NB Beefur

On your marks, get set, MOVE!

2012-02-15T11:13:00.000-08:00

Finally, the ice melted enough to move. So after a short wait for a Tesco delivery at The Mucky Duck we were finally moving again after almost 3 weeks. We've seen more boats moving today, than we have done in the last 2 months put together.

The first boat to cut a swathe through the ice was Sapphire, which had come from Streethay on his way to Bromley Whart for some work to be carried out there. Easy enough past our boat, as we'd kept a large patch ice free for the ducks.

He had to put on a bit more power to get through the next bit though, which was still solid.

Within half an hour of this boat breaking through, the BW checker man was round taking numbers. Talk about quick off the mark! Good job though, there are boats that have been here for months - (one boat at least, years). One bloke was complaining to us that he had been moved on (from outside the BW Fradley Yard, duh!) after he had been there for weeks BEFORE he was frozen in. His argument to the BW enforcement man was that he was a 'blue badge holder' and needed disabled access. Since when has the 'blue badge' scheme applied to boats? Best get yourself a marina mooring mate instead of freeloading.

The ducks discovered the seed spilt by a very fussy nut hatch, who insisted on spitting out all the seeds he didn't like, in order to get to the black seeds which were his seed of choice. We got a huge bag of wild bird seed from Aldi for £7.99. Good old Aldi. After a few days of our resident ducks having found the bird seed, they were joined by this odd looking duck - a muscovy duck. (Known as Barbaray Duck in culinary terms apparently - can't say I'm tempted).

What's this - something has caught our resident 5's attention....

A fox.

He's to the right of the tree

Missed. Fox sloping off, hungry.

We were getting fed up with the ice, so we ordered a load of logs from Stuart, who's another helpful contact from the pub community, which arrived a few days ago. That did the trick - the weather immediately turned milder. I know - we should have done it a week ago. We've now got a roof full of logs again, oak by the way, which burns incredibly hot, it's that hot in here, we've been sitting with the doors open, and atthracting very strange looks from passers by. Unfortunately, the wood's that hot that it's burned a hole in the bottom of the fire grate, so we ordered a new one, which was delivered to the pub today. (Yes, poor Dave had to walk back to the pub this afternoon to pick it up).

Whilst being frozen in, again - as in previous ice bound periods - we have met some lovely people (hello to Colin & Ellen from NB Oasis Too). Again, people's generosity is heart warming. From borrowing wheelbarrows & water containers, to offers of shopping, humping logs, coal to us, and even a load of 'morning' sticks ("I was making some for myself, and thought you might like some"). When the threat of the diesel van man not turning up, Plan B was devised in the pub, where by a posse would sus out the local fuel depot to see about getting containers filled. "We're all in it together". Crisis averted when Graham the diesel van can man arrived as promised.

Unfortunately, I cannot say the same of our immediate neighbours - they were the exception to the rule. Didn't want to speak, don't need your water container, I'd rather get water in my litre bottle. Don't want to use your big axe, I'd rather use my pen knife to cut this log. Ok Ok, Dave says I'm being too harsh on them and some people prefer to keep themselves to themselves. Oh and finally - don't want anything from the co-op a mile walk away - cos we've got a car and go there every day for our shopping!!! Thanks - talk about I'm all right Jack!!.

Full Moon and Full Boat

2012-02-08T10:46:00.000-08:00

Full moon shining through the trees last night, lighting up the whole area.

Whilst running the engine today, it coughed and spluttered and ran out of diesel. Dave phoned the elusive man with a can in a van & the phone went straight to answerphone, so Dave left another - polite message - we're not in a position to be demanding! Crisis averted when Dot & Dave came to the rescue and took [my] Dave to Streethay for a couple of cans of the rare red liquid. We then did an Aldi shop, whilst Dave carted water from tap to boat till it was full again. The icing on the cake was Mr Diesel Man turned up with 100ltrs of red gold. Thank you very much, we appreciate it alot! So we now have a full load of water, shopping, red stuff of the drinkable variety, and enough diesel to last a few days when diesel can man says he will return.

This is a pic of how far we got when we tried to move to the water point the other day. We didn't get very far as you can see before admitting defeat just alongside the boat moored in front. We've broken up the ice again to give the resident ducks somewhere to move around, and also as a deterrent for Nemo cat - who fell in at around 3am this morning, but thankfully managed to hoist himself out. Will he ever learn? I doubt it.

Frozen canal:- picture was taken from the swing bridge at Fradley Junction, looking back up the Coventry Canal.

Mr Duck was looking decidedly tasty before Dot & Dave took me to Lichfield to do an Aldi shop.

Still Stuck at Fradley

2012-02-06T10:00:00.000-08:00

Whilst reading up on narrowboat blogs today, I found NB Rock N Roll [click] has taken a photo of our mooring in Fron as they went past the other day! We're obviously not in it as we're frozen in at Fradley. They, together with, NB Seyella and NB Moore 2 Life are all travelling towards Llangollen.

Today we tried to move the few yards forward to the water point at Fradley Junction but despite looking as if it had thawed, the ice was still like concrete and after a few attempts of running against a brick wall, we gave up and retreated to 'our mooring'. It was time to dig out the water container and trolly dolly and get a couple of loads of water from the tap by wheels. Not easy in the slushy mire that is the towpath here. If the four boats between us and the water point each ran their engines in gear for a few minutes, it would agitate the ice and make it passable. As for the fibreglass that has been moored here unattended for almost 2 years now, well, he takes his chances.

The phantom man in the van with the diesel in the can, remains elusive. He was due here last Tues, so dave hung around the pub for an hour at the time 'a bloke in the pub' told him he would be around - only to discover, he'd been and gone. So we phoned him (van can man, not bloke in the pub) who said he would deliver some diesel at 10am on Friday. So Dave hung around the pub (notice the theme here) for two hours in the freezing cold, with other boaters I might add, also waiting. Apparently van can man was waiting for a delivery and didn't know what time he would be there. Dave again told him our location, on the Coventry canal, "no problem" said van can man. By 5pm, still no show, so Dave did what anyone does in this situation, and went to the pub, only to be told that van can man had been and gone! Thanks. Another phone call - delivery due Saturday around lunchtime. It's now Monday evening and we still haven't seen anything of him. We'll need diesel in the next few days. If van can man can't deliver as he says, then just let us know and we'll make other arrangements. We would have liked to give him our business, but if he can't be bothered - well.....

Fantastic rugby this weekend by the way!

White Out at Fradley

2012-02-04T13:01:00.000-08:00

We've been trying to keep a bit of water free from ice for the resident ducks by running the engine in gear for a bit, which breaks the ice up. It also deters the cat from exploring this new surface - as well as an aide for any boat which tries to get past us.

We've been keeping very warm (Mum), with the two fires going 24 hours a day, and will be in danger of running out of the wood I brought back from Fron, stuffed in the tiny hire car. Needs must. We can always go foraging as soon as we're released from the ice. I hear on the blog-vine that BW have been cutting trees near Kings Bromley.

We've been waiting for 2 days now for the man with the diesel in a can, in a van, but despite promises of a delivery, he remains elusive. We're not short (yet) but in this weather, we'd rather keep diesel tanks topped up - as well as give trade to a man with a van who's trying to make a living selling "stuff" to boaters.

Dave - the trooper that he is - ventured out at 4pm (ish) to take photos of the pub with the first smatterings of snow.

This was the scene 4 hours later - snow still coming down with gusto, and it's now around 3" deep. I've managed to take photos with the flash on the camera, rather than the mobile phone. The camera will work when the flash is on, but won't take "normal" pics, and every picture taken, seems over exposed.

Nemo cat has ventured outside, and is having a whale of a time diving in the snow. It just gets a bit cold when you have to stand outside and throw snowballs for him to keep him entertained. At least he has ventured out - he's been very reluctant to leave his furry "den" in this weather, and as we've been here for a week now, he's also bored with the place.

We spent a lovely day with old friends Dot & Dave (NB Lace Lady) down at Wychnor moorings a couple of days ago. Dave came to Fradley and picked us up in the morning and kindly brought us back later in the day. We hope to visit with them again, after the weekend of proper sport on the telly.

Fradley

2012-02-02T11:15:00.000-08:00

We're camped out at Fradley, and will remain here until the weather forecast improves. We have all the services here, and don't want to risk being iced in out in the sticks. I hired a car and visited Mum for a few days as it's been two years since Dad died. Car hire for the weekend was £45, plus £25 petrol. Still a bargain when they pick you up and drop you off, and I got to retreive some wood from our store.

Rachel, Bruno and the girls also came up for the weekend from Kenilworth. Bethan, Rob and Nel also joined in for a Burns night supper. It's becoming an annual event now. No we're not Scottish, but Bruno (despite his name), my brother-in-law is (his parents came over from Italy to Glasgow in the 1960's and joined the rapidly growing community of Italians there) and he and Rachel spent a few years living near Dundee when they returned from a stint in the states. Anyway - we had a Burns night supper, complete with one large 'normal' haggis, and one vegetarian variety (eh?!?!) We all had to recite a verse of the Robbie Burns poem "Ode to a Haggis", Bethan got to do the stabbing bit to "Trenching your gushing entrails bright". Good fun.

I visited our moorings in Froncysyllte, and loaded a VERY small hire car with some logs (thanks for the help Hazel). I'm sorry I didn't take a picture of this stuffed micro sized car with a tesco shop, logs and clean bags of washing (thanks mum), spilling out when the doors opened! Dave reversed the boat to the bridge at Fradley so we didn't have so far to walk. Note to self: Get bigger car next time. I also picked up my new Hawkshead walking boots which had been delivered to mums. My last pair, which Dave bought me for my birthday, had a pin prick hole in the bottom of them. Size of hole is irrelevant when you've got a very soggy foot. So I returned them & got my money back (from Cotton Traders) which is another story I forgot to blog about: After arguing with Cotton Traders, I parceled them up and took them to Atherstone post office when we were there, but the post office was closed due to an armed robbery! So it was a bus ride to find another post office, only to find there was one 50 yds away from where we were moored. I was too fed up about the whole episode at the time to write about it.

The pub in Fradley is alive and thriving I'm pleased to say, and although it's the same people as the last time we visited, it's alot cleaner and not full of family members watching the telly. We haven't tried the food yet though. The same "continuous cruisers" are also still here from the last time we visited.

On the way to Fradley we passed the hundreds of poly tunnels, waiting for spring planting time.

Another one!!! New marina being built near Huddlesford, for Dai, the people building it are Green Ford, how does that work then? Not soon enough to save The Plough, which has closed. Again, same boats moored outside that have been there FOR YEARS!

Hopwas

2012-01-26T02:47:00.000-08:00

Don't take any notice of our location on the Waterways Explorer map - Dave has been plotting journeys from previous years to try and get a log up to date, and it shows we're in Llangollen Basin at the moment - which we're obvisously not! He's spent months doing it, and it shows he's near the 10,000 mile mark!

We've had a leisurely few days meandering towards Fradley, where I've got a hire car booked to travel to Mum's for the weekend. The plan is to load up the car with the wood we have sitting in "storage" . Not much point in having a load of wood in our summer mooring when we don't have the fire lit.

Strange one this:- an old WW2 look out post in the middle of the field, protecting the canal and the railway I guess, the railway line was all rebuilt a couple of years ago to accommodate four tracks, with long bridges over the River Tame, which is prone to flooding. The 6 blocks of flats in Tamworth are visible to the left, which dominate the skyline for miles around here, as there's not many hills round here.

Moored near Hopwas

We've got all the bird identification books out since visiting Kingsbury Water Park, trying to identify the interlopers, like this goose - not a canada goose, but not much of anything else either!

Picture taken out of the window of one of the bird hides in the water park. There is an egret dead centre of this pic, which can be seen when you display the photo on the computer, but not much good when it's this small size. One day we'll buy a proper camera!

Haven't seen this one before. There's all sorts of traders on the canals these days, selling everything from coal and diesel to cheese, but - nope - never seen a floating hairdressers! (Moored near Hopwas if you're in need of a short back & sides)

Blast from the past

2012-01-21T11:25:00.000-08:00

On Wednesday a BW work boat came down Atherstone bottom lock & past us. Great, an ice breaker! So we quickly untied and followed him as he bounced off the sheets of ice towards Grendon road bridge. After 3 attempts of him trying to get through the bridge and going every which way but straight, we decided perhaps it wasn't such a good idea after all, and retreated (backwards) to where we came from. Incidentally, the BW blokes spoke to Matey on boat stuck at the bottom and said he was free to travel up the first few locks. He still couldn't get all the way through due to works being carried out on the top locks, but at least he was nearer to the town, so off he went.

Thursday morning saw the ice on the canal all but defrosted, so after a Tesco delivery to Grendon wharf (yes Hazel - Ogio half price again!) we were a few inches deeper in the water, but were off! We have a rendevous in the Dog and Doublet on Sunday with John and Mary from the Market Tavern.

We stopped for diesel at Alvecote, and blow me, Del Boy's car was parked in their car park - complete with "Trotter's Independent Trading Co" emblazoned on the side.

Just after Alvecote, we came across an obstacle in the water. Is it a dead sheep? dead body? traffic cone? No, when we got closer we could see it was a space hopper, you know the ones - bright orange with ears for handles, with an sinister smiling teethy grin on the body of it. I had one many years ago, and had to fight my sisters to get possession of it. Talk about a couple of blasts of the 1970's!!!

Now this is a busy garden - there's everything in here as well as the kitchen sink, which I suppose is used for a swimming pool for all the knomes. And on to Fazeley .....

New buildings at Fazeley junction.

Where have all the boats gone?? Fazeley, like Grendon is bereft of boats, I've never seen it so quiet.

We stopped off at BW Fazeley to do the recycling before turning round and going up the Birmingham Fazeley canal. Another rant about recycling coming :- I lifted the lid of the glass recycling bin, only to find a black bin bag full of - glass!! Duh. So I duly emptied the bottles into the GLASS bin, and put the plastic in the PLASTIC bin. Next to the paper recycling bin, yep you guessed it - a black plastic bin bag full of .... PAPER! So I emptied that out as well, which was full of BW's own bits of paper. Yes, I did shout out loud, but I refuse to give up!!!

Passing through Drayton Manor fancy footbridge. No queues for the fun/theme park today. Moored near Kingsbury water park so we can have a look at the birds there, but the weather hasn't been that good. Unfortunately Nemo has taken to running along the outside gunnel (water side), and like an accident waiting to happen - it did - and he duly fell in good style last night. I heard the splash and quickly opened the side hatch, fished around in the dark and yanked him out. How many lives as this cat got??? Note to self: Buy more bath towels.

A babble of bloggers head up the Llangollen

2012-01-17T11:42:00.000-08:00

I've spent the last hour or so catching up on boaters' blogs, and it seems the Llangollen is very popular at this time of year. NB Armadillo is leading the advance party, followed by NB Rock N Roll, Moore 2 Life, and NB Seyella, with NB Jandai bringing up the rear. Give 'em a wave as they pass, or leave a comment!

On Friday (13th) I blogged that a boat had arrived at the bottom of Grendon, hoping to ascend the Atherstone locks - which were padlocked. Dave also showed him a photo taken on his mobile phone of the works in progress on the lock above. We later left to walk into Atherstone to get some shopping, it was around 4.30pm by now and starting to get dark. We arrived back a couple of hours later by taxi to Grendon (as we had shopping to carry, and nothing to do with visiting the Market Tavern), only to find the newly arrived boat had disappeared. Ah well, we decided he'd backed up to Grendon winding hole and decided to move off - somewhere. On Saturday morning however, we see him backing out of the bottom lock. It appears that a fibreglass cruiser approached the lock (in the dark) removed the lock from the gates and ascended. Our man didn't need any more encouragement and immediately followed said fibreglass up the locks, only to find fibreglass boat coming back towards him as he exited the second lock up, and proceeded to descend the locks again. It was only then, on approaching the third lock that it dawned on Matey that - yes - the locks are actually shut! Duh! So he than had to reverse all the way back to where he started. Apparently he had phoned BW Fazeley who had told him that they would try and lock him through, if and when the work was completed. The arrival of a fibreglass boat at the locks was Matey's ticket to Atherstone. Yeah - that's likely at 4.30pm on a Friday afternoon!

Backing out of the bottom lock

Broken padlock on the bottom gates

Matey - back in position on the lock bollards - not as if anyone's going to be using them any time soon!

Unfortunately, Matey's maiden voyage continues to be rather fraught - we're now iced in here at Grendon and he's short of fuel, so Dave lent him our 2 jerry cans so he could get some diesel, along with the stack-truck. However, his biggest problem was that his batteries were flat, as he'd only run the engine for an hour or so for the past couple of days. Dave had tinker, then decided to disconnected one of our batteries, so he may do a 'jump start' which thankfully worked. Dave did tell him he needed to run his engine for longer - alot longer. After an hour of engine running, he switched it off, so it'll probably be the same problem tomorrow.

As for us, we're just fine. We checked the weather forecast and knew ice was on the way, so moved up to the Grendon services and did the necessary filling and emptying, so we're ok for a few days at least and moved back to where we were at the bottom of the lock in the peace and quiet. We thought we'd rather be in sight of a tap - than not - in the ice! The temperature is due to go up into double figures again Wed/Thurs, so we'll move on then. We've also had a delivery of logs from Carl in the pub (Market Tavern) - yes - we've finally used up the logs on the roof which we've been carting round the country for the last few months.

It's pretty cold here this morning!

Nemo keeping busy, catching mice....

(Action shot this one) This is the mouse making a break for it - and succeeded!

Ah, that's better, I've had such a busy day .......

Grendon Blog Update - A boat appears!

2012-01-13T08:22:00.000-08:00

Within an hour of me posting my last blog, saying how quiet it was here with the lack of boats - blow me a boat turns up, expecting to go up the locks! Now 'aint that typical when you're trying to black the boat?

Dave went over & had a chat with boat owner and his mate, who at first didn't believe Dave when he told them that the lock was shut and had been listed in the stoppage programme for several months. After (unsuccessfully) trying to open the padlock on the lock gates with his BW key, blokey phoned BW fazeley Office for confirmation of the stoppage and the news finally sunk in. He had just bought the boat from somewhere round Birmingham, and was on his way to Middlesex - not this way you're not! Even if he got up these locks, there's more stoppages en route. All together now ..... "That's another well researched start to life afloat then". Friday 13th just isn't his day.

Strangely enough, the boat is an ex-hire boat from Chirk Marina (2004-ish) Dave - the anorak that he is - spotted it immediately as ex hire boat "Jenny". I know - he should get out more.

Grendon

2012-01-13T05:36:00.000-08:00

Beautiful sunset last night, though this mobile phone pic doesn't do it justice. We never did get round to buying a new camera in the January sales. Never mind.

Nemo cat is having a lovely time playing in the woods, unfortunately for us, he brought us a furry "present" yesterday, and we've been playing hunt the mousey ever since. I hadn't realised he had brought one in, until it popped out from the side of the fridge to see what I was cooking for tea. I had my suspicions after a couple of Nemo's cat biscuits had appeared near the fridge. After removing the washing machine and fridge without success, we turned our attention to the cooker, where Mr Mouse had obviously set up home behind, after removing the cooker, Mousey made a dash for freedom into the wine rack. Dave was not amused and started dismantling the rack. At this point the mouse seemed to surrender, and ran into our mouse catching recepticle (a large plastic beaker) and stayed put, so liberating him wasn't as hard as it has been on previous mouse catching excersises. Of course Nemo was extremely bored by now and had retreated to bed.

There's only one other boat here at Grendon moorings, which is wonderful. Our only neighbour is the boat Jack The Lad, who's been travelling in the same direction(s) as us and who we've been bumping into since November on our way down to Oxford. I've never seen so few boats here. Dave's enjoying his 2 mile walk up to the Market Tavern, where he's treated as a local - probably due to the fact that we were frozen in at the top of Atherstone locks for over 6 weeks last winter! It's nice to walk into a pub where people know your name, even if the Landlord has changed. The real ale is still great.

Dave is taking advantage of the lovely weather, and the absence of any boat movements, and blacking the side of the boat.

The bottom lock here at Grendon has been padlocked to stop any boats going up, due to the work being carried out on the locks further up. We're going to have to move and do some cruising soon, 2 miles in over a week while we've had such lovely weather is a bit slow, even for our standards. We've been hanging around here for the last 10 days as Dave has been having his teeth seen to. You wait - the weather will change on the day we decide to move off!

Atherstone

2012-01-07T11:14:00.000-08:00

After a very jolly new year spent in Kenilworth, with Rachel (my sister), Bruno & the kids, Bruno kindly drove us back to the boat at Sutton Stop. We were about to move off, (it's not our favourite place if you hadn't gathered that already from the last blog) when Roy on NB Gerald came round the corner, so we had to stay and have a pint with him in the Greyhound (the only redeeming feature of Sutton Stop). He had moved there in order to catch a bus & train to go to the funeral of Horace Foster - better known as "H". Dave was also going to the funeral, but we'd planned to go from Atherstone. Here's a lovely picture here [click] with H holding the horse - H and his father were one of the last horse boatmen.

So, we pushed on the next day.....

They're building a huge housing estate right next to the huge hole that is a quarry on the outskirts of Nuneaton - good luck with that one, I don't think i'd fancy the first house nearest the precipice. I'm sure the safety fencing will keep the kids away from the edge.

Meandering through Nuneaton - allotment city - nothing round the prop this time, but we had a good game of avoid the obstacle in the water instead. This one is part of a burned out cruiser boat.

Past BW Hillmorton depot, and into Atherstone, just before the nasty weather hit.

Above - a canal side house in Atherstone. Why buy a house next to the canal, then do your utmost to mask the view of it? It's not like the canal sprung up one night catching the owner unawares - it's been there for a couple of hundred years!

Lovely wooden canal side sculpture below the top lock.

We waited above the locks for the storms to ease before stocking up at Aldi, and descending the locks. En route, I spoke to a bloke on a boat coming up the locks towards us & I said unfortunately all the locks would be against him, as BW were moving equipment up the locks in front of him, probably equipment for the stoppage. What stoppage he said - I havent seen any notices about any stoppages in this area. I explained that the Atherstone flight would be closed till the end of January. Just as well I'm going up today then he said. Don't know how far he got, as there's another stoppage at Brinklow till 9th March, same comment applies to the Braunston Hire boat heading up the locks yesterday. There's been a flurry of boats today moving in either direction to get through before Monday, one boat was the infamous "Reckless" - the boat that Guy Martin DIDN'T build on the telly.

On the move again - to Sutton Stop

2011-12-31T02:46:00.000-08:00

Christmas done, so time to move on, we wanted to get past the Brinklow and Ansty before the stoppages kick in on the 4th, so this should be the last time we pass the huge orange buffers where the bank has slipped.

Past some lovely pygmy goats, billies with magnificent horns, playing I'm king of the castle.

Past the volkswagen graveyard

and on to Hawksbury Junction aka Sutton Stop**

This is what the BW rubbish & recycling point looks like

wheelie bins full to bursting, with some idle trouts dumping bags on top of the full skips, instead of walking another 3 paces to find the empty skips. Duh!!!

This is supposed to be the glass recycling bin, (theres another two for mixed recycling), which was stuffed full of mixed "household" waste. Now we go to alot of trouble to ensure we recycle as much as we can, the storage of which, isn't easy on a boat. Then we finally reach a recycling point on the canal, only to find that others have stuffed it full or miscellaneous rubbish. The recycling in these skips is now useless - the rubbish/recycling collectors do not have the time to sift out the detritus from the genuine recyclables, so the whole lot will be dumped into landfill. Thanks.

NB: Yes Hazel, that is one of our Ogio bottles on the top.

The locals should be ashamed of the state of the elsan point - especially the (older) lady who walked with her loo on a trolly from the moorings above the lock, and used it just before Dave. She got there before him, so Dave backed off to give her some space. Unfortunately, she left raw sewage all around the "sink" and on the floor, without a whiff of blue to be smelt. When Dave entered the elsan point, he jumped back out and shouted "oi you dirty cow" to the woman walking away, but she chose not to hear him and quickened her pace. Dave of course cleaned it out with a brush and loo roll, as he has done to numerous elsan points along the way. If these elsan points are treated so badly, it won't be long before BW just say "no more" and close them.

** and out the other side - onto the Coventry canal. Dave did however walk back to the Greyhound (above), for a pint. He had to see if the accolade of "CAMRA Coventry pub of the year 2011" was merited - purely for research purposes of course.

Well that's Christmas done then!

2011-12-30T08:33:00.000-08:00

I know I was tempting fate when I wrote in my last blog "what could possibly go wrong..." well, nothing did, go wrong I mean. We had a lovely mooring in Brinklow Marina, even though we were'nt expected (our booking hadn't been passed on) no matter. We didn't want to risk leaving Beefur unattended over the xmas period. I was expected at Enterprise rent a car, which was nice, although the petrol guage was on reserve before I started and unfortunately I overdid the petrol & filled it up, so we ended up driving round a bit more that was necessary, just to use some up! Nemo cat didn't know what to make of the cattery never having been in one before. I was extremely impressed at the plush two tier cat accommodation, with climbing ramps, vantage points looking out of the glass fronted building, scratching posts, toys and comfy bedding areas - then they showed me to Nemo's cage for the week, round the side in the dingy lean-to. Hang on sais I, what do you have to do to get the posh hotel suites then? Dunno, said the girl, just first come first served I guess. Ah well. He did have a radio to listen to.

Christmas at mums was lovely, and she'd done a great job with the decorations and tree (thanks Mum). Christmas day can be a difficult time, and even more poignant when there's someone significant missing at the dinner table - my lovely Dad. We all miss him so much.

We took a trip to our moorings to say Merry Christmas to Rick, Hazel & Dai, and to take advantage of the hire car which we loaded up with wood which had been drying out nicely in one of the old limekilns. Not much point in having a load of wood sitting there where we spend the summer months - when we don't have fire number 2 lit.

Our empty mooring.

The Llangollen wharf horse drawn trip boats are out of the water on the Limekilns yard and awaiting blacking - or something

Dave had time to meet his pal Mike the train in the Corn Mill for a pint on boxing day. The Dee was running rather high!

On the way back from Chirk to Brinklow, we passed over 8 different canals (in one shape or other);-

1. Llangollen (Chirk)

2. Montgomery (Queens Head)

3. Shropshire Union (M54 The Hawthorns)

4. Staffs & Worcester (Coven Heath)

5. Disused Hatherton branch (M6 Calf Heath)

6. Wyrely & Essington (Anglesey Branch, Chasewater M6)

7. Birmingham & Fazeley (M6 toll Curdworth)

8. Coventry (Hawksbury Junct)

9. Oxford (twice at Ansty)

We also went under the M6 (toll) bridge which will eventually carry the Lichfield & Hatherton canal - well hopefully it will in years to come! The bridge structure is there, it just needs a canal.

What is a Blog?

2011-12-23T09:26:00.000-08:00

Well I thought it was a collection of thoughts, opinions, ramblings of someone. An on line diary if you like. This blog was started to keep family and friends informed of our whereabouts, a brief comment on what we've seen and what (if anything) has happened to us, yes the occasional (ha!) rant, and to let my Mum know we are still floating, and are not iced in, or cold, or broken down. It was intented to be read by those who are genuinely interested in what we're doing.

The definition of blog as per Maffi's blogspot states: "This blog has no more importance than the writing on a toilet wall, it is merely an opinion. If you don't like what I say, I am sorry, but I will keep saying it. Opinions don't have to be right, just heartfelt". Spot on.

The reason I feel compelled to say something about my blogspot, is the vicious comments received by Matilda Rose's blospot. From "Anonymous", and "Chris (on a boat near you)", which is rather ominous. There is a site dedicated to this kind of vitriol its called "Canal World Forum". Indeed, I thought I'd pressed the wrong button on the computer and landed on said site with the ongoing rantings about "my boat is deeper than your boat", and that old chestnut "tie your boat up properly". Well, for the record, we have a permanent mooring, which we use 5 or 6 months of the year. It's a linear mooring on the Llangollen canal. (Ooo, I hear you say). We tie our boat up very well thank you. However tightly you moor up, we are still rocked and buffetted by speeding boats. Indeed, the 70ft ex FMC boat Fern on our moorings has resorted to using tensioning straps (usually found on wagons). Yes, I do understand the Archimedes Principle. Dress it up how you like, 18" or 3ft - the fact remains, that some boats go too fast past moored boats. End of. I just feel so sorry for Jill, she just said it how she saw it, and there was no need for such harsh comments, mind you, the blog spot didn't half shoot up the rankings!

By the way, the "Comments" button on this blogspot doesn't work, unless your name is Graham, Gill, or Jill (with a "J"), so I'm in the clear and can rant away! Neither can I leave comments on anyone else's blog. I've tried fiddling with settings but nothing changed.

As for us, we're just fine, this mild weather is just the ticket. I was starting to get a bit twitchy with the first bit of ice, but it cleared within a day so we've carried on cruising. This christmas malarkey is a doddle. Cards made and posted. Christmas presents bought (and sent) on line. Going to someone else's house for christmas dinner. Cat booked into cattery, hire car sorted, marina berth sorted, what could possibly go wrong......

Flecknoe

2011-12-19T09:52:00.000-08:00

Ha! Managed to get my own photo of Gosty Hill today as Iain passed in the pouring rain, loaded up - well - literally to the gunnels!

We took a walk up to Flecknoe village on Sunday to the pub for lunch. Dave had already done a couple of rekkies (surprise, surprise). We had a fantastic beef dinner with all the trimmings for £8.95 each, washed down with very with well kept real ale. A very nice mellow Sunday. You can see where Beefur boat is moored for quite a distance when walking up the hill, then with views accross to Rugby and Braunston.

Dave outside the Old Olive Bush pub.

We took a jaunt into Braunston on Thursday to get some water, and say farewell to
Jill and Graham [click] (who judging by thier blog, havent had a good day today (Mon). We also called in at the butchers there. Although we do get Tesco deliveries here and there, we do try and shop locally, however the prices at the butchers in Braunston do seem to be a tad high: 1lb stewing steak, 6 sausages & few rashers of bacon = £10.40.

Braunston church - who's spire can be seen for miles around.

The Old Mill, now a holiday let.

When are they ever going to remove this old sunken boat? It's been here for years causing a hazzard!

We watered, found Matilda Rose, managed to spend another £10.40 on a door catch at Midland ~~Swindlers~~ Chandlers, turned round and came back to Flecknoe for a couple of days, passing a bloggers gathering (Oakfield, Tranquility and Piston Broke) at Fox's Gate, so would that be a babble of bloggers? Oh, and the famous Maffi came past us (a friend of "Bones" and referred to in her Canal Boat articles), who seemed to recognise Beefur from our blogs. Again, I was excited at someone famous going past us, I just waved maniacally and forgot to speak! He's been doing a fantasic job cleaning up bags of litter as he cruises around [click]. Something we should all be doing.

Like Buses: No blogs for a week - then two come along at the same time

2011-12-15T11:14:00.000-08:00

We've had a few days at Napton and The Folly pub, which is fantastic. The locals, landlord and staff are very friendly, which makes the atmosphere very welcoming. The shop is open till all hours, and although he doesn't sell papers, he was happy to get Dave a paper if requested the previous day.

We're not far out of Braunston, (with an internet signal, which is a bit rare round these parts) but decided to stop short and wait for Gosty Hill to arrive with much needed diesel (the fact that it was bitterly cold had nothing to do with it). This is an old pic of Gosty Hill, I had my phone/camera ready to take a pic as they arrived, but I got excited at the sight of them, I forgot to take a photo. (We were about to run out of heating oil!), anyway, don't know where this pic came from as it was in my archive, so very sorry if I've "stolen" someone's pic. Very impressive though! We do like to give Iain & Alison our business when ever we can, as Iain got us out of a very tricky situation when we were iced in up the Ashby back in Jan 2010 and were about to run out of fuel. Gosty Hill was iced in at Sutton Stop (I think) but despite this, he arrived with a mate, in his mate's van (Ralph off NB Annabelle) and delivered loads of diesel by containers in wheelbarrows in the snow. Over and above the call of duty. He wouldn't take any 'delivery' or petrol money. If he hadn't arrived when he did, I think we'd have had to abandon the boat. Sorry to hear that they're selling up, but hope they get to do some cruising when they do & come & see us up the Llangollen.

On our way to Napton we stopped short of the Folly, above lock 12, and awoke to find the canal frozen, so we decided to do a runner and get nearer civilisation at the bottom of the locks. We need'nt have been so twitchy, as there was no ice at the bottom of the locks. Still, better to be safe than sorry, after the last two winters of being iced in.

Photo of me in silly winter hat - one of many which will no doubt have an airing soon ...

The pound above lock 13 at Napton was incredibly shallow, the boats in the moorings were sitting on the bottom. Apparently, someone had left the paddles open on the lock overnight and drained the pound. Not nice. Matilda Rose had gone down in front of us and had warned us of the low water levels, so we let a couple of lock fulls of water down, but it wouldn't have made any difference as the pound was so low. Water was now coming down, but it would take a while for the level to get back to normal. We've seen alot of boaters leaving paddles up, and not closing gates whilst on the South Oxford. Mostly single handed boaters, who put their hands up & say "oooh sorry, I'm single handed" as if that's some kind of excuse. Look Matey - If I can do it single handed - anyone can - and if you can't do it properly and shut gates behind you "because you're single handed" - then don't do it at all - get off the canal!

Before Napton, we took refuge in Fenny Compton when the weather men forecast doom and gloom and violent storms. We picked this spot, which luckily was in a bit of a dip, so missed the winds. Felt a bit sea sick in the evening, but by morning all was fine and sunny again.

Whilst we were in Fenny Compton getting water, a 70ft Alvechurch hire boat was turning in the winding hole in a howling gale - which he did very successfully. Dave went over for a chat and discovered that the couple on the boat had hired it for 3 weeks, as they were having a boat built to live aboard, and wanted to experience boating in the winter, to make doubly sure that it was the life for them. They had hired a maximum length boat, far bigger than the one they were having built, and in December. Well done them. I'm always banging on about people not doing their reseach before buying a boat, but this couple had done it in spades. We wished them well in their venture.

Wedding Bridge

2011-12-15T11:09:00.000-08:00

We noticed that The Old Wedding Bridge (Br133) between Fenny Compton and Napton had been replaced since the last time we were here, by a sort of similar footbridge...

This is the old footbridge - one huge beam held up by a couple of stilts, with not much headroom. This pic was taken back in January 2008, I'm on Beefur, with Dave on Sans Souci following behind, trying to avoid the lowest point in the middle.

Me and my big mouth (about carting wood around the country on the roof of the boat), we've already used one load of our blue tarpaulin mass now that the weather had turned cold, leaving space on the roof for foraging some more. Will have to get Dave a wet suit for this task, as he seemed to take a dive into the cut whenever this task presented itself. We've got Shifali back on the weather forecast now, who warns us of overnight snow and decreasing temperatures - so it must be true.

Beefur, at Banbury. Dave waiting patiently whilst I just popped into town for a couple of minutes, hmmmm.....

Banbury - back in the land of the phone signal

2011-12-05T05:58:00.000-08:00

We haven't been able to blog for a week or so due to lack of phone signal, hence the bundle of blogs. We're moored outside Banbury, between the lift bridges for a couple of days, still with Matilda Rose Far enough to be away from the town, but still close enough for Dave to walk back and visit The Olde Raindeer. This sign is one of the reasons (apart from the beer) Dave loves this pub....

Horay for common sense!

We had a lovely couple of days cruising, and the weather was again fantastic. These two pics are of a red kite at Somerton Deep Lock. Oh yes they are. You can just make out the speck. Christmas is coming, and we will get a camera rather than relying on mobile phone pics.

We got under Nell bridge without any problems as the water level is so low. There was rain forecast, but I doubt it would make much difference, but we weren't taking any chances.

Nemo has been to the vets for his annual vaccinations, which involved a short taxi ride. He did not make one sound during the whole time, and has slept ever since. That's him sorted for 12 months (fingers crossed).

We have ditched the flowers as the frost saw off the last of the geraniums. The roof is looking rather bare now, apart from the stack of wood which we have been carting round the country. We have finally lit the back (2nd) stove - we did hold out till December - so no doubt the stack of logs will now decrease rapidly.

Trouble is - it's now too hot!! We're just not acclimatised yet, but we'll persevere!

We'll be going through Cropredy in a couple of days, and hoping that The Red Lion has solved any problems and has now re-opened for business - but I doubt it. We've also heard that another of our favourite pubs has closed - the Two Boats at Long Itchington, which is a great shame after the efforts the landlord Chris has put in over the last two years, but like he says, £1200 per week rent is just not possible during the winter months, so he's closed the doors. Another greedy brewery to blame.

Mooring - How close do you go?

2011-12-05T05:57:00.000-08:00

Whilst we were in Lower Heyford, we moored out in the countryside, between "The Heyfords" you might say. Now, here's the thing - how close do you moor next to someone, whilst out in the sticks, and not on designated 24hr, 48hr, or 14 day moorings? This close?

Button to Button !

I expect to be nose-to-tail whilst moored on designated moorings, or near a pub or a shop, but come on! There was loads of room behind us on the piling - two boat lengths worth infact. Mooring button-to-button with us made no difference to "Misty Blue" as his ex Canal Time boat doesn't have any outlook from the front, but it does make a great deal of difference to us. Whilst out cruising in winter, we go out of our way to moor in a rural spot, mainly due to the fact that for 6 months of the year we are nose-to-tail with other boats on our moorings - our choice - but through the winter, we want to have a little space when we chose to moor in the middle of nowhere. Thank you. Rant over.

Great signs. Hades is the God or Lord of death and the dead (or underworld), so nice to see that this road caters for this world - and the next !

Oxford by Train

2011-12-04T05:57:00.000-08:00

We abided by the (mooring) rules whilst visiting Oxford, and only stayed 48 hours (unlike everyone else it seemed). But we felt that we hadn't seen enough of the place and decided to revisit the by train once we got to Lower Heyford, as it's got a handy station alongside the canal, and go to the Ashmolean Museum. We didn't fancy going in to the city on a Saturday, no trains ran from Lower Heyford on a Sunday (it was raining anyway), so we opted for Monday, and duly went to the station to catch the 0953. Information display said that the train was on time and there were 5 other people waiting at the station (always a good sign I find, when travelling somewhere different). Unfortunately, the train didnt turn up. We phoned the information line, and were told that the train was on its way. Then two taxi drivers turned up and informed us that the train had been cancelled in Banbury, and they were to take us by taxi into Oxford. Ah well, so much for Mrs. Information. The taxi dropped us off right outside the Ashmolean. Great. Unfortunately, the Ashmolean is closed on Mondays! B****r! A change of plan was in order, so we went for a look around the Bodleian Library instead, and to the exhibition "Treasures of the Bodleian" which was wonderful.

The Bodleian Library

We climbed the very narrow spiral staircase up the tower of St Mary's church, (great fun going up the steps - not so funny trying to come down them)

and got these stunning views of Oxford ........

Winding on the Thames

2011-11-25T10:13:00.000-08:00

We had plenty of room to moor opposite the old Jericho boat yard. Lots of boats moored further up, but none here, just us and Matilda Rose.

The Jericho boat yard is still fenced off and shows no signs of any development, due to the disputes regarding the attempts to build a four storey block of flats on the ex BW land. St Banabus' church dominates the view here - and it's bells toll out every quarter of an hour between 8am and 11pm.

As Beefur is over 52ft (57ft), the only way we can turn around is to wind on the Thames. Since we were here last, there's a pontoon been put in just below the lock, and large instruction boards telling you the direction in which you need to wind, which seems to be rather illogical and the wrong way round. Not wanting to go against any instructions - we winded the way which had been set out in a large diagram at the lock, not the way which seemed to be the safest! No current so no problem.

Job done. Off we go again, heading slowly back North.

The locks down here are much easier to operate: one bottom gate instead of two, so no jumping accross open gates. Mind you, the gates are a heavier, but you can't have it all ......

Oxford - Part 2 (Better late than never)

2011-11-24T10:13:00.000-08:00

We haven't had a mobile signal for the last few days, so have been unable to upload the rest of the photos from Oxford until now. We've had to find a pub with wi-fi, dirty job, but someone's got to do it, so we're back in Lower Heyford after spending a lovely few days out in the country, and revisited Nemo's favourite mooring at the quarry at Kirtlington.

Now, where's this pub Graham told us about.... down an alley way under the Bridge of Sighs. Ah ha! Brewery delivery van is a bit of a clue, down this alley way...

Then this one.....

At the end, was The Turf Tavern. Very nice pub, but very busy.

We didn't want to overstay our 48 hour mooring, though any restrictions didnt seem to bother the other boats moored on the 24 hour moorings. Same boats there when we left, as when we arrived, despite BW person taking their numbers when we passed on our way into the centre. Probably still there now.

The lift bridges on the bottom bit of the Oxford (the ones around the "Agenda 21" moorings) have now been fitted with a locking mechanism, operated with a BW key. I remember reading something about it on the e-mailed BW stoppage alerts, but didn't take any notice. Anyway, we arrived at the first one, I jumped off, indicating to Dave in sign language that there wasn't a chain to pull (and so lift the bridge). I then proceeded to climb the fence to get a grip onto the balance beam to put some weight on it and lift the bridge. I failed miserably. In sign language, I indicated to Dave that the bridge was b*******d, and that he'd have to come and do it himself, and started to walk back to the boat, whereupon I saw the instructions on how to operate the new locking mechanism. Duh. Back to boat, get key & do it properly!

Oxford

2011-11-19T10:47:00.000-08:00

I could bore you with lots of photos of Oxford. So I will.....

End of the Oxford Canal

Beautiful buildings - and bikes everywhere

Woah! Like I said... bikes everywhere

Did the sight seeing bit, interdispersed with sightings listed in the Good Beer Guide. Dave's got a smart phone, with an "app" from CAMRA that locates your position, then tells you how far, and in which direction the nearest CAMRA pub is located. It even shouts directions at you whilst walking along. "Turn right into Beaumont Street." "I said right". This technology is too advanced for us! However, once Dave was on the scent of a pub, it couldn't keep up with our location - so we bought a street map. Bit less embarrassing than standing on a street corner staring into your phone, walking in one direction, then walking back the way you came, to ensure that the "device" knows exactly where you are & which way you're going. We even found a West Cornwall Pasty Shop. Beer AND (proper job) pasties - you'll never get him from here....

Best Cat Mooring

2011-11-17T09:22:00.000-08:00

We moored at the disused quarry near Kirtlington. This has to be the best cat mooring we've come across. Nemo loved it. He kept disappearing for hours at a time, before checking in again. He was running around all over the place. He doesn't usually go out during daylight hours, but as soon as he heard the fenders dropping as we were tying up, he was out - and stayed out. He's absolutely shattered today though!

Off the short section of the River Cherwell back onto the Canal at Shipton Weir lock.

As we were approaching the lock, a bloke in a little fibreglass boat ~~slurred~~ shouted accross to Dave as we passed "Scuse me mate, but there's been a woman following me since I left Oxford, she is, she's following me, honest" "You should be so lucky was the reply from Dave", and carried on. I must add here, that this little fibreglass came up & out of Shipton Weir Lock & turned right - the wrong way down the navigation & turned round when he saw us coming. He then came towards us, we moved to the right, so did he, we moved further over, so did he. We were now on a collision course - not a problem for us with 20 tons of steel, but it might have been a problem for him. I gave him a few hand gestures & he eventually moved over. Needless to say - there was no sign of a woman stalker.

Charming lift bridge

Jolly Boatman and Muddy Waters from Oxfordshire Narrowboats, moored at Thrupp.

Whilst we were a Lower Heyford, I took the opportunity to meet up with Mum at Rachel's house & celebrate my forty-something birthday. Lovely food HUGE leg of lamb, and Rach had even make a chocolate birthday cake. Thanks for a lovely weekend.

L-R Nia, Mum, Rhiannon, Rachel & Iona

Rachel & Mum in the kitchen - keep at it - you know you love it!

To Lower Heyford

2011-11-16T09:22:00.000-08:00

We bumped into Dennis & Lynn from NB The Higgler at Nell Bridge who have de-bunked from the Llangollen for the forseable future. After a quick catch up, we agreed to meet for longer on our way back up the Oxford.

Sign on Nell Bridge, indicating how much head room one has, as we cross the River Cherwell. Levels are low for this time of year, and coloured indicators read normal (green for go)

Safely into Aynho wier lock which is diamond shaped.

Great name for a boat

The lift bridges are all left up. When we were here last, a couple of years ago, they were mostly down. I got caught out with one:- Dave and I were both single handed. I was in front on Beefur, and jumped off to raise a lift bridge, taking the centre line with me & dropping it on the ground. I then proceeded to lift the bridge but once up, there was no way of securing the bridge in the "Up/open" position, no cord to tie down nor a chain to hook into something. By this time Beefur had drifted under the bridge whilst it was open, so i was now completely stuck. I couldn't let go of the bridge as it would close, on top of Beefur. There's not alot of flow on this canal, so Beefur was now just sat under the open bridge. Eventually Dave turned up and rescued me, boat and bridge!

This is Dave's favourite house (not that he does houses), due to it's remote location. There isn't a road within 1/2 a mile of the place. Somerton Deep Lock. Exactly what it says on the tin.

We moored just north of Lower Heyford, rather than alongside the railway line. Lovely spot, but we couldn't understand why we had flies buzzing round all of a sudden. Checked the map - yep - we were just below the sewerage works.

View of Oxfordshire Narrowboats at Lower Heyford, taken from the station bridge.

MUM: For more photos of Banbury click here to go to Matilda Rose's blog spot

Trains, Boats and Planes

2011-11-11T04:18:00.000-08:00

When we got nearer to Banbury, Dave contacted his pal Mike, (who lives in Llangollen), and is a train driver with Chiltern railways, as he sometimes has a stop-over in Banbury, but not this time (in the hope of a pint in the Raindeer). Mike said he would be passing through Banbury station Wed afternoon and would keep an eye out for Beefur on the way, as the railway line and canal run side by side for quite a distance around Cropredy/Banbury. So Dave surprised him by turning up at Banbury station to give him a wave and congratulations for becoming a granddad. Quite a coincidence, as this was the first time Mike was driving a loco for 8 months (proper engine), instead of the more modern Chiltern units. No time to dawdle, schedules to keep, so with a flurry of horn blasts as he left the station, he was on his way to Marylebone, scaring the passengers on the platforms to death!

And on to boats, lovely old working boats and buttys in various stages of repair on the way into Cropredy...

some fully restored

some not

and some newly built.

And so to planes, well the nearest thing to a plane was a ~~woka woka~~ chinook, swooping very low, and one of a pair. Something else that made the cat shoot inside. Woos.

Cropredy to Banbury

2011-11-10T04:18:00.000-08:00

Disaster at Cropredy !!! The Red Lion has closed. What a great shame, this was a lovely pub which closed down without warning last week. This resulted in us going to the Brasenose pub instead. Dave bought our beers - fine - Hooky at £3.20 a pint. Pricey but ok. Graham & Gill arrived & bought a pint of brakespear - at £3.70 a pint. G choked & spluttered & complained. "Not our fault - blame the brewery" was the reply! I suppose we'll have to get used to southern prices the further down we go. We've also lost Nick & Suzanne on Midlands Today, it's now BBC Oxford. Without Shifali in charge of the weather, who knows what's going to happen now.

This is the first time Dave and I have come down this canal on one boat, the previous times we've been single handed on two boats. Bit of a novelty being chauffeur driven. Major flood alleviation works going on around the M40 here, which has encroached on the lovely isoloated lock cottage at Bourton, leaving them with a few feet of garden at the back before a whopping great 20 foot bank of earth, obscuring any views they may have had. The cottage itself remains unoccupied, unsurprisingly.

Matilda Rose entering the lock just before Banbury.

Our mooring, right in the town centre. Nemo had a bit of a shock last night - he was chased back into the boat at 11pm, by what I assumed was a dog, I stuck my head out of the side hatch, to find a fox standing by the back of the boat. I don't know who's tail was fluffier - the fox's or Nemo's. He didn't venture very far after that!

Thankfully, Ye Olde Raindeer pub was alive and kicking! Beautiful 15th century pub serving a variety of local Hook Norton ales, at £3.30 / pint.

Mousefest at Wormleighton

2011-11-08T07:26:00.000-08:00

We've not been getting much sleep lately, due to Nemo cat bringing us presents in the night. Gill & Graham have had the same problem with Daisy - though she doesn't go out at night. So we've got Daisy taking the day shift & Nemo the night shift. We'd better move on from this spot before the whole mouse population is depleated. Nemo brought in 5 mice last night, 4 alive and one dead. We managed to catch them, as we now have a cunning plan in place to retrieve said mice:- Nemo brings mouse in & sits under the bed. We then trap him (and mouse) under the bed using tin trays, lift up the bed base (we've got a cross double which folds up) then quickly trap mouse in plastic jug. This usually works, but last night unfortunately a particularly lively mouse made a dash for freedom before the tin trays were in place, and dived into the skirting board & hid between the pipes. We managed to extracate mouse with the aid of a spatula, a delicate operation trying not to move the pipes too much. A split or leaking pipe is not what you want at 3am!

Yes you ......

Nemo's taken over the sofa as he's had such a busy night

Dave getting some help from Nemo on the computer

Scouting for mice

The Summit Pound

2011-11-07T11:26:00.000-08:00

On our way to one of our favourite moorings on 'the summit' pound, we came accross many signs "say no to HS2", and also this one...

Hope you can read it ok - it says "you are about to go under HS2", and this is it ....

What a lovely bit of the canal - which could be destroyed. I find it very difficult to justify the argument of ploughing up the countryside in the pursuit of a couple of minutes saved on one's journey time - when we spend our day languishing in the slow lane, with a top speed of 4mph, downhill with the wind behind us. Dave's view however is completely opposite, and fully supports it. Hmmmmm!!!

Beefur, with Matilda Rose behind.

We haven't seen a boat today, after the flurry of activity of boats going up and down the Napton Locks before the stoppage started today. Yesterday we saw a hire boat from Anderson at Middlewich heading south. I hope the realise about the locks shutting today - cos they can't now get back. I suspect it's one of the hire fleet which has been sold at the end of the season, we've seen alot of hire boats shuffling between hire bases, and new owners taking newly purchased boats to their new mooring. We had a lovely view for bonfire night - far enough away not to upset the cats and dogs, but we could still see the illuminations.

Well I certainly didn't expect to be dead-heading on 7th November, after planting the flowers back in May, but they're still going strong ....

Fuschias & geraniums still going strong

Napton

2011-11-05T11:12:00.000-07:00

We had a lovely night in The Folly, food and ale was excellent & landlord was very welcoming. The Folly shop next door was open 9am-7pm, which is a bonus, considering it's now out of season. (CLICK HERE FOR GREAT PHOTOS OF THE PUB).

We moved up the Napton locks, as they are due to close for winter maintenance from Monday 7th, till the end of November. You can just about make out the Napton windmill on the brow of the hill.

One of the locks, preparing for the stoppage ....

Surprisingly, these were a herd of buffalo grazing in the field at lock 12.

We're meeting up with Matilda Rose again tomorrow, and then slowly continue our way down the South Oxford canal.

Long Itchington & wide beams

2011-11-03T11:16:00.000-07:00

We hung around Long Itchington for a couple of days but had to move on in order to get to the top of Napton by the 7th November due to stoppages. We stopped at the Blue Lias for water & Dave was approached by a couple who's shiny new boat was moored just off the water point, (we knew the boat was new due to the cellophane still on the brass mushrooms). "Is this where you get water then?". Yes, Dave replied. "But how do you open the box?" they continued. "With a BW key". "What's that then?" Dave explained what the key was for, and that they would find the key on their key ring, which they retreived to examine. Dave then had to explain how to look out for water points (buy a guide book). They listened intently and thanked Dave for his trouble. No idea how long they had been without water. Well, that's another well researched start to life afloat then!!!!

Up the Stockton flight alone - Matilda Rose had departed a couple of days earlier to Braunston. We're meeting up again at Napton in a couple of days time.

Hello swan-ee

~~The two planks~~ Oak and Ash hotel boats moored up at Birdingbury wharf, season over.

Some unusual boats around, we're in wide beam country now ......

How 'bout one of these on the Llangollen !!

More wide beams - BW this time

One way of walking 3 dogs at a time - let them pull you along.

Right turn onto the Oxford Canal, and into Napton, with the windmill visible for miles around. (Sorry about the quality of photos, I'm still using my phone for photos, and hoping Father Christmas will deliver a new digital camera.)

Loads of photos today, as we're taking advantage of the Folly's free Wi-Fi. The Folly is 'under new management' and is 10 times better than the last time we were here - but still not the same without (Dotty) Lottie.

Google Ate My Blogspot!

2011-11-02T09:16:00.000-07:00

We're back - after the blogspot mysteriously disappeared for a few days - "Account removed" for no reason whatsoever. After asking Google to explain why this had happened, it reappeared, with an email apology. We still don't know what happened, or why, but it all seems to be working again (touch wood).

After catching up with Gill & Graham on Matilda Rose, we decended the Lapworth flight in fantastic weather. After a brief pit-stop at Kingswood Junction to use the BW recycling facility, (which, incidentally - someone had again dumped their rubbish bags into the recycling ggrrrrr), we turned off the Stratford Canal, and onto the Grand Union.

Left turn Clyde

We decided to stop at Tom O'The Woods - purely as a fact finding mission of course - to see that now it has re-opened, it was better than the last time we stopped here, thankfully it was.

A "project" boat

Shrewley tunnel, with horse tunnel to the right.

We moved on to Hatton, so we could celebrate Dave's 19th anniversary of living afloat and had a meal in the Waterman. Very nice, with good beer. The first day of Dave's life afloat back in October 1992, was spent breaking ice on the Leicester branch of the Grand Union, so we can't really moan about the weather - YET!

Another glorious day spent decending the Hatton flight, with Beefur & Matilda Rose strapped together, but steering like a brick. I was nomiated driver for the day & this is the only photo I took as I was too busy clenching the tiller and concentrating!

Gill took some lovely photos though (CLICK HERE)

Down, down, down to Warwick & Leamington Spa where we only stopped to do a Tesco shop & didn't do any exploring this time, as we've been there many times before, both by boat, and from visiting Rachel in Kenilworth up the road.

The towpath had been taken over at this point, with Gill having to pick her way through the kids, wheelbarrows of wood, and three legged dogs (yes really). This is the spot near Radford Semele that we found all that wood last year, a 'community' has now grown around it!

Then it's up, up, up again towards Long Itchington. Oh, by the way, if you need to use the elsan point at Fosse Wharf - dont! It was absolutely disgusting. It doesn't have a BW lock and is open for all and sundry to use. If the Environmental Health bods saw the state of it - they'd close it down. Dave said he would have cleaned it if we had a couple of hours to spare, as it is a facility we need to keep.

Out of Brum & on to Stratford-On-Avon Canal

2011-10-24T16:08:00.000-07:00

After doing the necessary at the BW point at Cambrian Wharf, (that's filling and emptying) we were on our way. Through the middle of Birmingham City Centre, through Gas Street Basin and the lovely old working boats, under Broad Street and a sharp right turn at The Cube. We passed Barrie Johnson NB White Locks of the BCNS, who had also been at the Stourbridge Rally. Which reminds me:- Dave bumped into John Dunn off NB Druid in the middle of the Bull Ring Market the other day. He wasn't at the Stourbridge Rally this year, or last year, and people were getting quite concerned about him. His boat is now moored at Dadford's on the Delph. He is no longer on the water and the boat has been passed to "a member of the family". So, after much speculation - he is alive! - but not that well, arthritis having caught up with him & he can't do single handed boating any more. Can still talk for England tho!

We've cooked our cheap chicken, bought with a fight from the indoor market on Saturday. I've never been shouted at by a butcher before for not buying his meat. It was a real eye opener. I didn't understand why customers for each meat stand were congregating at one end of each counter, until the butcher stall holder started bellowing "LISTEN! £10 FOR THIS TRAY". It slowly dawned on us that as it was 4pm on a Saturday, the butchers were selling their stock off cheaply. Talk about country bumpkins in the city! We stood our ground and said meekly "but we only want £5 worth, very sorry but we havent got the room for all that chicken". Loud Butcher shouted at us some more, but then gave us half a tray worth, for £5. We then ran away, leaving the masses glued to the display cabinets of the meat counters, ready to pounce on their bargains. That's our city visiting done for another year!

The debris/litter from the Great Birmingham Run the day before was still in evidence, despite the litter pickers from Brindley Place. We encountered a few silver 'blankets' in the canal and lots of discarded plastic water bottles. Shame about the competitors making such a mess around the place - after running for such noble causes. Brindley Place was quite a different scene this Monday morning - all black suits and briefcases - rather than the lycra clad mobs of yesterday.

New Aqueduct and new overpass - though the grafitti artists have found a lovely new surface to deface....

Onto the Stratford on Avon Canal, and past that strange place that is Dickens Heath. A huge conglomeration of flats and houses in the middle of nowhere!

We've caught up with NB Matilta Rose, strangely enough at the Blue Bell Cider House, and we may or may not be moving on tomorrow - depending on the weather.

Birmingham Markets and The Great Run

2011-10-23T11:56:00.000-07:00

I've returned to Dave, the boat and Nemo pusss in Birmingham, and we decided to stay a couple more days so we could do a bit of shopping and exploring. Nemo is not as neurotic as I thought he would be in the city, and has found sanctuary behind the gates of the closed Fiddle & Bone. Stourbridge's busy towpath seems to have hardened him up abit. Saturday night was busy for boats, with 3 separate operators running boat trips and party nights, with the usual hen parties belting out "I will survive" as they trundle past.

Work on the construction of the new library continues...

A bit more to the structure than our last visit to Brum, 12 months ago, when work had not long started..

Stop Press!!! We have found the Andean pipe music man! Horah! He's alive and well, busking outside the Rag Market, it's been a while since we last saw him in Nuneaton, but I am pleased to report that he sounds just the same.

We had a good mooch round the indoor meat market and found some goat in a Halal butchers - yes - the curry was lovely. We also came accross a butchers (if you can call it that) selling offal, including chicken feet (as per pic below) all sorts of bits of stomach (whole and bits), pig snouts, yep just the snout, and sheep heads (I refrained from taking a picture as it was enough to put you off your dinner). What do you cook with chicken feet? Chicken foot pie? Chicken foot omlette? The mind boggles.... (Dave suggested chicken fajitas) We've stocked up on all the curry ingredients we can think of, so hopefully the stocks will last till we visit again.

There's a heron perched on the top of the Sea Life Centre - no doubt sussing out if he can get into the open otter enclosure below him.

Today Sunday, was extremely busy round the NIA area due to the Birmingham Great Run. We watched the start on the telly, then went to see the finish line on Broad Street. There were thousands of people milling around between Brindley Place & Broad Street. Glad to see Batman & Robin completed the course (saw them on tv, they're centre picture with the black capes). Unfortunately the silver blankets were discarded by some & stuffed into plant pots and left lying around. No doubt the council will have everything cleaned up by morning.

Looking towards Broad Street and the finish line..

The atmosphere round the finish line was fantastic, with thousands of people cheering on the competitors. The commentry from radio BRMB was spot on, enthusiastic and encouraging people over the finish line. Quite emotional really. All the bars around the canal side were heaving with competitors and their supporters tucking into chips and lager! It was great to be able to sit around outside at the end of October and watch the throngs, that's throngs not thongs. All in all a brilliant couple of days, we've been back to The Wellington & sampled a couple of their 40 beers on offer. Dave was disappointed that he couldn't get into the Prince of Wales today, due to the number of people, you physically couldn't get through the door - good for the pub tho!

Tomorrow we move on, and catch up with NB Matilda Rose.

Power problems solved - that's 4 new batteries then!

2011-10-22T15:21:00.000-07:00

On our way to Brum: Well it's bye bye Stourbridge for another year. We have solved the power problems - it wasn't the inverter (after buying a new one), and it wasn't the fridge. No - we didn't buy a new one. Despite the Numax batteries showing "green" for good, on the indicators, and despite them being less than 2 years old, the batteries were shot. We have now bought 4 new batteries and (touch wood) all is functioning as it should. Thank you Martin Brookes at Stourton for the testing equipment. Dave did try and sort it out at the dry dock at Stourbridge, but the new guy there was disinterested & couldn't be bothered in such a trivial thing as no power on a narrowboat.

Pic below - Albert is waving goodbye - he's one of the three (yes 3) employed to move Tenacious & Temeraire with the owner, the 7 miles & 7 locks back to their base. Albert tends to pop up unexpectedly at locks and start lockwheeling - we've known him for many years round Stourbridge and the BCN, but also at Audlem, Tyreley and bizzarly in Llangollen of all places (no locks there tho).

It was another lovely couple of days for cruising. Up the Stourbridge locks and past the Red House |Glass Cone.

Up and up the Stourbridge and Delph locks

To Merry Hill where we moored for the night

Netherton Hill in the distance, which we'll be skirting round on the way to join the Main Line

Through the waterfront at Merry Hill. There was a boat moored here, can't remember the name, only the owners (as signwritten in big letters) "Norfolk and Chance". Charming! We stopped for a meal at Wetherspoons, we thought cheap and cheerful would be the order of the day after forking out so much on batteries and an inverter - we had 4 drinks and two main meals for less than £20!

Getting closer to Netherton Hill, with the church spires poking through the trees.

Lots of wonderful new sculptures and mile posts on the Dudley Canal...

Still without graffitti

Windmill End

And into the Netherton Tunnel, where there was a workboat moored in the right in the middle of the tunnel. Luckily we did see workmen walking around with torches on their helmets, but the boat wasn't clearly distinguishable. There's light at the end of the tunnel....

And eventually - after 40 minutes and 3058 yards - out the other end

and onto the Main Line, with it's toll islands

Under the M5 and the old line canal

And into Birmingham City Centre, where we'll stay for a few days, giving me time to visit Mum, for what would have been Dad's birthday.

Power problems, delays & another dunking for Nemo

2011-10-18T14:46:00.000-07:00

Well, that's Stourbridge done for another year. The weather over the weekend was fantastic, which brought the crowds out - not so many boats this year - only 58. Never mind, next year is the Staffs & Worcs 50th anniversary for The Battle of Stourbridge so hopefully, the number of boats attending the rally will be over the 100 mark. Dave will miss visiting his favourite pub (The Royal Exchange on Enville Street) He'll probably have to wait another 12 months for his next pint of Bathams!
We met up with lots of friends over the weekend - and made some new ones too. But time to move on and start cruising - now i've (finally) picked up my new glasses from Specsavers. They look like and feel like safety visors. I'm sure they're not the ones I picked!

Here we are at the Exchange on a lovely sunny afternoon: Frank & Gill (NB Fragil), Me, Ken & Judy (NB Flying Fox) & Sandra (NB Iapetus) & Ken & Judy's dog - who's name I can't remember I'm afraid. Ken, Judy, Sandra & Brian (not in picture) have just returned from 2 weeks on the Caledonian Canal - they hired a boat & didn't take their own! They managed to pick the 2 weeks in September when the sun came out for their trip, and highly recommended it. Oh - and that's the BCN committee having a meeting on the table behind us (they weren't there just for the beer)

We've been having trouble with our power over the last few weeks. We thought it was the inverter, so changed the fan, which made things worse and it packed up, so we bought a new 1800w inverter. We still have problems, so it wasn't the inverter after all. Which left batteries or fridge - either way it was going to cost money. After testing and re-testing, isolating, & recharging, we have discovered it's the batteries - initially ruled out as 3 of them are less than 2 years old. So it's 4 new batteries, which we are hoping will be delivered tomorrow (Wed), fingers crossed as we want to get into Birmingham on Thursday so I can go home & visit mum for a few days. This will leave Dave free to visit is 2nd favourite pub - The Wellington, which i've raved about before. 16 hand pull ales plus more for cider. No food served, but if you'd like to bring your own in, they will provide knives, forks, plates and condiments, and clear away afterwards - how good is that! Unfortunately we're a week too early for the Birmingham Beer Festival from 27th - 29th October, but depending on where we are, we'll try and get back by bus (cat permitting).

Whilst waiting for this to upload, Nemo cat has taken another dive into the canal. He's been dodging bikes at 40mph on the towpath, drunks, dogs and hoards of people whilst moored at Stourbridge. We get into the countryside & he takes a dive off the wrong side of the boat. We've been moored right side to towpath for almost 2 weeks now & he still jumped off the wrong side. As I've said before.. not the brightest button on your shirt that cat.....

Stourbridge Open Weekend / Boat Gathering

2011-10-15T14:55:00.000-07:00

The open weekend is in full swing, with boats everywhere! Lots of beautiful working boats here, all with brasses shining & engines popping. What a wonderful day for it!

Beefur & Fragil competing for the "who's got the tallest aerial" competition.

You know you're getting old ... when the car you learned to drive in is now a "vintage"!

At least it wasn't one of these though....

Ah - police cars when they were round and friendley (Ken Smith had one of these)

Back to boats - this should solve any arguments about being "under propped"

The always immaculately turned out boat & butty Tenacious & Temeraire

Lord Mayor's parade & cavelcade returning to the Stourbridge Arm to the noise of boat horns and bugles.

Of course there's always one ... This boat decided to go for a jaunt just as the Lord Mayor's procession was rounding the bend heading through the line of working boats, thus sending all the boat in the flotilla into reverse and subsequently sideways. Ah well, all adds to the spectacle I suppose.

Stourbridge

2011-10-15T08:57:00.000-07:00

We've been in Stourbridge for a week now, while Dave has been doing bits and bobs around the area, such as painting out the grafitti & clearing up dog poo etc, just to tidy things up ready for the boat rally - or "Open Weekend" as it's called. Boats have been arriving thick and fast over the last couple of days, and the organisers are hoping for anything up to 80 boats. On the day we arrived last week, there happened to be a jazz night in the bonded warehouse so we went along - it was great. Packed out & very entertaining.

Old arms & buildings on the way into the Stourbridge Arm.

Stourbridge Town Hall (opened 1887)

Unfortunately, Stourbridge town in plagued with charity shops. There's a shop for every charity you could think of - from the usual Oxfam & various children's charities - to "Happy Staffie Rescue". I haven't counted them, but there must be more than 25! Sadly, the indoor market area is deserted, but there are plans for it's redevelopment - by Tesco. There's a beautiful clock there, which gives a lovely display at 12 noon, when the figures go round....

We'll be here till at least Tuesday, which will give us time to visit the laundrette, collect my new glasses (eyes that is - not the chink chink cheers variety - although with all these glass works around here.....)

End of the Shroppie & onto Staffs & Wus

2011-10-04T09:55:00.000-07:00

A slow couple of hours on Sunday, as we hit a fishing competition just before Wheaton Aston - miles of em! A boat travelling towards us warned us they were there & he had counted 72 fishermen. It was amusing to see, as we approached them, that they turn away & rummage in their maggot pots to avoid making eye contact. How about one of them, just one, saying "Thank you for going at tick over". That'd make a nice change.

The wind was making things very difficult between the M54 and Autherley junction as it's quite exposed. We were pleased to be turning onto the S & W where we were a bit more sheltered.

This mini narrowboat is moored at Oxley, unfortunately it wasn't moored next to another 'normal' size narrowboat, so you can see the difference in size. Just after turning onto the S&W, a lovely surprise - Dave produced a bottle of bubbly which he'd been hiding in the gas locker, to celebrate our anniversary! He's after brownie points .... We moored above Dimingsdale locks & walked up to The Greyhound at Lower Penn which was featured in the local CAMRA brochure. Another great find. Hand pulls, great local beer, good food - bit pricey tho' but it was our anniversary after all. (More brownie points for Dave)

Thanks Mum for the lovely oasis you gave us last week as we wouldn't be around for 'the day'.

I love these things, someone with ALOT of time on their hands has been defacing/enhancing (which ever view you take), old tree stumps and sign posts all the way down the cut. Makes me smile anyway!

Beautiful old plough at Awbridge lock

When we arrived at the Bratch today, there was a bloke with a camera who asked if we would mind him filming us entering the locks. No problem says Dave, as I dived inside to put some slap & lippy on! No pressure then - I was driving & thankfully didnt touch the sides & we descended perfectly - being filmed each step of the way. Phew.

No I haven't got the picture the wrong way round - this is the stonework exiting Greensforge lock, showing genuine erosion caused be ropes on the stone - rather than the stuck on false stuff you see on the sides of bridges.

Last pic of the day, beautiful deer sculptures at the garden centre Greensforge. Moored tonight below Rocky lock. Stourbridge tomorrow, as it's a convenient place for Dave to get to his Aunty's funeral in Plymouth, then we're there for the clean up weekend, the weekend before the rally.

Blakemere to the Anchor

2011-10-02T10:11:00.000-07:00

We had a night with our friend Bill at Colemere (A.K.A. Steam Boat Bill) who had made a 'lightning machine' Tesla coil, amazing - but very noisy. We continued on our way the next morning feeling rather delicate after one too many bottles of the red stuff.

Lightning indoors!!!

For this next bit of the journey, it would help set the scene if you would hum the theme tune to the film "Jaws" duh duh, duh duh, duh duh, duh duh, duh duh, duh duh dahhhh! "There's something in the water" AGHHHHH It's Jawcals (Jaws) the day boat from Trevor Basin, sneaking up on us round Bettisfield as we stopped for water! There's no getting away from them. The good news however, is that it's been sold, and Jack from Anglo Welsh is delivering it to Norbury Junction. (As I write this blog, moored at The Anchor, Jawcals passes us again).

We caught up with Jack again at Grindley Brook where I helped him down the single locks, as we were in a queue to go down the staircase. When I returned to the top Beefur was next in line (3rd) to go down. "There's no one coming up" I said to the lockkeeper, "Is that a fact? No one's told me" very grumpily (you've probably worked it out that it wasn't Gary on duty that day). "Yes, actually, it is a fact!" Dave explained to Mr. Grumpy that I'd been to the bottom of the locks to lock the day boat down & noted that there wasn't any one on their way up, & thought he might like to know, as the boats were stacking up at the top. "Sue! sorry I didn't recognise you". I was only trying to be friendly to an ex-colleague, I shan't bother next time!

We thankfully got through the Wrenbury lift bridge without incident - unlike friends Ken & Denise a couple of weeks ago: Denise operated the bridge & Ken went through without problem, but then the bridge would not go down. The traffic was piling up, and tempers were fraying for the jammed motorists, who by now had started honking horns. A farmer who was also in the queue, jumped out of his tractor with a large sledgehammer and started to walk towards the bridge. "Its not my fault" shouted Denise at the farmer, whereupon he wacked the bridge with his sledgehammer, and it started to descend "That's got it, it's been playing up for weeks & BW were here to fix it this morning".

Fantastic sunrise near Wrenbury

From Wrenbury, we had a leisurely 30 mins walk to the Bhurtpore Inn. A fantastic pub with 15 handpulls, extensive menu and great food. Well worth a detour from the canal. Beautiful old buildings here, this one states that it was built in 1667!

We don't think we've ever seen so many boats around at this time of year. We've queued at nearly every lock. Loads of boats at Coole Pilate, including blogger NB Armadillo, we exchanged pleasantries as we passed by & carried on our way.

As we went through Market Drayton, this little black dog fancied his chances with 7 very large signets, mum and dad. Needless to say, he backed off pretty quickly!

We continued our journey - no time for leisurely stops, as we had a rendevous at The Anchor, high Offley, with friends Mike & Hazel (NB Tess of Wooton), who were going to set up their tent there for the night. We have never seen so many boats at The Anchor & the pub was heaving, stuffed to the gunnels with boaters and campers, with most tables outside occupied, which was a wonderful treat to be able to sit outside till late at this time of year. There were plenty of musicians, and we had a fantastic night, and even stayed till after midnight - very unusual for us - we only do "early doors"!

Off we go!

2011-09-27T07:12:00.000-07:00

Bit of a monologue today, trying to catch up: We finally ‘set sail’ at 4pm Sunday, after loading the wood onto the roof, and watching the F1 Grand Prix. Button 2^nd, so worth waiting for. We’re “spot the live-aboards” traversing the cut, huge amounts of wood covered with plastic sheets, though the flowers seem to lessen the impact. We knew the weather would change for the better, as se swapped our summer clothes for winter outfits from my Mum’s loft, and retrieved all the wooly jumpers, hats, scarves, gloves, wellies & sou’westers. The weather is glorious, and we’re appreciating it in our vests.

We made it to the Lion Quays & had a mediocre meal served in a poncy bowl. Is it too much to ask to have a dinner on a plate? There were a lot of boats on the move & still a queue coming up New Marton Locks on Monday, no problem for us going down. No doubt there’ll be a queue Wed morning coming down when they all return from Llangollen. We moored in our favourite spot at the end of Blakemere Monday evening, for me to admire the sunset over the mere, whilst Dave walked back to the White Heart. Good news - after a few years of temporary managers and periods of closure, the pub is open and serving great beer with 4 hand pulls. The current Landlord has sold his house, given up his day job and moved in full time and wants to make a go of it. I just hope the brewery don’t do their usual trick of doubling the rent as they start to make a profit.

The queue to go up New Marton bottom lock

People have been lovely over the last few days. The usual dog walkers, pram pushers & locals have been shouting across “not long now till you’re off”. “You’re like swallows” said Elver, the old guy who walks his very fat choc lab past every morning, “be glad to see you back next year - I’ll know summer is on its way”. A local spotted us passing his canal side house on our way to the winding hold, and was waiting for us on our return, arm outstretched with some eggs from his bantams “for the journey” Very kind. We’ve also had people shouting at us “keep blogging”, which was very encouraging. Thanks all.

As we passed Frankton Junction, the two planks - sorry - Oak & Ash Hotel Boats, were being tethered together after having come up the locks. We then quickened our pace, as we didn’t want him tailgating us all the way to Ellesmere. He passed our mooring last Friday morning, again shouting abuse at a passing hire boat (who was desperately trying to get out of his way) and unnecessarily hitting their bow whilst holding his hand on the horn for ages. No need for that.

We had a “Hoot off” last night at Blakemere, with quite a few owls calling to each other in the trees above our heads as we sat on the front deck in the darkness. I wanted to grab my phone and record it all, but was afraid of moving in case I disturbed them.

View from the front of the boat this morning at Blakemere

The optimist in me says, If it continues to be as good as it has been over the last few days, then we’re in for a wonderful cruise. Life doesn’t get better than this. The Pessimist says: I hope we haven’t peaked to early!

the House at bridge 62 has finally been sold, its so overgrown now, so no doubt will be completeley transformed by the time we return next April ...

We’ve stopped at Colemere while pall Bill has a look at our unreliable bubble stove & hijacked his broadband connection. Bloggers Bendigedig went passed on their way up to Llangollen for the winter.

Sans Souci now sold & we're ready to go!

2011-09-22T10:32:00.000-07:00

Sans Souci has been sold and we've delivered her to her new owners at Whixall Marina - so not that far away, and we will no doubt see her again. Dave was very sad to see her go, after all, it was his home for 18 years, but time moves on, neither of us are getting any younger, and single handed boating was becoming more difficult and cost prohibitive, so having the two boats was rather over indulgent. Besides, we have a wonderful home on Beefur. We will both sorely miss the dunky dunk of Sans Souci's single cylinder Armstrong Siddeley. I'm sure the new owners will appreciate her as much as we did. Farewell Susi Babe.

The magnificent AS1 .....

Snapped this boat passing, with exactly the same colour scheme as Beefur. Good Taste.

The flowers are lasting well, so a few indulgent snaps to follow. Hope they last a couple more weeks till we get to the Stourbridge rally mid Oct. Makes driving the boat a bit tricky, you have to look down the sides as the geraniums are too high. Ah well, it adds to the fun, and the colours are fantastic. They've taken too much TLC to get rid of them, the roof will be back to just wood for the fire in no time, so we'll just hang on to this last bit of summer on the roof.

We're all set for the OFF on Sunday. The engine has been serviced. I've stocked up on spares. I've washed everything that wasn't tied down. Brasso-ed the things that were tied down till I ran out of elbow grease. Hazel next door is a whizz with the chain saw, so we've cut up the last of the big logs we collected last winter, in the vain attempt to load them on the roof for our winter fuel this year. Dave won't leave any flowers behind, so there won't be alot of room. I don't know where the summer went, but it's time for us to leave again till next March/April. I've been studying the stoppages, and we think we'll head for Oxford after Stourbridge, till Christmas - then tum-te-tum round the midlands.

We've had our last trip to Llangollen for this year, and managed to sit outside in the Corn Mill in our coats for a bit before whimping out & going inside, it has to be one of the best pubs we have ever been to, and we're lucky enough to have it as a local. It's such a treat to get a pub selling 5 or 6 real ales, with views to die for. The river Dee was running very fierce, but there were still canoeists. This is a pic of a friend of a friend (sorry about the finger in the shot). I can see why her nick name is Marbles - cos she's lost em!

Day boat number 6 arrives

2011-09-05T04:07:00.000-07:00

Another day, another day boat. Day boat number 6 was delivered last week, to add to the fleet operating at Anglo Welsh at Trevor Basin. We had hoped that this meant that one of the old boats would be "retired", but all 6 are operating at the moment.

Brand new boat being delivered - no scratches on the paint - for now.

Dayboat No. 1 "Jawcawls" in action - bouncing off the concrete then into the boat moored in front of us, then back to the concrete. It missed us though.

We seem to have survived the busiest week of the season, August bank holiday week. The kids start to go back to school this week so the number of hire boats decrease, only to be replaced by the private and ownership boats. Although there has been a huge number of boats around this summer (we counted 108 one day), they don't set off at stupid-o'clock in the morning - they're on holiday!!! Unlike the private boats who tear past at 5.30am, so as to get a good run at it [llangollen]. So we're preparing ourselves for a few early starts in the weeks ahead. We'll no doubt get an 'owners club' convoy of 18-20 narrowboats over the next couple of weeks, who always remark "Isn't it busy here?" "Well it wasn't until you lot turned up".

Beefur and Sans Souci out for a final cruise together (more of that in a future blog)

We didn't want to miss out on the fun at such a busy time in August, so we went on a jolly to Ellesmere/Blakemere. On the way back up the locks at New Marton, we were number 3 in the queue going up, which is great for this time of year. However, the queue at the top lock waiting to come down was something else - 14 boats. We must have passed another 25-30 boats over the next 2 hours, all heading for the queue. You queue to go up on a Tuesday, and queue to go down on a Wednesday, always the busiest days of the week. Unfortunately, when you meet the boats coming down they're all grumpy for having had to queue and then rush you through the locks ("helping") by opening the top paddles with gusto before you've fully entered the lock "OI - it's OUR lock, OUR boat, OUR home, slow down or step away".

On a lighter note, Beefur's flowers are exceptional this year, and we are the proud recipients of the certificate for "Best narrowboat" as part of the Best Kept Garden Competition 2011 (Wales in Bloom), awarded by Llangollen Rural Community Council. Just for a bit of community spirit, but it makes it very rewarding when you actually win something for your efforts.

Squid-tastic!

2011-08-25T07:56:00.000-07:00

Our pal Nigel has been out and about showing off his new paint job......

Courtesy of the artist Phlegm (awful name)

Another day, another day boat. My heart sank last week, when day boat number 5 was delivered to Anglo Welsh at Trevor Basin. I had hoped that it would replace one of the other 4, but sadly no - all 5 were out on Saturday.

Thank you for slowing down!

We've been out and about ourselves most weekends during this summer, either up to Llangollen or downhill to Ellesmere or down the Monty. Rachel & co came to stay with Mum a couple of weeks ago, so of course we had to do a boat trip. On another occasion, we had a wonderful afternoon in Llangollen watching Thomas the Tank and friends - including the Fat Controller. Fantastic! (Yes - we were watching from the balcony of the Corn Mill!)

I haven't blogged due to the fact that (1) my phone did not like being connected to the computer, so couldn't download any pics, and (2) the camera packed up - and remains dead. Last couple of pics for today ... Nemo cat celebrated his 1st birthday, which is a remarkable achievement due to the amount of times he's fallen in the canal. He is - i'm very pleased to say, a little more sturdy on his feet now.

Nemo's at the top of the steps, with his next door neighbour Gypsy below him.

Down the Monty

2011-07-19T11:55:00.000-07:00

We've just returned from a few days down the Monty & dragged our neighbour Dai with us with his 70ft long 3ft deep rebuilt ex FMC boat Fern. There were a few bits where he got stuck, but managed to drive a path through by taking a run at it! Unfortunately he can't go any further than Queens Head as he's rather deep drafted & comes to a complete stop just under the road bridge. Not to worry, we still had a lovely peaceful time - quite a contrast to the busy top end of the Llangollen in July. The good news is that Colin the Lockeeper has come out of hospital today and is on the mend. Our best wishes to him for a speedy recovery.

Smile for the camera boys - I said smile Dave !!!

The last bit of towpath of the 11 mile section of World Heritage Site has now been completed, this is through Chirk cutting between the golf course & Chirk Tunnel. Fantastic. It's now accessible by walking, bikes and for wheelchairs all the way from beyond the Poacher's Pocket (almost to the Lion Quays) and up to the Horseshoe Falls at the top end. Unfortunately, there's still a section of about 500 yards through the cutting which has not been, and will not be done - that's the muddiest section in the whole of the 11 mile stretch! It's the only bit that hasn't been upgraded in the last 4 years. As you can see from the picture, the new towpath stops a few yards from where the muddy bit starts. Duh!!

At long last, the "layby" just by Chirk Tunnel has been rebuilt. This offers mooring for 4/5 boats wishing to visit Chirk town for shops, pubs etc, also handy for Chirk Castle. The bad news is that all the mooring rings have been removed and not replaced - so you can't actually moor there anyway - unless you're prepared to be the first to hammer through the newly laid hardcore and concrete. Ah well, it looks nice.... The only alternative for mooring up to visit the town is drive stakes into the soft mud a bit further away, which jump out of the earth as soon as the first boat comes past. I know I shouldn't complain, as the towpath and facilities on this bit of the canal are far superior to others we visit, but it's just so close to being perfect! just a little bit more foresight and we would have been there.

I had to put this pic in - it's the boat & butty selling "canalware" which has been moored at the top of the locks at New Marton for over 2 months now - and it's on the move - a rare sight. It just so happened to be on the same day that we saw the BW licence checker on his way up the canal .....

Jaunt to Blakemere

2011-07-01T03:52:00.000-07:00

We've just returned from a lovely couple of days at Blakemere - it seems that nature is reclaiming the mere, after an absence of wildlife over the last few years (apart from mallards). We saw grebe, swans, canada geese with goslings, herons, oddly enough - an oyster catcher, and much to Dave's delight the first kingfisher of the year. There was a noticable absence of fishermen - is this a coincidence ...... ?

The weather on sunday was fabulous, we were thankfully moored under the trees on the side of the mere. Unfortunately the sun brings out the most inappropriate attire - shorts short enough to make one's eyes water - and that's the men who are old enough to know better, and very large women wearing not very much on top - and don't start me on the men wearing no shirts !!!

We passed a field full of lambs, which had been separated from their mums. Lambs on one side of the canal and ewes on the other side. All bleating at eachother - what a racket! One lamb made a dive for his mum (the black one in the picture) but then couldnt get out of the canal on the other side. It did eventually get itself out onto the "lamb" side field with the help of me with the boat pole "persuading" it back to the correct bank, or put another way, poking it with a stick.

Lambs on one side of the canal

Ewes on the other. That reminds me, must get mutton out of the freezer.

We were boat no.6 in the queue to come up the locks at New Marton, so I jumped off the boat with my windlass to help things along abit. As I approached the lock, a woman who was shutting the top gate shouted at me "C'mon, hurry up, start winding". "I'll wait until the steerer is ready" I replied & waited for the nod from the boat going down, then opened a paddle. Organising woman trundles over to me - "which boat are you on?" "The one at the back of the queue" I replied. "Oh, sorry" she said, "I thought you were on a hire boat". I shook my head and tutted at her & walked away, as it wasn't worth wasting my breath, she too was "helping" at the lock and had nothing to do with the boat going down - she too was waiting to come up. This is what the hire boats have to put up with, this superiority complex. By the way, there was also a bloke at the lock, locking boats up and down who was from a hire boat waiting to come up in the queue, he was getting stuck in & getting the queue down while the owners of the private boats waiting to come up, just sat on board and watched. We did see some terrible examples of pushy private boats over the last few days. There is definitely a hierarchy involved - my boat is shinier than yours, so therefore I can push past you and tut tut at your inefficient driving methods. Not so shiny boats can't shout at the shiny boats, so they have a go at the hire boats, and think its good sport to push past if anyone is aground or having trouble - so making the situation 10 times worse.

Soggy picnic in the park concert in Chirk Castle

2011-06-16T08:17:00.000-07:00

I'm sure you remember what the weather was like on Sunday (12th) - it rained all day without stopping. This was of course the day of the open air concert in Chirk Castle billed as "The picnic in the park", and featuring Stuart & David Kempster, and Froncysyllte Male Voice Choir.
[Newspaper article] Of course I didn't take my camera, so you'll have to try & imagine the scene of hundreds of umbrellas of various size and colour trying to keep the masses of wellie wearers dry from the rain. I volunteered to be the driver for the night - somehow the appeal of "picnic in the park" with a rain diluted pinot grigio didn't have the same allure as it would do on a balmy spring evening. The performers were fantastic but the concert was unfortunately marred by the sound system which was rubbish and nowhere near loud enough. http://www.fronchoir.com/Photo/2011/Chirk3.htm Despite the rain we still had a lovely time.

2011-06-04T09:47:00.000-07:00

Went for a fantastic walk today, from the top of Froncysyllte, accross the tops to Llangollen. makes a pleasant change from walking on the flat along the canal. The views were breathtaking .....

You can make out the ridge of Beeston Castle many miles away & Peckforton hill

looking down on Cefn Viaduct & the A482 Newbridge Bypass bridge to the right

The Aqueduct & Trevor

Looking towards Llangollen. The white blob in the centre is the eisteddfod pavilion

Dinas Bran

The intrepid walkers

Must be a record breaking day for boats

2011-06-02T01:22:00.000-07:00

On Tuesday (30th May) we had a total of 104 boats go past us. Yes, I know, we must get out more, but as we were here all day and the previous few days had seemed rather busy for boats, and Tuesdays are always the busiest day of the week, we counted each boat that went past. The majority of these boats were going to Llangollen, so today Wednesday, they're all coming back down. I doubt there were any moorings free in Llangollen on Tuesday night, which - rumour has it - will be increasing the mooring fee from £6 per night to £10 per night from next year. Whichever way you look at it, 104 boat movements is rather alot. We hope that this year will be similar to last year - everyone comes up the Llangollen canal in spring to avoid the "busy" time of the summer, so the summer isn't really as bad as people like to make out. We haven't even been hit this week - yet - (I shouldn't have written that statement down).

Well we're now into June and the BW Visitor Information Centre at Trevor Basin remains closed. Surprisingly the army of volunteers hasn't materialised ........

I'm able to blog again after ditching Vodafone and switching to Orange. This was after downloading "improvement software" from Vodafone corrupted all sorts of files on my computer and rendered it useless. Vodafone said it wasn't their problem, & PC World didn't want to know either, despite paying them £8 per month to fix any problems. So it was back and to between the two shops, getting more and more frustrated. PC World eventually agreed to fix the problem - but only after bumping into an old friend who happened to work there! I think we'll do the same with the mobile phones as the signal strength for Vodafone is hit and miss here in Fron. So now the computer is working again, here's a few random photos I wanted to publish but couldn't:

Above: Royal Wedding Day and here's the Queen, Prince Phillip, Kate Middleton and two corgies aboard the hire boat Romantic Lady.

This duck roamed back and forth collecting ducklings as she went - she ended up with 28 of varying sizes.

Beefur with Llangollen moorings to ourselves - before the season started.

Having a glass of ribena with Graham & Jill on Matilda Rose when they visited back in April.

We met up with MR again two weeks later down the Monty - the weather had changed for the worse by then, with rain coming down like stair rods. Luckily for me, it was Dave's turn to drive the boat. It's still beautiful down there - whatever the weather.

Moorers Outing to Llangollen

2011-06-01T04:17:00.000-07:00

We decided to join in the bank holiday weekend ~~chaos~~ fun, and have a moorers outing and go for a pint in the Corn Mill. I took Beefur up to Llangollen on Saturday morning, while Dave was working - which is the best time of the week to travel there as there's not many boats about, and he joined me when he finished work at 6pm (he was busy sending Chirk hire boats this way). Tip: avoid Tues & Wed. Rick & Hazel on NB Tipsy Toad and Dai with the huge ex FMC workingboat Fern, arrived on Sunday. The weather kept fine enough for us to sit outside on the decking of the Corn Mill, watching the dippers on the river, and steam trains puffing in and out of the station.

L-R: Rick, Hazel, Dai, Sue & Dave

Beefur, Fern and Tipsy Toad in Llangollen moorings, with Black Prince boat Eva with a lovely couple from Australia on it who joined in with the boaty banter and a glass of wine (or two).

As usual, we waited for the trip boat Thomas Telford to depart from Llangollen, and tucked in behind him - he then carved a path through, but was soon out of sight! Another tip - let him go first! Trevor Basin was entertaining on a Bank Holiday Monday & with us three boats turning up at the same time added to the free spectacle for the gongoozlers. We luckily found space to moor for a pie and a pint in The Telford before returning to our moorings. Great weekend.

Good news - we now have a village pub again. The Aqueduct Inn has reopened for business, positive feedback so far, but we need a couple of days to dry out before giving it a go.

More BW Cuts - No job for me this season

2011-04-01T10:19:00.000-07:00

British Waterways have decided NOT to open the Trevor Basin Visitor Information Centre this season. They hope that the centre may be manned by volunteers in the future, but there will NOT be any BW staff there this season. I do think this is a backwards step by BW - and not just because I loved the job! After 10 years of hard work by various bodies (including BW), 11 miles of canal, was awarded World Heritage Status in June 2009, it's centre piece being the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct. The whole area has attracted more and more visitors year on year. I think it is disgraceful that just when the Info Centre was becoming established, as was a rapport with visitors and locals, BW pulls the plug. Being realistic, it was never going to survive the cut backs as the whole area does not generate any income for BW. The fact it's BW's ONLY World Heritage Site, and attracts over half a million visitors a year seems to have passed "the powers that be" by. It's such a backwards step. Surely when BW are trying to increase visitor numbers to the canals, someone in a BW uniform, welcoming the masses to this fantastic location is a great asset. It's so disappointing that BW management don't see the potential. Bitter - Me? - You bet I am!

That's it folks - we're back home

2011-03-23T08:55:00.000-07:00

Everything on the mooring is as we left it, although we have got new neighbours in Dave's old mooring on the end - not the best spot to be as anyone with an online mooring will tell you. We're glad to be in the middle, people have usually slowed down by the time they get to us, and hit us with glancing parallel scrapes, rather than full on.

Dave & Hazel. Dave's sorting out the HUGE tv aerial he's mounted on the bank, in the vain hope of getting all the digi channels. They have cleared a couple of trees over the winter so reception may have improved a little. It's OK now, just gets worse as the summer goes on, with more leaves on the trees. We had time to collect some more wood through Chirk, which Dave managed to do without falling in, or even getting just a little bit wet.

Oh joy - the day boat (1 of 4) - I've missed you like a hole in the head!

Well, that's it folks. We're back in our mooring in Froncysyllte until the end of September. As it's such a poor reception area for mobiles, I've got no chance of loading any photos onto the blogspot, indeed I'd be lucky if I actually opened the blogspot at all (I'm doing this one from my mother's house and broadband - eee technology). So it's au revoir. Have a lovely summer cruising. Thank you for reading what was hopefully an amusing diary of our winter adventures & we'll be back doing the same thing come autumn. Dave & Sue

Almost Home

2011-03-23T08:38:00.000-07:00

What a fantastic few days of cruising. Just the kind of weather that makes you want to GO on a trip - not return from one facing work - or even no work (still haven't heard if I've got a job or not)

Beefur crossing Chirk Aqueduct alongside the Viaduct

Not far now .....

View through the trees to the Cefn Viaduct

Time for a chat with Carole & Peaches (Strider)

Ellesmere to Chirk

2011-03-23T08:31:00.000-07:00

We had a bit of a laugh on the way up the Llangollen - we played "spot the continuous moorer". We wrote down a list of names of boats who have scarecely moved up and down the Llangollen Canal over the last few years - and ticked them off as we came to them. All were present and correct - including the one outside Jack Myttons - you know the one - featured in Canal Boat magazine recently as it had been squashed by a falling tree last winter & there he was, back in the very same spot!. We were missing one boat from the list, but friends had spotted it on the Shroppie, so not that far away then. There were a few additions which we'll add to the next list & look out for next time we're out.

We met up with an old friend in Mad Jacks, and had a lovely evening. It's been nice catching up with people.

These lovely chickens roaming very freeley, produced these fantastic eggs ....

Very tasty they were too !

Quick pint on the way past the Lion Quays - had to take a run into the pontoons as they were so silted up, you've got no chance of getting all the way into the pontoons on the road side, as there's only 6" of water!

The towpath has finally been done between the Poacher's Pocket and Chirk Bank and the contractors are currently carrying out work between Llangollen & Trevor so that's 11 miles of reasonable towpath throughout the World Heritage Site from P/P to Llangollen/Pentrefelin - unless it's been raining, when the bit of towpath between Chirk Tunnel & Marina becomes a bit of a quagmire!

Ellesmere Sculpture Trail

2011-03-23T08:08:00.000-07:00

If you haven't already done it, have a look at the Ellesmere Sculpture Trail , which is a gentle tour of Ellesmere, incorporating the sculptures sited over the last 3 years. For some strange reason, not all sculptures are listed in the "sculpture trail" which is rather frustrating - you see some wierd canalside object, but you can't find out what it is exactly!

I thought this one was of a horse - it turns out that it's the bow of a boat. Shows how much I know.

Now this one DOES look like the bow of a boat...

located opposite the BW yard at Ellesmere, on the junction. It has some wonderful old photographs imposed on the tiles inside it.

And one of the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct - or is it a seat ..

Blakemere

2011-03-23T07:48:00.000-07:00

We took our time coming up the Llangollen, mainly due to seeing so many people along the way! Met up with Dot & Kevin, who kindly took us to their local by car for a pint. Their "local" now being about 5-6 miles away, due to the Waggoners Inn burning down a couple of years ago. We passed it on the way - it hasn't even got a roof on the building, so no sign of it reopening any time soon - despite signs still visible on the canal! Managed to have a night in Blakemere on the way, it is a beautiful place - but still no kingfishers. As we hadn't seen any on the way, we felt sure they'd be here in one of their old haunts, but sadly no signs.

What about this for some nifty paintwork .....

What's this boat called then ?

Very unusual - The Maid of Fibre is a "knitting sanctuary", where you are invited to come and view their yarns, and also an opportunity to stay on board this knitting hotel for upto 7 days.

New Hire Fleet for Llangollen Canal ?

2011-03-20T10:18:00.000-07:00

Could this be the start of something? I'd love Anglo Welsh at Trevor Basin to start using these plastic boats as day boats - it would save alot of damage as they slowly glide past us - instead of the usual 5mph bouncing between boats and the concrete!

Well, we're back on the Llangollen Canal, on the last few days of our cruise. We turned right at Hurleston to go up the locks, unfortunately there was a boat stuck in the bottom lock & couldn't get out as he had all his fenders down (despite signs top and bottom of the flight which say "lift all fenders"). Luckily it was a small boat & could move forward and backwards in the lock chamber and eventually managed to lift the fenders and exit the lock. He was very lucky he wasn't 'hung up' by his fenders. As soon as he got out, he dropped all his fenders again! That was lock 1. Lock 2: People from the boat coming down came to "help", by opening the top paddles with great gusto, needless to say the boat shot backwards before Dave was ready. Never mind, nothing broken. Lock 3: More helpers from said boat coming down (private boat I might add) then shut the lock gates in front of us. Thanks. Lock 4: Couldn't get in as it was too shallow so we had to let some water down so we could float again. This doesn't happen when there's a Lock keeper!

Beefur passing through Wrenbury lift bridge - Dave does the bridge and I do the boat due to all the barriers, lights and hooters going off.

Dave did a 2 mile hike from Wrenbury to a pub he'd read about and he wasn't disappointed - The Bhurtpore Inn had 11 draft beers. Just as well, as the Dusty Miller was closed and having major work carried out.

Major work also being carried out on Marbury Lock Cottage

Glad we haven't got a 70ft boat with the amount of water pouring in over the top gates of the middle lock at Grindley Brook due to leaking gates on the top staircase lock. Just an hour before, there had been an altercation at the locks where a lady on a boat coming up who had set the locks in her favour was shouted at and told to get back as a bloke at the top decided he was coming down. Apparently it was the boat coming up who was there first, doing everything right. The boat at the top came down in such a rush that he managed to leave most of the paddles up, so flooding the lock surrounds.

Yes - it was an ex-Challenger boat! Again, no Lock keeper.

Breathe in: Passing Viking Afloat - it's impossible to squeeze through without bumping into these boats - 5 deep in places!

Money well spent on the bollards then ......

Bunbury

2011-03-17T14:47:00.000-07:00

We moored above Tilstone Lock again, so we could have a walk to the Dysert Arms, opposite the church at Bunbury (huge church for a small village). Lovely pub, good beer and friendly locals. Each Brunning & Price pub is very different inside - until you go to the loo! Exactly the same green tiles on the walls, and loo doors with a latch, as in all the other B & P pubs we've visited.

Deer on the grounds of Beeston Castle - apparently there's been a herd here since the 13th century. It was market day (wednesday) as we passed through, but didn't visit - we spent enough money on diesel at Chas Hardens!

Beeston castle WW2 fuel bunkers, containing 6 underground fuel tanks, with ventilation shafts. This isn't the greatest picture in the world, for better pics, click HERE

That's one big motorbike to cart on and off your bow!
That short blog took an amazing 5 hours to complete with such a duff signal. I didnt have the heart to do today's.

Out of Chester

2011-03-15T13:47:00.000-07:00

We were up early (for us) to get up the Northgate staircase locks, and get some shopping done on the way out of Chester. Unfortunately we didn't get very far - someone's trousers wrapped themselves around the prop so we ground to a halt. This spot is just unlucky for Dave - it's exactly the same spot that Dave's Dad fell in the canal after he missed his footing whilst getting back on the boat after coming down the locks on a holiday on Dave's boat (Sans Souci) back in 1994. Dave managed to remove the offending pants without too much trouble & we were on our way. The boats moored in the basin have taken root - one's been there 3 weeks now & the other two, 2 weeks each (according to the boat yard) - so much for 48 hour mooring!

There's alot of water behind those gates!

Is that the train to Chirk going past?

Ah, The Old Harkers Arms. After much (ehem) research over the last few days, we conclude that the pub we favoured most in Chester, is this one, so we had to re-visit to make sure. Although we didnt eat here, the menu looked good, (but not alot of vegetarian choice). Dogs were allowed in, and of course the beer was excellent, oh, and there are moorings right outside, now what more can you ask for?

On the way out of Chester, we moored outside the Frog & Nightingale (silly name, so didn't investigate), which is close to Tesco & stocked up with the necessary as we didn't have far to carry it - especially as trolly dolly is no more after the wheels fell off. After a quick visit to Aberkhan for some more hessian (Chester prices), and a dash to the wonderful cheese shop on Northgate Street, we were off.

Although there are a few new marinas in this area, it doesn't seem to have diminished the long line of moorings between Chester & Beeston, they go on and on for miles. Never mind, we didn't have a deadline & moored up a couple of miles the Chester side of Beeston, in the middle of nowhere - all quiet after the sirens of the city. Nemo cat is impressed with our mooring tonight, Chester was a bit to lively for him!

The Boat Museum

2011-03-13T12:11:00.000-07:00

As stated yesterday, we had a few hours looking around the Ellesmere Port Boat Museum. It's was fascinating - an absolute delight to anyone interested in canals and boats, crammed full of all things boaty, from an historic boat collection, archives, and wonderfully restored vintage engines. Click on the link above to have a look. I don't want to write too much about it as the website of the museum is far more informative than I can be.

These locks mark the end of the Shropshire Union Canal and carry you down onto the Manchester Ship Canal. Click HERE to see why we have no intention of going any further & turned around at Ellesmere Port!

Sorry about the bright yellow saab - kind of distracts you from the view of the boats

This is a pic of Porters Row: Traditional cottages "lovingly recreated picture of domestic life throughout the ages. The cottages recreate homes from the 1840s, 1900s, 1930s and 1950s - each with the decor and feature of its time". Complete with outside loo. Excuse me sir!

An old boiler (no jokes please)

Dave especially wanted to see this Armstrong Siddeley twin - he has an AS1 single cylinder in his boat Sans Souci

We had a lovely day in the countryside. As you can see, the towpath is excellent all the way from Chester to Ellesmere Port, unfortunately it's part of a cycle route so you really have to be on your guard - they don't slow down & sneak up on you from behind. However, it's nice to see people taking advantage of our canals, walking with families & making use of a free afternoon out. So if it takes a cycle track to improve the towpaths - so be it. We'll have to move tomorrow as we're now riding on fumes. Just hope we've got enough diesel to get us to Chas Harden's.

Chester & Ellesmere Port

2011-03-12T14:29:00.000-08:00

We had a lovely couple of days in Chester Basin, now overlooked by the new apartment blocks. Dave's birthday got off to a good start, (he's now officially a Grumpy Old Man), whilst I was out shopping & checking out the delights of the Aberkhan fabric shop, I came across ye olde authentic West Cornwall Pasty shop, so that was Dave's breakfast sorted. He has always said he could eat a pasty at any time of day! Later, Mum came to visit and we did a walk around the walls - my thighs are re-living all the steps up and down now. Mum also brought our mail, with some birthday cards for Dave - the day was getting better and better. We sampled a couple of pints on the way round the walls, Mum was very patient as she was driving. We ended up in Telfords Warehouse for some much needed food. It was Friday night and we were perhaps an hour out with our timing, as it ended up full of 'young people' out on the pull. Nice place though, with good food, but when we left there were bouncers on the door & we felt very old!

Mum & Dav e on the walls near the Cathedral. Why does he always have to pull such faces???

We also had a walk down the locks from the canal onto the River Dee, I thought it wa still possible to lock down onto the river - but not looking at these gates.

View from The Clock

Had to include this pic - it's the beluga (or guppy) coming into land at Broughton.

As our 48 hours were up on the mooring in Chester basin, we decided to go on a jaunt to Ellesmere Port Boat Museum (will post the pics tomorrow), with the intention of coming back to Chester - blow the 48 hours - the other 3 boats have taken up residence there so I don't think we have to worry. We were pleasantly surprised by the rural landscape on the first half of the journey & we spied a great mooring we would come back to after visiting the Boat Museum & not have to sprint back to Chester (great - as the six nations rugby was on the telly later). After about 4 miles, the landscape changed to the more industrial that I expected. We also clocked some more lopped trees on the way - we'll get the logs on the way back.

Above - lovely viaduct, with many arches & below one of many metal sculptures near the bridges on the way

Rural landscape disappears & Stanlow refinery appears

As for that wood mentioned earlier - we remembered where it was, great, got the bow into the off side bank, lovely, wood was cut into pieces 2 ft long, fantastic. I jumped off with the bow rope & held the nose in. Dave excitedly shimmied down the gunnel from the back and jumped off to collect his booty. Two large pieces of wood, one in each hand, leapt onto the front of the boat, then everything went into slow motion - I was still holding the bow rope, he teetered on the front, swayed back, then forward, nope he was ok, then he looked round with that look "what shall I do now" as he again swayed backwards, raising one arm with a huge log, then the other arm, again with a big log, "which one should I let go" look came on his face as he fell backwards into the canal, throwing the left arm log onto the front deck, but going down with the one in his right hand. Another dunking getting wood, he still hasn't got the hang of it. Anyway, dripping and squelching, Dave was not going to let this wood go, so it's now neatly stacked on the roof.

A cracking game of rugby, and another lovely day. Lovely peaceful mooring between motorways and industry, opposite a golf course on designated moorings. Although we didn't get any trouble in Chester basin, Telford's Warehouse was a bit rowdy last night and the shouting in the street continued till after 4am, not disturbing a snoring old man! but that's life in a town/city - me - I'm a country bumpkin and proud of it!,

To Chester in the wind

2011-03-10T14:19:00.000-08:00

Rather blowy out there today! Dave lost his wig (old joke but still funny). The lock gates on these double locks are really hard to shift, so Dave was elected to do the locks and I did the boat. Not easy in the wind, but no disasters. As we approached Christleton, we could see that Blue Boar were dredging, and sure enough, there was our next door neighbour from our moorings operating the dredger, so we stopped for a quick chat.

This will be the third of the three remaining lock keepers huts from the Chester Canal Co days, the first is at Tilstone Lock, second at Beeston stone lock and this one at Tarvin Road lock. Unfortunately this one has lost its roof.

Beautiful old water tower as you meander through Chester

This tower is now in the middle of a building site - hope it'll still be there next time we visit

On to Northgate staircase locks, with the views stretching out infront of you.

Not for the feint hearted!

Beefur just visible at the top of the lock gates with the water cascading over.

The walls.

We took a walk back up the towpath to The Old Harkers Arms, canalside, as we passed it on our way to Chester Basin. Again a great pub, and again a Brunning & Price pub co pub (Corn Mill, Dyserth Arms) we're not Brunning & Price groupies, but we keep stumbling upon them, and they certainly know how to run a great pub, and look after their beer, a great birthday treat for Dave. We had planned to visit 3 or 4 pubs on the Chester CAMRA list, but we stayed in the Harkers Arms for a couple, before moving on to the Pied Bull for some food. Not as pricey as some Chester pubs, cheap and cheerful you might say, I had a steak which was very good. We waddled home just before their quiz night kicked off. Fair play, they're doing their best to attract customers & the staff were very friendly.

Beeston Castle and another great PUB

2011-03-09T14:03:00.000-08:00

We had 2 quiet, sunny days moored just above Tilstone Lock, tremendous!
After studying the local O.S. map, and a web search on CAMRA, Dave decided to go for a beer. It was just over a mile up a very quiet country lane to Bunbury, and The Dysart Arms The locals were friendly, and there were snacky things on the bar to go with the 4 hand pull ales. Harviestoun Tam O' Shanter was the preferred tipple. Luckily there was 50p. off a pint between 5 and 7 in the evening, a very good plus to a pub that will be stopped at again. One of their numerous awards is the "Winalot Dog Friendly Approved Award". It's the same pub co that own The Corn Mill Llangollen (another of Dave's favourite pubs).

We moved on today, down Tilstone Lock with the unique to this area, lock keepers circular lockhut complete with chimney (one of only three left from the Chester Canal Co days) and a view that almost every boater loves ... newly lopped trees with lots of wood left on the ground!

Next on the trip were the 2 Beeston locks, one stone, and then the iron lock with it's warning notices. Nowadays it's recommended by BW for only one boat to go at a time, previously pairs were o.k. as long as they were less than 60' . It didn't really matter because with it being this quiet, we would have had to wait quite a time to share. The hills as you approach the lock seem to be made up purely of sand, hence the lock being made out of iron to avoid land slips.

The views of Beeston and Peckforton Castles were stunning, although being very open, the cut was windy. So we decided on a more sheltered mooring at Bate's Mill Bridge, opposite The Shady Oak (disappointing), with views of the castles.

The Wild Boar Hotel was visible on the hill as we passed through Beeston. Beautiful tudor timbered buildings which I dined at a couple of times in my previous life working in the fast lane!

Time for one last jaunt - to Chester

2011-03-07T11:42:00.000-08:00

Change of plan - we've decided to turn right at Barbridge instead of left, and we're going to have one last jolly before having to return to the Llangollen for the start of the season. We're heading for Chester as we've got two and a bit weeks left. I've been visiting mum for a few days and returned to Dave and the boat in Barbridge via train and bus. So following a delivery from Mr. Tesco to the boat this morning we up sticks and took advantage of a wonderful day. We've found a beautiful spot just above Tilstone lock & luckily it has about 5ft of piling where we can attach one piling hook as someone nicked our mooring spikes from the front deck a couple of months ago, leaving us with just the one emergency pin. Didn't see the point of buying a new one at the beginning of the boating season, as we tend to find loads throughout the summer. Unfortunately we're not going to get to Chester in time for the annual cheese rolling festival which is tomorrow, but we'd rather be in this glorious landscape for a few days.

Today's lovely mooring with my resident wood cutter

Steam narrowboat moored below Tilstone Lock

Bunbury staircase locks

with old stable block

Had a nice few days with mum, following her adventures in India. Lots of stories to tell, mostly regarding the poverty encountered there. She's very glad to be back home safely, no illness, just a hundred or so mosquito bites. Mum had volunteered to cook 30lbs of bacon for the Cancer Reseach Charity all day breakfast on Saturday - and guess who ended up having to cook it - muggins here! However, it raised about £1000 so thats a terrific achievement, all in a good cause.

Not good news on the job front for me, due to major cut backs by BW, there may or may not be a job for me at the Info Centre at Trevor Basin this season, I'll have to wait another couple of weeks to find out, so fingers crossed as I loved it.

Glory Glory Boats on the Move

2011-03-02T11:19:00.000-08:00

What a glorious spring day!

Out of the dark of the winter in The Midlands !
North of The Harecastle Tunnel and sunshine, we are on our way. It's a pity that it's back to work because on days like today there is only one place to be,(CRUISING) aaah well.

We had some really good days in Stone, meeting old and not so old friends, and some really old ones!
But time came to move on, thanks all.

See what we left Stone for, the nearby benches had all the bottles bagged, well done the all day drinkers! Canals are still good rubbish dumps for the locals, WHY?

Heartbreak Hill was joy easy locks with well maitained towpaths, until we approached Middlewich, where it appeared that the lock gear was last greased or oiled in 2010. Really good descent though. Thanks to Mike and his wife, from Lucky mucklebucket for raising some paddles for us, Cheers, we owe you one.

Having a couple of days above Winsford TopFlash whilst I cut some logs and Sue gets ready to visit Mum, with her latest Rag Rug

This is the impressive tightly pulled back view

This is the finished aricle. have a great visit Sue , hope your mum likes it! This is my first attempt at blogging (getting some practice in for when Sue is away), so far so good .... DAVE

Middlewich - ish

2011-03-01T13:09:00.000-08:00

Another early start today, and was a shame to leave such a lovely mooring on the outskirts of Wheelock. Unfortunately I have an appointment in Chirk on Friday, so we thought it better that I get a bus to Chester from Barbridge, then train to Chirk, that's Plan "A", but things may evolve as we go along.....

Another wonderful mooring this afternoon, looking down on Winsford top flash. We've been trying to find out if The Badger at Church Minshall has re-opened after being closed for a refurbishment. Last update we can find is from August 2010. Does anyone know if its open yet?

Note for Graham: Dave had withdrawal symptoms after passing the Romping Donkey during opening hours, so he had to visit the Cheshire Cheese in Wheelock where his nerves were steadied. Crisis averted.

We passed through some lovely countryside today, and - shock horror - 5 moving boats 5!!! that's more than we've seen in the last 3 weeks.

Beautiful countryside until you get to Middlewich that is, then industry takes over, like the salt works..

Sharp left turn at Middlewich onto the shortest canal in the country, the Wardle Canal, all 154ft (47m) of it. It was built in 1829 so that the navigation authority of the Trent and Mersey Canal could maintain control over the junction linking it to the Middlewich branch of the Shropshire Union Canal.

There's a lovely old lock cottage at Wardle Lock, but unfortunately a housing estate has been built all around it, so it can now never have vehiclular access to the property. Lovely lady lives there who always comes out to say hello when we go through, not today though, hope she's still there.

Dydd Gwyl Dewi Sant hapus i bawb

2011-03-01T11:44:00.000-08:00

Happy Saint David's day to everyone!

Harecastle and Heartbreak Hill

2011-02-28T11:32:00.000-08:00

After a weekend of waiting at the Tunstall end of the Harecastle Tunnel this weekend, this morning it was all systems go! Chimneys down, tv aerial stowed inside and off we went into the one and a half mile long tunnel to Kidsgrove. We found it far less disconcerting travelling from south to north as you can see the light at the other end of the tunnel, unlike travelling north to south when the tunnel doors are shut at the north end to maximise the effects of the huge ventilation fans. Quite scary when travelling this way, as you cant see where the tunnel ends until the last minute. You start to wonder.... do they know we're in here? .... have they forgotten about us? Then hey presto - the doors open and you can see daylight again - we've made it! When travelling through the tunnel you can see the various repairs done, some in brick, some sprayed concrete, some concrete segments and of course the orange walls due to the iron ore which also colours the canal. Just after half way through the tunnel, the roof starts getting lower and lower, and you have to duck down in a small section before it gradually increases in height once again.

Brindley's old tunnel entrance is just visible on the left

This tunnel was built in 1777 and operated until subsidence forced its closure in 1914

Barrier raised, and off we go!

Downhill all the way, down 'Heartbreak Hill', which is a lovely series of parallel locks. I see my brass tiller pin could do with a polish, if you're wondering what the gold face is popping up on the left.

No time to stop at the pub today - bit to far away as this pic was taken with phone not camera - but its one of the best pub names I've come across - The Romping Donkey - fantastic!

The potteries

2011-02-27T06:07:00.000-08:00

Not sure how many of these photos will come out as we can't get this blog to work properly on a mimimum signal, so my apologies if this is a duff blog! The following are a few pics of our travels through the Potteries, some beautiful old buildings, and some not so.....

The old kilns above have been preserved in the middle of a new apartment development, sums up these photos of the old and the new...

Not a building, but had to take this photo - above, a bloke with a tatooed blue and red head and face, completely covered - I kid you not - complete with mobility scooter

Bill and Ben must have moved from Market Drayton - here they are at Etruria Junction

Some canalside old pottery buildings are still in use, with a large shop open to the public

We await our passage through the Harecastle Tunnel, after giving 48 hours notice of passage through, and we're booked in for Monday morning. Dave

Cornish Pasty Triumph (Alternative Blog)

2011-02-25T13:28:00.000-08:00

This blog should be titled "Stoke and The Potteries", and contain lots of photos of old kilns etc and of us travelling through the (ehem) delights of Stoke on Trent. Unfortunately, its taking 18 minutes to download one photo, so I've abandoned that blog till I can psych myself up for it tommorow, so here's one I prepared earlier......

Cornish Pasties: After a nine year campaign by pasty producers, the Cornish pasty has been given protected status by the European Commission. From mid March, only a pasty produced in Cornwall can be called a Cornish pasty. The dish could still be baked elsewhere, but has to be prepared in Cornwall. As a Cornishman, Dave was rejoicing at this news and feeling very smug about it. The smile soon dropped when I informed him that I therefore couldn’t make him any more Cornish pasties! Ha!

Dave salivating outside the pasty shop in Banbury a couple of years ago - who's pasties are shipped out frozen from Cornwall & cooked on the premises - so they'll be ok.

Barlaston - and a lovely day for a cruise

2011-02-24T10:22:00.000-08:00

We're on our way again, taking advantage of a beautiful day, although we havent moved many miles it is nice to be moving again. We've met up with all our old friends in Stone - mainly those displaced by the Rising Sun being demolished. We were also fortunate enough to meet up with an ex work colleague from my previous life in the rat race, (Hi Jean & Lawson) and had a very pleasant evening with a couple of pints of Titanic in the Royal Exchange.

So it's au revoir Stone and the little wood duck

Nemo hasn't been swimming for a while .... I hope this isn't an omen ....

Damage to BR98, where a car hit the side of the bridge

Meaford top lock

Thanks for leaving your broken plastic snowman stuffed into the hedge, bah humbug!

Again, the railway follows the line of the canal, this time rather too close for comfort i think

Barlaston, and again, there's no other boats here, apart from a couple outside the pub. As I was taking this photo, Nemo leapt out of the trees opposite the boat on to an unsuspecting passer-by giving her the fright of her life.

Rugs & Mice

2011-02-23T04:49:00.000-08:00

Well it's happened, that thing we've both been dreading since we got Nemo the cat - yep - he's caught is first mouse - and he brought it in for us as well, bless him. We did manage to catch it and put it outside, only for Nemo to escape out of his cat flap and catch it again. Shoes on, torch out and relocated it abit further away. Bits off one week, catching mice the next - he's not a kitten any more!

We're still moored just past Roger Fuller's yard - who incedentally, has a fascinating web site with details of historic narrowboats click here for historic boats. There's no boats moored here at all! BW has definitely had a crackdown around here.

I hope I've got time before we get back to finish one more rag rug. Although I say it myself, I'm impressed with the last two i've done, though how anyone can hope to make a living at it is beyond me. They sell for around the £50 mark, but take £150 worth of your time to do them! I'll stick to doing it as a hobby.

This one was a christmas present for my friend Jeanette (hello you!)

This one is for the bathroom. Very comfy under feet.

One end of Stone to the other

2011-02-22T04:08:00.000-08:00

We decided to move up a bit yesterday, from the bottom of Stone up to Whitebridge, stopping at the boat yard on the way to do the necessary. We got 3 bags of coal, which we hope will burn better than the last lot we got from Great Haywood, and filled up with diesel which will be for the last time before we get back home to our mooring next month. This year, like last year, six weeks of our cruising time was taken up stuck in the ice and by the time we were extracated from it, we had to turn for home due to stoppages to allow us to get back to start work again in March. So we're pointing northwards & feeling dispondant at having to head for home without doing as much cruising this winter as we would have liked - but hey - that's winter cruising for you! We picked up our laundry on the way through, from the dry cleaning type place opposite the Swan - £15.00 for two small bags of laundry! Bit more expensive than the £3.00 per bag at Fradley Junction ..... I think i'll take up a new career !!!

Dave found a good branch on the ground down at Westbridge Park, which will come in handy.

Pic of the fancy apartments opposite Stone Boat Building

Above: little tunnel under the road for the boat horses at lock 29,

Not so fancy apartments built on the site of an old haunt of ours, The Rising Sun (demolished in the process)

We've got a great 3G signal here, and Dave's been having fun finding web sites about real ale. This one is a gem: http://www.yourround.co.uk/ . You put in the name of the town and it will list the pubs with real ale (pubs which have subscribed to the site). You can then click on "Beer Cam" & up pops pics of the hand pulls, with a full description of the beer in question. The Swan Inn Stone (for example) Great fun!

Welcome to Stone

2011-02-18T09:10:00.000-08:00

What a surprise! There's hardly any boats here in Stone. Whenever we've passed through here it's always been chock-a-block, from Westbridge Park right up to Whitebridge. The building you can see here is the hairdressers - called "lock keepers". Nice. We're here for at least a week, whilst Dave visits the dentist. Hopefully his last appointment will be on Monday. We've also visited the Vets - Nemo has lost his boy-ancy aids, and is walking rather slowly, but seems to be getting better. I love Stone, its such a friendly town with great shops. It'll be nice to do some daily shopping from local suppliers to stock up - especially as trolly dolly has given up the ghost and the wheels fell off after the last major shopping trip from Fradley.

Only 4 boats including us at Westbridge Park.

A Pair BW boat licence checker blokes walked past yesterday & turned around when they'd logged our boat index number. Dave politely told them to keep walking towards Aston where there's a non licenced continuous moorer camped out there. Reluctantly they sauntered off in that direction.

Only two boats in the Star Lock pound - and one of them is a BW work boat which arrived yesterday.

However, there's always one - the cheeky so-and-so who moors on the 48 hour moorings, just within hose pipe length of the tap. He's been there for 2 weeks that we know of - it's not as if there isn't any room on the 5 or 14 day moorings.

Wonderful sculpture of individually made tiles, made by children from Stone.
Better Photos here from Sonata Crew photostream on Flickr . (Hope they dont mind)

Rugby Weekend Number Two

2011-02-12T06:52:00.000-08:00

We've got the pop and crisps, and looking forward to another Six Nations weekend. Now - what's the difference between an international rugby match and an international football match? Answer: Rugby players sing their national anthem! We were going to watch the inaugural football match of the Nations Cup between Republic of Ireland Vs Wales, shown earlier this week, but only ONE welsh player managed to sing the national anthem & Ireland weren't that much better. Whoever heard of a Welshman not singing when requested to do so? So we said 'stuff you' and turned the telly off, they don't deserve our support! As I write this, the England rugby team are in fine voice and kick off is imminent. Time to pop the pringles and pull the tinnies. C'mon you blues!

No photos this time, we're still near Sandon and I think you've seen enough pictures of canada geese in various weather. Oh - news - a boat moored up just behind us a couple of nights ago, and had a barbeque! The smell of sizzling sausages was lovely - though I think we'll wait till at least March before dusting down our old outdoor cooking facility.