Albion

Ho ho, I only have experience of canal systems and none of the continental canals reach that far. ? Roger

Ruddy spell checker/auto correct strikes again. Just spotted 'Calcutta' instead of 'Calcutt'. Doh! Roger

In all honesty, he's not good at piloting a narrowboat, a craft that he has owned for years. Saw him and his boat once at Calcutta Marina when I used to moor our nb there and to say his boat looked well worn would be a kind description. ? Roger

The only time that I have ever heard that anyone has used the interior steering position of a 129 out of choice/necessity (129 the best steering version of the Euroclassics) was once when Timothy West and Prunella Scales did their TV canal series on the Nivernais Canal, late in the boating season. A 129 was prepared and cleaned to within an inch of its life and a port worker went along with them and the film crew (we were moored at Vermenton at the time and were actually asked if we could hang around and be interviewed for the program but couldn't because we had to head back to the UK just before the program was to be filmed). As usual, as can be seen from many of his other canal films, Timothy found steering difficult so they filmed some of him steering from the outer/upper deck position but it was faked because the port worker was the one actually steering from inside the boat while Timothy was filmed appearing to steer it from the outside ?. This info was relayed to us by the port staff the next season when we rejoined our barge at the port. Roger