Scholar Gypsy

Lovely engine room - you have the same air filter as my NB! You do seem to have lots of fuel filters and water traps ...

willowtree, a couple of miles along the Paddington Arm.

good idea. last time I did this while wandering around the royal docks, the police asked me in a friendly way what I was doing. I still have my stop & search notice somewhere....

NB some gearboxes use automatic transmission fluid, some use oil. some dipsticks you need to screw down to get a reading; some you must not.

Agree v pleasant rural moorings just through Curdworth tunnel. Last time I was there was early on a Sunday morning, and a two mile fishing match, but we just went slowly for an hour.

Very pleasant GOBA moorings at Waterbeach, just above Bottisham lock. I think GOBA members are currently allowed to use that, without a Cam Conservators licence - the position changes a bit from year to year. Easy to visit Cambridge by train if you want to... Don't forget the Lodes..

you could struggle to do that on a single tide, so you may want to go downstream for a bit on the ebb, and then up to Teddington on the flood. will be a longish day & some hanging around. (ps check insurance for below the barrier).

I did some sums on this in an idle moment yesterday. A 15 tonne boat doing say 5 mph is about 2 metres/second, and so if the anchor brings it to a complete stop in say 1 second (let's allow for the rope to stretch a bit) then the tension in the rope while the boat is stopping will average about 30 kN or a weight of about 3 tonnes. (very crudely Force x stopping time = mass x velocity). That does argue to me, for tieing up to the bow, and deploying from there on grounds of safety, and starting the boat to turn before the anchor bites. That will mean it takes quite a bit longer for the forward momentum of the boat to be reduced to zero, and that will reduce the force.

Well done for picking up all the rubbish....

Godmanchester very pleasant, above lock in weir stream.

see earlier posting in Stoppages, which gives a rather different story. http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=77315 . They could of course raise the water level in the Basin by partially opening both sets of gates at Limehouse at high tide (though that may mean overriding an interlock!)

Just checked this out with the PLA's tide tables. So at Tower Bridge LWS is 0.9m below LWN, and this difference gradually reduces to zero by Brentford (where low water level is between 1.9m and 1.0m above LW at Tower - at Springs and Neaps respectively). Unfortunately the next data point upstream (where one might expect this number to go negative) is at Richmond, which is the wrong side of the half tide weir, which rather spoils the experiment.

Thanks - reminds me of the instructions for my chainsaw which basically say "Do not use to cut trees, unless they are held in a vice". The gas fridge we had many years ago also said "not for use in boats", though I guess they had in mind yachts heeling over at 30 degrees! Thanks, interesting. I will take the old one to bits and have a look, before I throw it away. I will also add a regulator to the list of spares I carry on board...

Thanks - this is interesting & I can see why it could be the case, depending on the shape of the river etc. So there is a point on the river (which will move I guess according to the amount of fresh water at Cromwell?), such that below that point LW is lower at Springs than at Neaps (that is certainly the case at Hull, for instance); and above that point LW is higher at Springs than at Neaps. Where this point is (I wonder if there is a proper technical name for it) could be modelled by some big computers, or just observed in practice. I think you are saying it is below Torksey?

Very nice. I was disappointed that you did not include a photo of the bend on the New Bedford, one of the highlights of that trip. So here is one I took last year ...

I agree re Woodhall Spa - I went there at the weekend (photos here), to watch Jurassic World at the Kinema. The way to get into the Cathedral free is to go to choral evensong, or indeed any other service. They have taken the view that they have to charge other visitors, to cover the costs of running and maintaining the building (a team of thirty craftsmen and women, it says here) ...

Thanks, the one I just bought says "not for use in caravans" in the instructions. Not sure if this is because it doesn't like the rain, or because of vibration while on the road.... Thanks - I took a similar view. There was also a cover which when removed had a plastic disc with a cross (for a screwdriver) in it. I didn't want to fiddle about with that either....

The gas supply (propane aka red gas) to the cooker has been getting a bit weaker over the past few weeks, and finally packed up this morning half way through cooking the sausages! The bottle had loads of gas in, and clearly was not at all cold! Eventually I concluded that the regulator must have failed (fortunately it failed safe). The marina had a spare (about £5) and after three mins with a screwdriver and a new Jubilee clip all was fine. Has anyone had a regulator fail like this before?

And here you are at Washingborough ...

bad luck. do say hello as you go past Washingborough!

Just arrived. boat a bit hot. I will pop round to say hello after lunch, before we set off !

Thanks. Further research suggests that some NBs have got under the bridge and turned at the pumping station a few hundred metres further on. I won't be trying this ... See here

Thanks! I went to an interesting IWA talk on this canal a few months ago - the original plan to build it with no locks proved too challenging (and cost several thousand lives to demonstrate that was the case, as well as ruining the reputation of Ferdinand de Lesseps. Did you see the new locks, which I think have some innovative technology called side ponds (three each for each lock)?

I'm afraid to say I rather agree. I stopped for an hour or so in the shopping plaza (good mooring rings but you need to vault over the railings to get out!). If I did stop overnight, I would probably anchor in the Pool. Was much more pleasant on my last visit (1982!) when you could moor end on, to the side of the pool where the "no mooring" signs now are. SPJ

You will enjoy counting the empty beer bottles on the window cills of the student accommodation. Maybe they've been tidied away for the summer conference visitors....