Traditional Boats... a sense of entitlement?

[Rob-M]

21 minutes ago, Chris Williams said:

Just don't let anybody see you doing those things, the Play-actors will try to copy you and really do some damage.

 

I think that is part of the problem, somebody that doesn't understand the techniques being used attempt to do the same but end up ramming gates when levels aren't equal or causing other damage with incorrect use.

[Rob-M]

5 minutes ago, alan_fincher said:

Derek,

In view f your post you may be happy to hear that around a dozen "historics" are currently locked in on the Rochdale due to the major failure at Tannersfield Locks, with, by my estimation, very little prospect of them being able to escape for several weeks.

This  should considerably reduce your chances of meeting any more, unless you venture onto the Rochdale from the Sowerby Bridge end, but even then they are unlikely to be moving very far, as they can't fit the locks on the Calder and Hebble.

More sriously, you do at least concede it might be possible to meet well behaved ones, but the problem with your "shame but not name" post is that it potentially tars all of us that own such boats as being liable to such behaviours.

Personally I have no sense of entitlement or superiority associated with owning a couple of these craft, and expect to get no priority or privilege over anybody.  However, you are quite correct that we regularly don't come close to floating where your boat easily will, and that has to be factored into our options for moving about.

A further thought on this - some ex working boats are of course sometimes worked by volunteers rather than owners.  Some of those volunteers are excellent - probably far better than I could ever be, but there have been documented cases recently where historic boats have clearly been left in the charge of people completely unsuitable to handle them. This clearly should not happen, but has, and is inexcusable.   I'm curious if at east some of the examples you report might be such cases, as most "owned" ones I know about don't tend to acquire this kind of bad press.

If it was one of our volunteer operated boats I would like to know so that the issues could be addressed in our training. If one of our skippers was not operating in a courteous manner or allowing their crew to operate in such a manner it would need to be sorted out.

 

[roland elsdon]

I’ve never worn a trilby or spotted neckerchief in my life. Regrettably my occupation required a waistcoat and tie at times but I used to leave them at work. I was once asked whether the tie my team used in court was part of our uniform and had to admit to a large group of magistrates we had one tie, kept on the back of the office door that we attached for appearances.

as owner of various ageing ex cargo boats I boat in garments marginally dirtier than the engine.

[pete harrison]

19 minutes ago, roland elsdon said:

I’ve never worn a trilby or spotted neckerchief in my life. Regrettably my occupation required a waistcoat and tie at times but I used to leave them at work. I was once asked whether the tie my team used in court was part of our uniform and had to admit to a large group of magistrates we had one tie, kept on the back of the office door that we attached for appearances.

as owner of various ageing ex cargo boats I boat in garments marginally dirtier than the engine.

The nearest I ever got to dressing up was a bib and brace overall, and the occasion was the Black Country Museum boat gathering in September 1989 where participating boaters were asked to dress sympathetically to their 1920's re-enactment. I was on my Grand Union motor BADSEY, which like all of the other Grand Unions there was not built until the mid 1930's.

 

I do find a donkey jacket useful when boating as rain is absorbed into it rather than dripping into the cabin as is the case with a waterproof jacket, and a donkey jacket can easily be dried in the engine room ready for the next day. I do not see a donkey jacket as having any special links with boating as they were in common use everywhere - I even wore one to school  

 

edit = spelling

Edited June 11, 2019 by pete harrison

[cuthound]

2 hours ago, MartynG said:

A lot of people live in house and are competent boaters.

Nor does living on a boat make that person a competent boater.

 

 

Indeed, some people who live on boats, particularly in the capital, move less in a year than many a hirer would in a week.

Edited June 11, 2019 by cuthound
To remove a duplicate post

[Derek Porteous]

Evening Alan,

 

I know your initial two paragraphs are tongue  in cheek, but I do like to see all sorts of craft  enjoying our unique waterways. It is particularly fitting that historic craft are still a significant feature in what are historical water roads.

However I do take your point. I certainly didn’t mean to perform a global tarring of all  historic boat owners. Indeed the vast majority of those I have encountered have been pleasant courteous people;  you  being a preeminent example. So for the aspersions casting, I apologise. 

However the three consecutive instances remain valid (well, in my memory anyway). 

Perhaps you have already alluded to the possible source of what I regards as a significant change in behaviour of some, but certainly still a very small proportion, of historic boats.

Edited June 11, 2019 by Derek Porteous

[Iain_S]

2 hours ago, dmr said:

.(snip)

As you might guess from this rant we were hit very hard by two of these things recently.

 

..........Dave

At least I managed to miss you!  ?

[dmr]

2 minutes ago, Iain_S said:

At least I managed to miss you!  ?

 

We are on moorings rings but its still a high stress spot right next to a busy lock landing. Its an OK trading spot for the festival, a bit on the edge of the main trading but its nice and deep and they usually have some good local bands on a little stage next to the lock, good basic pub rock stuff. Can sell a bit of stuff, drink beer and listen to music all from the boat. Last year we briefly had two diesel boats breasted up to us....that caused trouble ,

 

............Dave

[matty40s]

1 hour ago, pete harrison said:

But I am sure the style of boating you were used to doing back in 1975 is the type of boating that would be getting highlighted in this thread as anti-social - fore end resting against gates, pushing gates open when running uphill (not ramming them), using a mast line to open gates, using a strapping line to close gates when running downhill, using a shaft to close bottom gates e.t.c. - and all of which are techniques I was familiar with using back in the day, but I can see that I am going to have to review these when I get to go boating again 

I do like practicing strapping gates shut with Old Friends, such a good feeling when it works almost every time, however, with so many gates now having strapping posts removed, it cant always be done.

I was told off by a volocky once who was waiting 'to do my lock for me'. As I pushed the end and strapped it in, night on perfectly, he said, you cant do that, they weren't designed for that reason!!

[Dav and Pen]

Sorry to say we often strapped in and used mast strings where there were proper shaped hand rails.

[cheshire~rose]

1 hour ago, alan_fincher said:

A further thought on this - some ex working boats are of course sometimes worked by volunteers rather than owners.  Some of those volunteers are excellent - probably far better than I could ever be, but there have been documented cases recently where historic boats have clearly been left in the charge of people completely unsuitable to handle them. This clearly should not happen, but has, and is inexcusable.   I'm curious if at east some of the examples you report might be such cases, as most "owned" ones I know about don't tend to acquire this kind of bad press.

Let's face it there are good and bad examples of boat handling to be found everywhere, whether the much (and in my view wrongly) maligned hire boaters, the "all the gear and no idea" brigade on many different types of boats, the newbie boaters on a vessel they just bought and also among historic boats.

 

I am never comfortable with this sort of thread because, as you pointed out, the problem boats are not identified so all historic boats and their owners are under suspicion. 

Your comments allude to the possibility that the boats may have been handled by volunteers. Well maybe they were, or maybe they weren't. By making that suggestion you start to tar all volunteer helms of historic boats with that same brush that you were bothered about being tarnished with yourself. 

 

Some of those volunteers you have yourself suggested are excellent will be tarred with that brush. Those that are not excellent have to gain experience somehow and how will they do that if they do not take to the helm? Of course an inexperienced helm should not be "in charge" but even a volunteer with a moderate amount of experience may not be experienced on a specific stretch of canal and could get caught out by unfamiliar depth issues. 

 

With regard to the opening post, a succession of evens has caused the poster to draw a conclusion that the behaviour witnessed was associated with historic boats. That is his perogative but, for example, what colour were the boats? There is scientific evidence suggesting owners of different colour cars will drive in differing manners. Has anyone every done any scientific research on whether that applies to boats and if so could that have been the underlying cause of the problem wrongly blamed on historic boats? 

Personally I think the rude and arrogant behaviour that was displayed was probably a result of the boats being operated by rude an arrogant people. Sadly there are a lot of them around in the world these days and they find themselves on all sorts of boats 

[Captain Pegg]

37 minutes ago, Derek Porteous said:

Evening Alan,

 

I know your initial two paragraphs are tongue  in cheek, but I do like to see all sorts of craft  enjoying our unique waterways. It is particularly fitting that historic craft are still a significant feature in what are historical water roads.

However I do take your point. I certainly didn’t mean to perform a global tarring of all  historic boat owners. Indeed the vast majority of those I have encountered have been pleasant courteous people;  you  being a preeminent example. So for the aspersions casting, I apologise. 

However the three consecutive instances remain valid (well, in my memory anyway). 

Perhaps you have already alluded to the possible source of what I regards as a significant change in behaviour of some, but certainly still a very small proportion, of historic boats.

There’s little point in starting a thread with a bold assertion like you did and not backing it up with more conviction than above. It’s highly unlikely that all three of these allegedly errant boats were crewed by volunteers (which I am assuming is what your last sentence is referring to). There aren’t many volunteer associations that actively work their ex-working boats to any great degree; and one of the few that does has it’s motor out of action at present.

 

All @alan_fincher did was to demonstrate it wasn’t him, and I think we kind of knew that anyway. I agree with his sentiment about tarring historic owners but at the same time he’s a little disingenuous to bring volunteer groups into it. Like @Rob-M I am interested in the instances he cites and where they have been documented as I am not aware of such.

 

The vast majority of volunteers are also boat owners, sharers or regular hirers and they should know how to behave toward other boaters whether on an ex-working craft or not.

 

JP

[alan_fincher]

2 minutes ago, cheshire~rose said:

I am never comfortable with this sort of thread because, as you pointed out, the problem boats are not identified so all historic boats and their owners are under suspicion. 

Your comments allude to the possibility that the boats may have been handled by volunteers. Well maybe they were, or maybe they weren't. By making that suggestion you start to tar all volunteer helms of historic boats with that same brush that you were bothered about being tarnished with yourself.

Sorry Jan - t's hard to see how I can be accused of tarring all volunteers when I said....

 

Quote

Some of those volunteers are excellent - probably far better than I could ever be.

However you will probably be aware the excellently restored wooden boat "Dane", (not the tar boat -the other one!), has recently featured in a series of pictures and videos where it is seen hitting a series of other boats, to the extent that people posting it believed it was deliberate ramming by an aggressive steerer.  The actual truth seemed to be that someone was steering unsupervised who had absolutely no control of the craft.

Goodness knows how that came about - I would assume with all the work that went into restoring Dane they would want to keep it in good order, but undoubtedly that was a case of lack of supervision leading to a lot of bad press being directed at one particular boat.  It shouldn't happen, but sometimes it does, unfortunately.

[cheshire~rose]

Alan,

 

you did not name those volunteers who are excellent and not many volunteers wear name badges so how is anyone to differentiate between a volunteer who can handle a boat well and one that can't? 

 

Very much like the OP - how many boaters know when a historic boat approaches them whether it is the courteous Alan Fincher at the helm or Mr Arrogant? Most boaters just see a historic boat. 

[alan_fincher]

12 minutes ago, Captain Pegg said:

All @alan_fincher did was to demonstrate it wasn’t him, and I think we kind of knew that anyway. I agree with his sentiment about tarring historic owners but at the same time he’s a little disingenuous to bring volunteer groups into it. Like @Rob-M I am interested in the instances he cites and where they have been documented as I am not aware of such.

See above.

Dane is the most recent example I have seen, (within the last week, I would say).  I don't know the exact ownership status of Dane, but it was claimed to be a volunteer steerer.

 

In the more distant past one "trust" group dismissed a volunteer steerer because of repeated problems with his behaviour - something we ourselves got on the wrong end of, at one point from that particular individual.

It does happen just as some owner steerers of historic craft sometimes behave badly, (and indeed steerers of non historic craft sometimes behave badly!).

I am neither suggesting, nor not suggesting that some of the boats Derek complains about may be "group operated" rather than privately owned boats - I have no way of knowing one way or the other, unless he tells us!

[Captain Pegg]

So in summary, some steerers of some boats sometimes are a nuisance to some other boaters.

 

No news here. Move along.

 

JP

Edited June 11, 2019 by Captain Pegg

[beerbeerbeerbeerbeer]

Some see an historic boat where there is no historic boat but instead a modern imitation. ?

Complete with all the paraphernalia. 

 

 

Just saying. 

 

 

[Chris Williams]

54 minutes ago, cheshire~rose said:

There is scientific evidence suggesting owners of different colour cars will drive in differing manners. Has anyone every done any scientific research on whether that applies to boats

How many of these 'arrogant' steerers drive white BMWs or Audis ?

[TheBiscuits]

1 hour ago, cheshire~rose said:

for example, what colour were the boats?

I think they were probably black on the hull ...

[Slim]

I don't dispute that there are good and bad in all groups but some years ago I experienced absolute arrogance on the part of of a number of crews of 'historic' boats (and butties). I was waiting to decend at Batchworth lock when I encountered a number of boats coming up after leaving the Rickmansworth Festival.. In the time it took me to untie (single handed) a couple of dungaree clad boat crew turned the lock on me without even acknowledging my existence. As they entered and filled the lock with a great show of 'skill' jumping from boats to lock and back. The gates were opened by ramming them and all four paddles allowed to drop uncontrolled. The next pair up promptly gave a repeat performance!!!!.When I took issue with them I was told there were 4 pairs coming up and I wouldn't be able to get past them (this was true). I had no option but to wait. At no stage did anyone apologise or show the slightest concern over their actions.

[nicknorman]

13 minutes ago, Slim said:

I don't dispute that there are good and bad in all groups but some years ago I experienced absolute arrogance on the part of of a number of crews of 'historic' boats (and butties). I was waiting to decend at Batchworth lock when I encountered a number of boats coming up after leaving the Rickmansworth Festival.. In the time it took me to untie (single handed) a couple of dungaree clad boat crew turned the lock on me without even acknowledging my existence. As they entered and filled the lock with a great show of 'skill' jumping from boats to lock and back. The gates were opened by ramming them and all four paddles allowed to drop uncontrolled. The next pair up promptly gave a repeat performance!!!!.When I took issue with them I was told there were 4 pairs coming up and I wouldn't be able to get past them (this was true). I had no option but to wait. At no stage did anyone apologise or show the slightest concern over their actions.

But, according to some on here, it could well have been 8 modern leisure boats doing the exact same thing.

 

Yea right!

 

Only one thing worse than a self-important historic boat driver, and that is a pack of them!

[Slim]

4 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

But, according to some on here, it could well have been 8 modern leisure boats doing the exact same thing.

 

Yea right!

 

Only one thing worse than a self-important historic boat driver, and that is a pack of them!

It could have been but it wasn't !!

[davem399]

A few years ago on the Staff and Worcs, we were waiting at a lock in which an historic motor was descending.  It came out the lock and just as we were about to move off, they closed the gates and refilled it for the butty they were paired with.  The butty was not roped to the motor but on the lock landing.  Surely it would have been sensible to allow us to rise as the lock needed refilling anyway?  There was no explanation or apology on why they turned the lock. What was rather surprising is that the "skipper" of the  pair was also the manager of the wharf where our boat was based at the time.  Not the best customer service, and a definite air of arrogance.

[haggis]

I agree that there are good and bad boaters on all sorts of boats but I think because we expect good boat man ship from those in charge of old working boats that it sticks in our mind when we see otherwise. I know that when 3 boats passed us with breaking washes when we were moored on the Middlewich branch  a few years ago I couldn't tell you the name of the hire or private boat but I remember the name of the working boat 

We were properly moored  so didn't move but breaking washes are not good for the canal. 

Haggis 

[MtB]

1 hour ago, davem399 said:

A few years ago on the Staff and Worcs, we were waiting at a lock in which an historic motor was descending.  It came out the lock and just as we were about to move off, they closed the gates and refilled it for the butty they were paired with.  The butty was not roped to the motor but on the lock landing.  Surely it would have been sensible to allow us to rise as the lock needed refilling anyway?  

 

Actually, I've had that happen to me too. I challenged them and they came up with a feeble-sounding justification, something to do with long-lining IIRC.

 

But the deed was done and the lock refilling while I was arguing about it. Can any of the historic boaters here offer a reasonable explanation for this behaviour?