12 weeks on the cut

[Bill Kennedy]

Chapter 5 – Week 4, Birmingham Canal Navigation/Grand Union/South Oxford Canal

 

Saturday May 22

A Little Help from Friends

 

We were blessed with another cooler but fine day with wonderful sunshine and an initial cruise of five miles of absolutely delightful scenery. We traversed the 396m Shrewley tunnel which had water dripping like rain from its roof and calcium carbonate streaming in solid rivers down its walls. Arriving in a leafy glade at the top of Hatton Locks, a flight of 21 locks, our reverie was broken by the noise of a loud speaker, making us realize we couldn’t be far from a town. We rounded a corner to see a delightful country gymkhana going on and knew we were really in rural England. Another boat was following us so we waited for them to see if they wanted to travel down the locks with us, given that the locks were wide and of the same difficult type as yesterday. They were very happy to do so and travelled with us for the first eight locks, two driving the boats and two opening the locks- so much easier than by ourselves. The young chap was a builder who told me he had sold his house to buy his boat and that he’d been living on it and traveling since February. He must have bought a shell as, looking through the window, it did not seem to have any furniture or fittings. They moored to go off to Leamington Spa to her sister and I gave the lass one of my cards then the chap appeared with a tin of half a dozen bantam eggs which I boiled for the larder. We then met other boats coming up so that eased things as the locks were set for us and Bill took over the windlass. One chap at the locks said “you’ve done this before, haven’t you” and when I said “only briefly” he said “you’re very good”- which made up for my driving disaster of going backwards yesterday. It was also reassuring that the same problem happened to Bill today - made me feel less incompetent.

Our spot of humour today happened as we approached a T-junction and, being without a map, were not entirely sure of the direction we should take. Just at that moment a boat came around the corner on the wrong side of the canal. Bill did some fast rudder work and got out of their way. I thought I’d ask them if this was the way to Napton Junction and shouted this out above the two engines, pointing in the direction we were now headed. Both of the chaps at the stern looked at me then dropped their eye contact and didn’t look up again as they scurried around the corner and I thought, “well don’t answer me then” then I realised they thought I was abusing them for being on the wrong side of the canal. We had good giggle over that one.

 

I saw the first of the foxgloves today - the flowers that charmed me in Wales in 2001, growing out of a rock face. I have also seen the first of the lupins and irises in the past few days. Today has been a far more relaxing day than yesterday; I’m sure because we had some help with the locks. Tomorrow we have yet another big day of the same (today we traversed 23 locks in 12 miles) and should reach Napton and the Oxford canal as we continue our journey south. We have found a pleasant country mooring about ten miles out of Napton, indulged in happy hour then prepared tortellini with sauce neopolitana, courtesy of Sainsburys fresh food to go department, followed by a shared chocolate muffin (from the store at Hatton Top Lock) and coffee. It’s important to feed a good boat woman well.

 

Sunday May 23

Not the old rope around the prop trick

 

Woke to a glorious morning with not a cloud in the sky and set off to tackle our first set of two locks at Radford. These were of the variety common to the Grand Union canal and my knees began to complain loudly immediately. I think this is largely because I have no arm power (and no, I don’t think I can blame the shoulder surgery) so I tend to transfer weight down through my legs and somehow get them to help. Suffice it to say Bill volunteered to take over and just at that moment two small canal boats each of 30ft travelling in a convoy asked if we’d like to share the lock with them. Talk about having your bum in the butter. We couldn’t believe our good luck. I commented at the time how arsey it was that the minute Bill takes over the windlass, we get help on the locks.

 

John & Jane and John & Chris from the Mid Warwickshire Yacht Club, were a godsend as it turned out. We travelled with them through nineteen locks in a very nice system with Jane and me going ahead to open, Bill and John and Chris driving and the other John closing.

 

As we entered the nineteenth lock disaster struck. I was closing the rear lock gate, and Bill threw the rope up ready for me to wrap around the bollard and pass back down to him. Unfortunately the boat was carried forward when Jane opened the front paddle so Bill put the boat into reverse to save crashing into the front gates and in an instant the rope fell into the water and was eaten by the propeller. Now a prop that has a ten metre rope wrapped around it tightly ain’t goin’ nowhere. Our new best friends towed us through the next two locks and, bless their hearts, moored and set about fixing our predicament.

 

Now the two John’s must have thought these boating novices have got Buckley’s and none of fixing this problem by themselves. So out came their tool boxes with spanners and hacksaws and the smallest of them plunged into the bowels of our engine space with a steel hammer in hand and our bread knife tied to his wrist.

 

First he brought up enough shredded plastic bags to fill another shopping bag and then half an old sari, all red and gold and glittering in the sunlight. Then finally he could reach the rope and bit by tedious bit, he sawed it into about six pieces, and for a three strand rope, with a bread knife, hunched over double, squatting, up to your armpits in a steel vat with a steel plate a foot above your head, this is no mean feat - the man deserved a medal. The best we could rustle up to say thank you was a six pack and a couple of bottles of red from our larder. After all, we had only stablised their boats in a lock, they had their day out totally stuffed up by a couple of rookies. They dismissed our praise simply by saying “that’s what boating’s all about, helping one another”. What great people.

 

We waved goodbye to them and headed off to Napton and they to Braunston. We decided we would moor early at the Folly Inn (ironic name.) and that it was a night for dinner at the pub.

 

Monday May 24

Our cup runneth over

 

Today was the best day. We were in the country all day with just the fields, the farms, the birds and flowers, the canal and a blue sky. We were the first boat out of Napton at 7.30am and all the locks were set for us. I’m sure this was because Bill volunteered for lock duty first. Once through the nine locks at Napton we had about five hours cruising the rural delights of Warwickshire without a lock in sight - sheer bliss - cuttings, embankments, woods, bridges, villages, twists and turns, through some of the prettiest countryside you could imagine.

 

As we neared Fenny Compton around lunchtime, we passed a derelict old boat with two equally derelict chaps sitting on the stern having a beer. One looked at the boat and said “Ah, Brewood, that’s where I met my best woman, in a laundrette”. We were told by Will Abbey that people would make comments about the boat but we weren’t expecting that one. Fenny Compton has a canalside pub called “The Wharf” (as do many other canalside villages in England) and, being lunch time, we thought a visit a good idea. After a drink and bangers and mash and a chat to the Aussie waitress we meandered on, crossing over into Oxfordshire in the process. Another nine locks later (eighteen for the day), at one of which Bill’s windlass was consigned to the deep as it flew off the paddle winch as he was winding, we moored at Cropredy, a picture postcard pretty village.

 

After strolling up its very short High Street, we retired to “The Red Lion”. Now you may think this journey has degenerated into a pub crawl but we had to visit this pub as LTC Rolt (the man of canal boating) used to frequent here. We were feeling no pain downing our bucket and our pint, respectively, and listening to the latest Nora Jones album and chatting to the young Aussie chef (they’re everywhere). Then the church bells began at the ancient church opposite the pub (and two hours later were still going.). We decided then it was stay until we couldn’t hear the church bells anymore (there were tram-like looped straps hanging from a beam above the bar presumably for that purpose) or retire to the boat and concoct dinner. We finally decided that two pub meals in one day may give the wrong impression.

 

Tuesday May 25

Historic Banbury

 

The man really is a slave driver. There I was, blissfully at rest, having a luxurious sleep-in in the middle of an ancient, pretty village and himself is up and dressed at 6.30am, having greased his shaft (no rude jokes - it’s a real boating thing) and all ready to go. [bill’s note - In fact I had done this the night before after mooring.] It was so early, in boating circles, that we decided to walk the boat up to the lock (only a boat’s length) to start the engine in order not wake our neighbours. We were making the short journey from Cropredy to Banbury but wanted a chance to explore Banbury, despite the Pearson’s guide saying it was like going “from heaven to hell”.

 

Locks, as usual, set against us (yours truly on lock duty). At the second lock there was a moderate chunk of weed floating in the lock chamber and himself came forward with his grappling hook, looking every bit the Inuit hunter with his harpoon, to fish it out - nothing more is getting tangled in his prop if he can help it. On the way out of Cropredy we saw the most delightful quarter size narrowboat and christened it “Mini Me”.

 

It must have been a long time since the Pearson’s guide was revised or Banbury really took the criticism to heart and cleaned up its act. The place was spotless, the moorings are fantastic and the canal travels right through the new quarter of town, much in the same way as it does in Birmingham. There is a new Museum here and they have preserved Tooley’s boatyard in the midst of it all. It was established in 1790 and is the oldest working boatyard in Britain. It is the place where Tom Rolt had his boat, “Cressey”, fitted out, and from whence he and his wife began their journeys before WWII, all chronicled in his book “Narrowboat”.

 

We spent the morning exploring the town, phoning the girls, sending our e-mails at the library and replenishing the larder. We went into a little greengrocer, staffed only by the man himself, an earnest little chap in a dust coat - so very English - just like Ronnie Barker in “Open All Hours”. We bought some English asparagus but somehow I don’t think it will be as splendid as the lot we bought from the Whitchurch farm, in 2001. Also purchased a big punnet of very red sherberty strawberries, with the same aroma as those one-off’s from the Spring Hill Fair in Brisbane. I had a need for some real meat, and to hell with the mad cow thing (still in the news here) so bought a nice slice of rump and some spring lamb chops. In the afternoon, we visited the Museum and Tooley’s Boatyard. That done I felt an urgent call for a snooze on the bed to replenish me for the continuation of our pub crawl - an exaggerated description for having one drink, then coming back to the boat and cooking tea.

 

Tonight a matching pair of 70ft Hotel Boats has moored opposite. Their passengers are all octogenarians; the staff, fit 20 year olds.

 

Wednesday May 26

Cruising to Oxford

 

Up and at ‘em early again. We left Banbury at 7.30 but were pipped at the lock that exits the city by a couple who looked in their late seventies. They were dashing down to London to a wedding and to take their son and his girlfriend cruising on the Thames and had been doing some extraordinary mileage. It gave me hope that one could still be very active at that age. This thought was immediately countered by coming across an elderly gent of apparently similar age to the previous couple. This man was from the hotel boat, had been for a walk but couldn’t figure out how to get back to the side of the canal where his boat was moored - all a bit of a worry.

 

Because a Bank Holiday weekend is coming up Bill wants to get to Oxford by Thursday as he is sure every man and his dog will be arriving on Friday and mooring will be less available than normal. I’m sure he’s right, judging by the comments from people we’ve met along the way. So today was a big day with eighteen miles covered, with eleven locks, all in a total of eleven hours, including an hour’s hold up at Somerton Deep Lock when some Americans dropped their rudder onto the cill of the lock and had to be towed out.

 

All of the locks are deep on this stretch and have very heavy single gates. I have done my resistance training for the week - even needed to call Bill to do a couple of them for me, they were so heavy. The day was overcast and infinitely cooler than it has been. The locals were all in short sleeves but we had on three layers each, including a polar fleece.

 

This afternoon we passed over the course of an old Roman road, Akeman Street, but could see nothing to identify it. I suppose I was expecting something like Hadrian’s Wall. We have stopped for the night in a little hamlet called Enslow which appears to have a pub, a gravel yard (the river Cherwell has been following us all day), a few houses and very little else. There were no moorings available but the pub has it own wharf so while Bill attended to the ropes I asked the publican if we could moor there. So here we are at the bottom of his beer garden across the canal from the gravel yard, with the railway line to the north of us and the A4095 to the immediate south - hope we sleep. We are too tired to care. In keeping with Murphy’s Law, food was “off” on Tuesday and Wednesday nights at the pub.

 

Today the canal and the river Cherwell met and do so again early tomorrow. Fortunately there has not been rain because when the Cherwell is in flood this part of the journey can be hair-raising. Here’s hoping for a peaceful journey tomorrow and a good mooring in Oxford.

 

Thursday May 27

Laughs and Lift Bridges

 

We set off at a leisurely 8am as today is a shorter day by Bill’s clever planning. At least two of the locks were set for us - with the gates left open for us as the departing boats could see us coming - joy to a girl with a windlass in her hand. The locks in this area tend to have single gates which are very heavy so Bill volunteered to do these for me. There are also lots of lift bridges, also heavy but beautifully counter-balanced. To date all have been left up but today we struck three that were down to allow access to vehicular traffic to the other side of the canal. Only the lower half of one’s boat will fit under a closed lift bridge - the upper half would be sliced off if an attempt to pass under it were made. In all of this detail lies an amusing story.

 

Bill had just opened and closed an extremely heavy lock gate when he decided this exertion had created a call of nature. Suffice it to say it was to be the lengthier of the usual visits, and, having forbidden him to read on this occasion, I took the tiller, suggesting he not be too long. The canal was a decent width at this point so I was moseying along feeling quite satisfied with my piloting efforts, taking the odd picture and communing with nature, when my reverie was broken by the realization that the swing bridge that I was headed for, and indeed was quite close to, was down. Hell, better pull up, and quickly, so I cut the motor and headed for the tie up point before the bridge. At this point the nose of the boat crashed into the angled bridge wall, I leapt off and tied it to the bollard, as if it were all intentional. When Bill came scurrying up from the depths of the boat I said nonchalantly “lift bridge”- then added with a grin - “bet that scared the s*** out of you”.

 

Bill opened this bridge and I took the boat through. I mention this detail because it deprived me of any experience of handling a lift bridge, namely, of any idea of their weight and how to get them to do what you wish. When at last my turn came, I was able to pull on the chain and elevate the bridge but not keep the counterbalance arm down - it was just too heavy. I was swinging on the chain like a demented bell ringer as the bridge went up and down, shouting to Bill, “not yet, not yet”, fearing that he would not hear me above the noise of the engine and that he’d proceed under the bridge just as I smashed it down on his head. Finally I launched my whole bodyweight onto the beam and it stayed down while he proceeded safely through. All lift bridges, unless in miniature, are now his domain.

 

We arrived safely in Oxford, mooring at the lower end of the canal just before the link section with the Thames (or Isis as it is known hereabouts). It is not the most salubrious part of town (we are opposite a boatyard and the towpath is very busy) but the closest we could get a 48hr mooring near to the railway station where we are to meet Maki on Saturday. At least Oxford graffiti has social and political comment. Having explored our options this afternoon, tomorrow we will probably move onto the Thames which only has 24 hour moorings but is much nicer. We plan to cruise out towards Lechlade with Maki as this is apparently a very pretty part of the R Thames however we need to be mindful that she must be back in Oxford by midday Monday.

 

As we checked out the position of the railway station this afternoon there was a tour-of-the-city bus waiting there so we bought tickets and did a very useful sight-see from the top of a double decker bus which we can repeat tomorrow if we wish, on the same ticket. The history of this city is amazing and so humbling when considering the minds that have come through here. it must be an enormous privilege to study here. We saw many of the famous colleges and theatres, their exquisite architecture all in a beautiful state of preservation, and of course, in full use to this very day. It’s an old but living city, quite fantastic that it has been so revered and treasured for so long. I think I could spend a week here exploring - one hardly knows where to start.

 

Friday May 28

Magnificent Oxford

 

Now I have to warn you that I write this journal entry well plied with dry white as it is happy hour after a day out and about in Oxford.

 

The morning began at 9.30am at a leisurely pace with an on-foot jaunt down to the Isis lock to check on available moorings and to our delight several were available. Returning hastily to our boat we proceeded through the lock separating the canal from the R Thames and made our way, somewhat hesitantly, into the world of deep water, currents and 180 degree turns. Because we want to spend a little time in the next few days cruising towards Lechlade yet moor in the Isis lock approach it was necessary to turn our boat to face back the way we had come because we will be going west and continuing towards the source of the Thames.

 

Now you will have to remember this was our first attempt at winding in a current and suffice it to say that we discovered by trial and error that the Thames at this point is not much wider than the 50ft of our boat - translated - we found ourselves broadside across the Thames with about a foot to manoeuvre. Problem solved by Lynn inching along the outside of the boat and then taking the bowline on shore and walking the boat to its mooring with much help from slow forward from the boat’s engine. Bill was enveloped in his deep stressful silence, shaking his head at why his calculations hadn’t worked to plan, and I think, grateful that no gongoozlers were in attendance.

 

Undaunted, we moored and then set off to attend to the larder, finding the covered markets that I always find fascinating. This was a completely new culinary experience - we found things like skate’s wings, skate’s knobs (I am yet to work out which part of the fish’s anatomy these are from), cod cheeks, langoustines, edible sea grass, wild wood pigeon, boned quail, duck breasts, every conceivable type of sausage, a cheese called “Stinking Bishop” and things called “cutting pies” that masqueraded as doorstops. I was particularly attracted to the egg and bacon one but resisted. We bought some plump fillets of fresh salmon, smoked salmon, a couple of delightful looking cheeses (not the “Bishop”), crusty bread, fresh asparagus, French dried figs, baby cos lettuce, vine ripened tomatoes (still on the stalk), cooked rare roast beef, semi-dried tomatoes, fresh pasta and some spicy salami. I think the weekend eating should be good.

 

Our dear Maki Fujita, who lived with us for nine months, some twelve years ago, when the girls were at Brisbane Girls Grammar School, is coming down from Birmingham to have the bank holiday weekend cruising with us. We marveled at the fact that it will take her 1hour 15 minutes by train to get here and yet it has taken us six days by canal.

 

With all the housekeeping attended to we set off again to explore Oxford. As an initial overview, apart from our tour of the city, we attended “The Oxford Story”, a thumbnail sketch of Oxford over the centuries viewed as dioramas seen from a people mover. It was created by the same people that made “Yorvick” (the Viking story), that we saw in York in 2001. One gained the impression that the Oxford version is in the infancy of its development.

 

Next was a visit to Trinity College after Balliol College was closed to visitors because of exams then on to the New Bodleian Library. It was all a bit of a genuflecting experience, to think of the age, the skill of the architecture and craftsmanship, the preservation, the generations of scholars past and the minds that have emerged from those hallowed halls. We popped into numerous bookshops on the way - a sheer delight. It is also “Artsweek” here and I have enjoyed pouring over the booklet advertising exhibitions and workshops. A pause at Starbucks for a pick-me-up coffee, then to finish the day we hopped on the tour-of-the-city bus on our yesterday tickets and did another round Arrived back at the boat exhausted, Bill poured me a bucket of wine and he cooked a fabulous red Thai curry with Basmati rice, steamed broccoli and grilled naan bread, while I slowly became inebriated and tried to create this diary entry.

 

Progress This week Distance (miles) 69.5 Locks 85

Total Distance (miles) 271 Locks 266

 

The journey continues.....