were it was very very shallow. As I passed the other skipper I remarked that the canal now was all his, though getting off from were he was now stranded I thought may take some time. All in all a very pleasant day ?????

We then of course had to get to Northampton on still a very shallow canal so it was very slow indeed

On arriving at the last lock before the River Nene we had been told of a brand new marina recently opened, So as we had Mat, Lorraine and Thomas for the weekend we would book in and get ourselves cleaned up

Other than gale force winds we have had a great weekend Mat Thomas and I got some fishing in we all caught a Crayfish of the American type which are Signal Crayfish as they had red underclaws apparently they are very tasty We Declined and put them back. Thomas loves Scones so him and Noreen sett too and made some all in all another good day. John and Kath are now moored alongside and first thing in the morning we are setting off for Peterborough

WHO SAID CANAL WERE BORING????

God Bless you all

Buggerlugs