Tonic required. Send in your photos of what is nice on the waterways now.

[PeterScott]

On this day in 2016

 

Aground on a falling tide near Richmond (below) River Thames. Resolved by the tripboat shouting over the passenger tannoy "Do you want a blast of wash". Which he did. Bounced into the water. "All in a day's work" said tripboat's steerer

 

 

On this day in 2016

 

 

Thames passenger craft, near Hampton Court

 

Edited September 15, 2020 by PeterScott
OK then, stay merged, just this once.

[PeterScott]

On this day in 2018

Salters Lode Middle Level / River Great Ouse

The tide is higher here on occasion

 

Compare

#2924 (2018 outward trip)

#2923 (2007)

 

And accessing the front of the boat on the journey from Denver Sluice

 

[PeterScott]

On this day in 1977

 

Norbury Junction SU. And the crane which is no longer there

 

[PeterScott]

On this day in 1978

 

Pool Lock Aqueduct T&M and Harecastle Tunnel nearby

 

[PeterScott]

On this day in 1979

Rugby Wharf Northern Oxford Compare #2235 (1975)

[PeterScott]

On this day in 1980

 

Rickmansworth Basin GUSouth, Compare #3248 (2010) and the locks on the main line

 

Edited September 15, 2020 by PeterScott
extra pic

[John Liley]

This is the lock at Basseville on the Nivernais, one of the hardest to get into when the river is running. The barrage close by causes a sideways pull, so you have to head upstream on the approach, while drifting sideways.

 

Just how much is hard to tell - until it is too late to put things right Fortunately we were OK this time, as the group at the lockside were student trainee keepers, expecting to see how it is done

[PeterScott]

On this day in 2018

March Middle Level

[Athy]

18 minutes ago, PeterScott said:

On this day in 2018

March Middle Level

I'd seen it going past our house shortly before. It doesn't seem like two years ago.

Edited September 16, 2020 by Athy

[PeterScott]

  

41 minutes ago, Athy said:

I'd seen it going past our house shortly before. It doesn't seem like two years ago.

Yes, we hadn't predicted how the downstream journey on the tide to Salters Lode works, with a seventy-foot boat needing to go through on the level and we had to wait for a couple of hours, so it was 6.45pm at Marmont Priory Lock and hence the Sun Had Almost Set (as they say) before we were relieved to have this space in March.

Upwell had the horses out:

 

 

and plaques on some of the buildings visible as we passed

 

 

[Athy]

Those little carts are a familiar sight around here - sometimes there's a gathering of six or seven of them. I suppose they belong to local farmers, as I've seen our next-door neighbour (a butcher and farmer) driving one.

    The houses are familiar too. Whenever I pass Up-To-Date Cottage I wonder what was so modern about it back in 1901. The first house in the village with an inside loo, perhaps? Ours was built about the same time and in similar style, but had to make do with the comparatively unimaginative name 'River Cottage'.

   We're lucky to have our river: it was unnavigable for years. Here it is being restored by members of the Well Creek Trust in the 1970s, with River Cottage peeping shyly our from behind Moss' Garage. Navigation was finally restored in 1975.

 

Edited September 16, 2020 by Athy

[WotEver]

19 minutes ago, Athy said:

Here it is being restored by members of the Well Creek Trust in the 1970s, with River Cottage peeping shyly our from behind Moss' Garage.

 

Wot, no shopping trolleys, pushbikes, or mopeds?

[Athy]

20 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Wot, no shopping trolleys, pushbikes, or mopeds?

The nearest supermarket is some eight miles away in Wisbech (and I'm not sure if it yet existed in the early '70s). So it would have needed a determined person to bring a trolley so far from "civilisation".

[Alan de Enfield]

Sunset on the Menai Straits.

 

Heading South (into the Sun) from the "Pont Britannia" (Built By Robert Stephenson) & the old 'Menai Bridge' (built by Thomas Telford) in the far background

 

 

(Fenders deployed as we are just about to lock into the Marina)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few other pictures around 'Pilots Cove' and heading back from the 'open sea' to the Menai Straits

 

 

 

 

Edited September 16, 2020 by Alan de Enfield

[Dav and Pen]

A late autumn holiday in Friesland 1991. This load of scrap cars on the Princis Margrit canal

[David Mack]

3 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Heading South (into the Sun) from the "Pont Britannia" (Built By Robert Stephenson) & the old 'Menai Bridge' (built by Thomas Telford) in the far background

 

 

But only the towers are left of the original Stephenson bridge. The railway ran through two riveted iron tubes, which were irreparably damaged in a fire in 1970. Since the requirement to accommodate sailing craft was now much less, the replacement bridge was built with arches, and so looks very different to the original. The road deck was added on top later to relieve pressure on the Menai Bridge.

 

Britannia Bridge as it was:

Edited September 16, 2020 by David Mack

[PeterScott]

On this day 2018

 

Redhill Lock River Soar GU Leicester Line

[PeterScott]

On this day in 1980

 

Bulbourne Junction GUSouth and Wendover Arm

 

 

Edited September 16, 2020 by PeterScott
unmerge a merge

[PeterScott]

On this day in 1980

 

Aylesbury Basin GU Aylesbury Arm

 

 

[PeterScott]

On this day in 1986

 

Marple Aqueduct Compare #1000 (2007) #2817 (2012)  #2348 (2014) #1466 (2019)

 

[DandV]

7 hours ago, PeterScott said:

On this day in 1980

 

Aylesbury Basin GU Aylesbury Arm

 

 

 

We spent the first few days of our ownership moored at the extreme end breasted two boats out in line with the white column. Here we provisioned, remedied deficiencies in the tool kit and waited for the great Aylesbury boat breakout by road to Milton Keynes.

Bloody cold and gloomy it was, that mooring. "The Dungeon:"

I remember Fulbourne was moored on the offside between the basin and the footbridge.

 Not even sure the footbridge existed then.

 

 

 

[Higgs]

22 hours ago, Athy said:

 

   We're lucky to have our river: it was unnavigable for years. Here it is being restored by members of the Well Creek Trust in the 1970s, with River Cottage peeping shyly our from behind Moss' Garage. Navigation was finally restored in 1975.

 

 

This photo shows a waterway in better condition than the canal into Derby that I knew as a lad. You could walk across it over rusty bikes and tin baths, all manner of rubbish, including the occasional pith helmet. It is now a cycle path to Swarkeston and the Trent and Mersey. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 17, 2020 by Higgs

[Athy]

15 minutes ago, Higgs said:

 

This photo shows a waterway in better condition than the canal into Derby that I knew as a lad. You could walk across it over rusty bikes and tin baths, all manner of rubbish, including the occasional pith helmet. It is now a cycle path to Swarkeston and the Trent and Mersey. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When we lived in Heanor there were occasional local newspaper articles about possible restoration of the canal - I particularly recall that there was one about making a start at the Swarkestone end of the line. There is a preservation society which wakes up and thrashes about from time to time, but I don't think they've made much progress apart from rebuilding an isolated lock and a bridge or two.

[Naughty Cal]

On this day 2016. Torksey to West Stockwith

 

 

 

 

 

[Higgs]

21 minutes ago, Athy said:

When we lived in Heanor there were occasional local newspaper articles about possible restoration of the canal - I particularly recall that there was one about making a start at the Swarkestone end of the line. There is a preservation society which wakes up and thrashes about from time to time, but I don't think they've made much progress apart from rebuilding an isolated lock and a bridge or two.

 

There are parts 'easier' to restore than others. From the bridge at Swarkeston, there is still a few miles of canal trench. You couldn't easily get into Derby, because of the Pride Park development - methinks. Even though the canal wasn't much of a canal in my school days, it was still a great place to play around, and with lots of interesting thrown-away stuff. It would have been classed as an eyesore, but the tip was also very close by, with lots of raw material for building carts and such things. 

 

 

 

Edited September 17, 2020 by Higgs