Darcy

OK - thanks for the warnings. We have far less experience on rivers than on the canals, so they are always a bit daunting. One of the best bits on the canals is that if things start to go wrong there is usually the option to stop, think and start again. Rivers aren't about to relinquish their control....... Having said that, we really enjoyed our trip down the Thames last year and found it easier than we had expected (except for the difficulty in finding moorings). So this year I'm determined not to worry too much. I shall add these and any other warning to my trusty Pearson's guides and then worry about them on the day. I put the Birmingham diversion + the Erewash, but obviously minus the Ashby into canal planner last night and it only takes the mileage up from 226 to 232, but adds exactly 100 locks (49 narrow & 51 broad). On the default settings this takes the trip up from 97 to 110 hours. This is certainly do-able, double the 4 counties or Cheshire rings, both of which we've easily done in a week. So I've put the two choices to the rest of the crew (well son and husband - since daughter tends to be a refusenik and aged parents don't do many locks these days) . Likelihood is that we will start out intending to do the longer trip and see what we feel like when we get to the Erewash. One more question. We will be doing this the first two weeks of August, so English school holidays. We usually try to fit it in the first two weeks of the Scottish hols before the English schools are off, but unfortunately, we had no choice this year. So one of the reasons for choosing the Leicester Ring was that we expected it to be less busy. Obviously the bit around Braunston is likely to be congested, but at least we won't hit it on a weekend. If we do the longer route, I imagine the Staffs and Worcester will be slow since it is on the 4 counties and we would likely be there on a Saturday, but how do Autherley to Napton and Fazeley to Rugby say compare for busyness at this time of year ? Our memory from doing the Warwickshire Ring was that the Eastern leg was the busiest, but that may just have been that we hit it on a weekend. Which are the worst pinch points ? Given that we will have the light, we might choose to do the busier lock flights in an evening. Again, thanks for all your help.

Thankyou everyone. It sounds as though anti-clockwise is the way to go. I had vaguely considered the option of extending the ring as Adam and Nick suggest, but had thought it would be rather longer than 104 hours. Didn't do it properly in canal planner though - so maybe I'll reconsider thanks. I don't mind giving up the Ashby if doing so gives us a better route, but I do want to do the Erewash if we can, as most years we only get to do a one week hire and it's hard to reach from any of the one week rings. I hadn't considered the lack of locks - (well I know the Ashby is lock free, but hadn't looked at the rest). We do like doing locks, but not quite so keen on the broad ones. So will have to weigh up the pull of doing the Wolverhampton 21 against the need to do Hatton.......... We do plan to stop in Leicester, although if we choose to extend the route, we might need to push on a bit further. Many thanks for all the pub and other recommendations. I'll add them all to my route plan - once I manage to finalise the route ! One additional issue I realised yesterday is that we will need to find a Wifi signal on the second Tuesday as my son's exam results are due out then. So no doubt I will be back to ask you about that once I have actually worked out where we might be ! Thinking about it, we might want a lock free day - as he represents 1/3 of our active crew and might quite reasonably be somewhat incapacitated !

Hi, Only 6 weeks to go until out annual boating holiday and I'm getting excited already....... This year we have hired for two weeks from Market Harborough and are planning to do the East Midlands or Leicester ring. (The two terms seem to be used in different places - so I'm not sure if there is a difference). We normally like to put in fairly long days, so this is a bit short for us. Therefore, the current plan is to add in two side trips up the Erewash and Ashby canals both of which we've not had the chance to do before. Even with these additions, according to canal planner, this is about a 97 hour trip, so a bit shorter than the Thames Ring which we did last year. We are undecided as yet whether we will stop along the way and visit some places or try to add an additional detour. I wondered whether any of you good people had any suggestions ? Also, our current thoughts are to go anti-clockwise, primarily as this will allow us to do the Soar and Trent bits fairly early on and hence give us time to change our plans if they should happen to be on Red boards. (Hopefully, this is fairly unlikely in August ?) Does this sound sensible ? And finally, does anyone have any suggestions of good pubs, places to visit or mooring places along the route. I am planning to sit down with the canal planner defaults and the guidebooks to try to draw up a rough plan. So far, it really consists of trying to stop at the North end of the Erewash. Many thanks......

Thankyou for posting the video Ray T. I've read the booklet thing in the past, but not seen the video. We've hired many times and tend to think that we know what we are doing, yet every year we have to remind someone in the crew of the correct order to do locks in, or how to do a knot. This year I have sent them a link to this and asked them to watch it before we go. Hopefully "official" instructions about hanging hands out of the boat etc, will have more weight than my attempts with the PIL. It was also good to see the bit about rivers as we've not done this very much. An additional benefit is that it has saved me from my normal panic, the first time we meet a boat of, "which side do we pass again ?" Would it be possible to sticky a link to the video somehow, so others can find it ?

Again, thanks to everyone. Lots of really helpful stuff in here. We had a good think about all the issues last night and on balance we will switch to anticlockwise. What really clinched it (apart from my hatred of throwing ropes) was putting the anticlockwise version into canal planner. It predicts that the journey will be 12 hours faster anticlockwise than clockwise. I remember reading that they'd added river flow into their calculations, but I've not really used it on rivers since then. I'd cavalierly said that we didn't mind taking a bit longer, but, I hadn't calculated just how much longer. 12 hours will give us the option to take a detour somewhere (suggestions welcome), stop to visit the natural history museum at Tring (maybe go up the Wendover Arm to get there ?) or just stop a bit earlier in the evenings on the Thames. It has an additional benefit for us, in that we have a partial crew change on the middle Sunday. Going clockwise, this would have been near Reading. Going anticlockwise we'll be near the M25 - Rickmansworth or a bit further on, which will make it easier to swap cars. (Week 2 party comes to boat, collects Week 1 driver, drives to boatyard (Napton), switches to Week 1 car. Week 1 driver then returns to boat, collects their party and luggage and deposits Week 2 driver). Does leave us with an additional issue though. Does anyone know of a launderette close to the bottom of the Grand Union ? Had been planning on using one at Pangbourne on the Thames.

For clarity, we'll be in a 65ft boat. My reluctance to spin the boat probably boils down to childhood experiences of canoing and strictures to never get parallel to the waves. When turning a boat in a canal, if I or hubby muck up, we can just stop and think again. We might draw gales of laughter from the banks, but we remain in control. Rivers don't wait for you to get it right ! I did know that you had to use ropes in the locks, but I guess I had assumed that they had those bar things running down them like on the Severn. Multiple trips have taught me that throwing ropes is not one of my strengths, I've mastered plenty of techniques to avoid throwing them on the canals. Avoiding have to throw both accurately and upwards might just be the deciding factor................. so thanks for pointing that one out.

Hi, I know some folk have already mentioned this in my other Lifejackets thread, but rather than confuse two different issues, I thought I'd ask the question specifically here. So we are heading off around the Thames Ring at the end of June and had intended to go clockwise. The main reasons for this was that I thought that it would be easier to get on and off the Thames that way and make mooring and other manouveres easier (although we've hired for years, never spent more than an hour or two on rivers). We also like the idea of doing the tunnels early in the trip in case of hold ups. However, some folk in the lifejacket thread suggest that there is no problem in mooring if we go anti-clockwise. Obviously it would be faster going the other way, so how real is my concern ? I've also noticed that the historic boat thing is happening in Braunston on the weekend we set off. So will it be possible to get through there on Saturday afternoon ? It would be lovely to see them all, but we won't want to stop for long. I'm guessing boats won't be leaving until the Sunday, so as long as we can get through, we should be able to keep ahead of the crowd going home.

Thanks for the linky Scholar Gypsy - that thread was really useful. I had seen the video - although I'm not sure that he had it on properly. However, we have decided it will be automatic inflatable ones with detachable crotch straps. That way we can wear the straps on the Thames, where there is greatest danger, but less physical activity, but if we decide to wear the life jackets locking back on the canals (e.g. when its icy or when we send someone ahead to set), we can remove the straps. Just trying to choose a brand now. We are leaning towards the crewsaver ones, but I can't find anywhere to buy the Freedom type any more and the Crewfit sport, which otherwise look ideal do seem to rid fairly high on the ribs. Not sure how compatible they'll be with the female anatomy !! Will try to find somewhere to try one out.

Thanks Bottle, yes that's the company we were considering buying from, but they had at least three makes that seemed to meet our spec, so was trying to get some hints as to which to go for. (We're sort of 90% convinced that they're a good idea, but its an expensive purchase, so want to be sure as we can be). Yes we do know that the Brentford is only open for specific times. On the day we hope to get there they open at 2pm, so we will plan to get ahead of Canal Planner and arrive there for lunch, so that we can go out as close to 2pm as possible. Unfortunately, if we were to miss the opening, we'd have to wait until 2.45 the next day which would give us some issues. But then, we generally do push on at the start of our trips and build in a safety margin for later holdups, so all good.

Thanks for your replies. Ditchcrawler - we had planned to go clockwise based on the advice that we should moor facing upstream. We were concerned about having to keep turning around. We also thought that other manoveures might be easier against the flow than with it, but I'm quite happy to be corrected. Clockwise did have the other advantage of getting through all the double locks in the first week in case of holdups. I realise that it will slow us down, but, according to canal planner it is possible, albeit with 9 1/2 hour days. Ianali - yes it is quite a long way, but we only hire for one holiday a year and we like to spend as much as possible of it moving. We've done 4-counties and cheshire rings each in a week a couple of times, usually with time for a side trip along the way. We tend not to stop for lunch, or only make a brief pitstop. Peter, yes it was the horseshoe shaped one we were looking at. Which make is it you have ? Why do you say you would want the ones with crotch straps, we couldn't decide if these would help or just get in the way ? How likely are the jackets to come off without them ? I know they are recommended for children, but ours hate them and avoid tightening them if they can get away with it.

Hi, I'm planning for our annual canal boat trip and as usual, I've been lurking on here for a month or so. After a flurry of questions and excellent advice from you folks in the early years of hiring, I've typically found answers to all my questions by searching through others questions. However, this year things are a little different. We couldn't get away at Easter, so we are hiring for two weeks in June/July from Napton. We've decided to take advantage of the longer period to venture south down the Grand Union and do the Thames Ring. So we will be travelling along the Thames from Brentford to Oxford. We've taken boats onto the Severn and the Avon before, but never the Thames. So I'm going to bother all you helpful people with some questions. First, as per the subject of this Topic, lifejackets. (I'll post another Topic when I've worked out exactly what else I need to ask................) Normally when hiring on the canals the adults in our party, all bar one strong swimmers, don't both with lifejackets. We borrow 2 from the boatyard for the teenagers and make them wear them when locking or if the older one is driving. We also borrow one for the non-swimming adult, but as he is elderly and no longer does locking that's only an emergency measure. However, since we will be on the Thames for several days, we thought that lifejackets for all of us might be a good idea. We could borrow enough of the normal foam type ones for everyone, but firstly they would take up an awful lot of room and secondly they tend to get in the way when you're doing stuff. Yes, I know safety is the most important thing, but, if we end up taking them off because they get in the way, they will do no good. So we were considering buying our own inflating ones. Firstly, do people wear lifejackets on rivers and if so do you use the inflatable ones? Even more importantly, can anyone recomend which ones to go for if we do decide to buy? We've decided that we would want 150N automatic ones, but there seem to be at least 3 makes with relatively similar specs. As we live a long way from any canals, (or other boaty places) there is nowhere here to go and try out the different types. So any real experience or advice would be brilliant.

What a surprise to find this in the Times yesterday. I'd just booked this very boat to do the 4 counties at Easter. Only prob is that I need to ensure the nubbies we are taking with us don't read it. One is rather nervous - and it doesn't give the best write up on the 4 counties !!

Excellent, thanks Dave -- looks like we will try to do Grindley Brook early in the morning (8.30am is early for us...........). Your timings are very helpful magpie -- particularly as your cruising times seem similar to ours - we typically continue a bit later in the evenings - but then we often stop for a pub lunch. Mmm thanks cotswoldsman - we'll definitely avoid mooring near Platts Lane........

We did it two years ago and had no problems with the locals. There were a small group of boys hanging about at one of the locks but we just said hello and they were quite chatty. Amazingly they lived quite nearby, but had no idea how the locks worked. They helped us push some of the gates and we shared our mini mars bars with them. The only real difficulty we had was with the Rochdale locks. There was water cascading over the tops of the gates and although we went down with another boat and so had 5 adults to work them - we really struggled to open some of the gates. It was a great experience though - I wouldn't have missed it.

Many thanks for all your replies. Sounds as though our timings should be OK. Alan, we don't really need help with the locks (although it is always nice to meet people that way). It's just that we will be a little slower than normal if we can't send someone on ahead to set the next one. Having said that - we will probably be greatful for help with Grindley Brook - we've never actually done a staircase before. We do plan to try to get there on the Saturday evening, and hopefully go up early in the morning. Does anyone know what hours the lock keeper works there ? I've looked at your trip report Joromo - but I'd rather avoid getting the lock-keeper out of bed if possible !! Also, I assume that it isn't possible to moor between the three single locks and the staircase ?? Does anyone know ? Really looking forward to the trip now. Our guide and map we're here when we got back from our long weekend. So its all systems go. If anyone has recommendations for good pub food on route - I'd be very greatful. I assume that there are plenty lovely places to moor ----- Thanks again, Darcy