Alway Swilby

Indeed. We tied our bow rope to the bridge 10 days ago. I wonder if it ever gets closed, just to test if it still works?

No! Although she did quite like climbing the Christmas Tree for about 10 minutes! 😄 Hull managed to hold on to some of the good vibes too after their year.

We have just stayed in Coventry Basin for two nights last night and the night before (Saturday and Sunday). There was no dog poo. There was a few pedestrians coming and going all day long and in the evening there were some youngsters having a beer or two and chatting away but they had mostly gone by 11pm and didn't prevent us sleeping. The whole basin certainly felt safe and clean. The litter bins were emptied on the Sunday morning. It was a good spot for a supermarket delivery too. We were last there in 2018 when there was a hire base taking up the whole of one arm but they are no more so the whole basin looks to be available for mooring. The route in and out has been cleaned up too. What were derelict factory sites have had housing built on them improving the look of the canal the whole way in and the towpaths have been improved. Lots of families out walking and enjoying themselves. No propeller fouls at all from Hawkesbury Junction and return. All in all it just generally felt much improved from four years ago. A bit of culture seems to have done it some good.

Maybe it's a very slow tap and it could take a day to fill your tank? If the tank isn't full after a day you have to move on.

Broadmore Lock is also closed as well as them fixing bridge 147. https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/notices/22654-broadmoor-lock-24. But as Simon says the winding holes mentioned don't make sense.

I've never understood "keep this gate locked at all times" signs. Why did they put a gate in there in the first place and not a plain fence?

If someone had said to me in the early 1980s that in 40 years time I wouldn't be going to the pub every night and having 3 or 4 pints of beer (having had two or three at lunchtime at work) I would have told them "No way". But here I am aged 64 and I hardly ever go to a pub and when I do it is to eat food and probably have one pint or one glass of wine. The last time I was in a pub was on 8th October, the Broad Face in Abingdon. I've now made it all the way nearly to Napton without visiting any pubs on the way.

Do the EA have powers to remove unregistered or unlicensed boats?

There wasn't when we wanted to go there at the back end of September this year. There was one gap but there was a rope going from boat to another blocking it off. The nice lock keeper at Caversham Lock let us moor on their upper lock landing while we went to Aldi (or was it Lidl?).

GJW were happy for us to go round Trent Falls including anchoring there for a couple of hours.

If the boat is not licenced when it should be then it is likely it won't be insured.

Presumably the web site is correct. I've just checked our proposed route from the South Oxford to the Aire & Calder on the map and nothing has changed. It's easy to check.

£19.50 for 25kg of Excel from NB Dusty today and their prices will be going up soon. The wholesale price of coal is rising because our coal is imported, it might be Russian and the wholesale market will be priced in US dollars. The GB Pound is very low against the US dollar at the moment so this puts our price up.

Is it just the poolstock locks that need booking? Could you come down Wigan then go staight on towards Parbold, Rufford, Liverpool etc. without booking?

I too remember the Humber paddle steamer ferries and went on them many times. My dad would drive his car along the pier at New Holland on the railway station platform then down a ramp onto the ferry. I seem to remember there was not much room for cars on the car deck, maybe 10 or so. My dad used to have a Humber Hawk and I remember saying "Look! A Humber on The Humber!" (Well I was about 7 at the time so this was very exciting!) The Tattershall Castle is now moored on the Thames at Victoria Embankment and is a pub/restaurant. Sadly the Lincoln Castle was broken up in Grimsby Harbour.

You have mis-understood my post. I was refering to the bit I highlighted in red i.e. "the best supply has a short run from the mains, with no tanks. " It is that that is not now possible. I'm sure they could test the water if they wanted to.

Yes, I agree. But that is not possible with this new arrangement. It's on the Thames so it is the Environment Agency not CRT.

We filled up with water at Abingdon yesterday. There is now a new means of dispensing the water. A big tall structure that I think has a tank at the top that fills from the mains then drains through the pre attached hose thereby creating an air gap. There was certainly a tank filling noise when I turned on the tap and the water took about 20 seconds to start coming out of the hose. The pre attached hose was probably 5 or 6 metres long. We had to moor the boat blocking the canoe portage point so that the hose could reach our tank inlet. It wasn't a very quick filler but it's an improvement on how things were last year when water leaked out everywhere. I don't know how things would have been if we attached our normal 20 metre hose reel. I wonder about the quality of the water getting into our tank. We are very used to getting mains quality water from the taps in CRT land and we normally drink and cook with water straight from the tank. But I wonder about the cleanliness of this new arrangement, is the tank through which the water has to flow clean enough?

Blog post about the trip here https://oleanna.co.uk/2022/09/29/wow/

I've deployed our anchor once in anger. Upstream on the Thames above Clifton Lock the engine overheated. There was no immediate danger and looking back I think we could have probably caught hold of a branch of a tree and tied to that. I've also deployed the same anchor as a planned mooring at Trent Falls whilst waiting for the tide to turn. Both times I had no problems retrieving the anchor (20kg Danforth).

Titanium white is the brightest of bright whites!

Sorry. I misunderstood. It came across to me as shouting at the OP. That's the thing about written text, it's open to mis-interpretation when you don't have the benefit of the nuances of the spoken word.

But Tony did shout, he said so himself: "Once again and I am so fed up i will shout - YOU CAN NOT DEDUCE THE STATE OF CHARGE OF A BATTERY UNDER CHARGE BY VOLTAGE. " Now I fully understand that the OP's charging regime might not be suitable for his use but shouting at him is hardly welcoming. But TB was shouting at him. See above.