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What's the best canal as a 'taster' for a new boater?


jandnrowe

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2 minutes ago, jandnrowe said:

Hello everybody, before leaping into a boat purchase, what would you reckon is a good canal to practice with a hire boat for a few day?

I live near Leeds but I'm not sure we're up to Five-Rise standards yet!

Cheers all.

 

Are you thinking of purchasing a narrowboat or a widebeam?

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3 minutes ago, jandnrowe said:

Hello everybody, before leaping into a boat purchase, what would you reckon is a good canal to practice with a hire boat for a few day?

I live near Leeds but I'm not sure we're up to Five-Rise standards yet!

Cheers all.

 

Welcome.

 

The Leeds and Liverpool is a great place to cut your teeth as  narrowboater. Its where we cut ours before hiring on other canals and buying (then eventually selling).

 

The Five (and three) rise is a doddle as there are lock keepers who help you through.

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Good news - you've got a lock free section between the top of Bingley and the bottom of Gargrave. 17 miles and at least three hire firms with a good selection of boat sizes (period and day hire).

Bad news - there are stacks of swing bridges on the stretch.

Plenty of scenery, towns, moorings and nothing too complicated to navigate.

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I'd say any canal really. Novice hire boaters are let loose all over the network with generally no issues. 

 

The only thing I'd say is a narrow canal will make your life a bit easier when it comes to operating locks, but only a bit and probably not worth going out of your way for.  

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1 hour ago, MtB said:

 

Are you thinking of purchasing a narrowboat or a widebeam?

Looks like NB. We visited the Crick boat show to confirm thoughts. Went on some lovely new boats waaaay above our budget!!!

Also have considered GRP but not sure  petrol is convenient on canals - any thoughts?

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2 minutes ago, jandnrowe said:

Looks like NB. We visited the Crick boat show to confirm thoughts. Went on some lovely new boats waaaay above our budget!!!

Also have considered GRP but not sure  petrol is convenient on canals - any thoughts?

 

Don't think many boatyards sell it so you've going to have to get it in jerrycans from roadside garages and keep it somewhere.

 

 

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7 minutes ago, jandnrowe said:

Also have considered GRP but not sure  petrol is convenient on canals - any thoughts?

 

Petrol is not especially convenient on canals, and GRP cruisers are less suited to the rough and tumble of canal life (running around, crashing into walls, being crashed into etc). But plenty of people get on fine with them and it does depend on your budget. 

 

For instance if your limit was £20k you might be better looking at cruisers as you could get quite a nice one for that sort of money whereas a £20k narrowboat is going to be a bit of a wreck. 

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1 minute ago, booke23 said:

 

Petrol is not especially convenient on canals, and GRP cruisers are less suited to the rough and tumble of canal life (running around, crashing into walls, being crashed into etc). But plenty of people get on fine with them and it does depend on your budget. 

 

For instance if your limit was £20k you might be better looking at cruisers as you could get quite a nice one for that sort of money whereas a £20k narrowboat is going to be a bit of a wreck. 

Yep that's what we thought. We had a marine-ply family runabout on the Thames years ago - basic but fun. We slipped it until we got a mooring nearby. Back to the research I guess.

Thanks for all the replies folks.

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9 minutes ago, booke23 said:

the rough and tumble of canal life (running around, crashing into walls, being crashed into etc).

 

Excuse me, I dunno what sort of incompetent skipper you must be but I certainly don't cruise around crashing into walls, being crashed into etc. the way you describe. Nor do any of the other narrow boaters I know. 

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17 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

Excuse me, I dunno what sort of incompetent skipper you must be but I certainly don't cruise around crashing into walls, being crashed into etc. the way you describe. Nor do any of the other narrow boaters I know. 

 

I think you have completely misinterpreted @booke23 's post. 

 

Obviously for effect or a reaction, 

 

Time for another sabbatical? Perhaps?

 

 

 

 

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Happens all the time, guy moored on the Huddersfield just by a bridge hole lock a few weeks ago thanked me for being the first of the last 4 boats passing him who didn’t hit his boat.
I’m sure you are careful but many aren’t. We got rammed last weekend by a boat passing another next to us while we were moored up, they drove straight into our stern.
Would have been very nasty in a non metal hull, just made a mark as it was. 

The skills of many boaters are often rather suboptimal and I won’t claim to be perfect either at times😞

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8 hours ago, MtB said:

 

Excuse me, I dunno what sort of incompetent skipper you must be but I certainly don't cruise around crashing into walls, being crashed into etc. the way you describe. Nor do any of the other narrow boaters I know. 

 

I'm probably a terrible skipper these days.....I haven't tried it since the late 1980's. I'm sure I have a skipping rope around here somewhere though, so I'll give it a go and let you know!

 

Actually I might have misinterpreted what you meant......if so, for the benefit of the OP it doesn't matter how good you are.....as mentioned by others, on canals you will scrape, get bashed into and even occasionally bang into things yourself (especially on a windy day). It's just the way it is.

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10 hours ago, jandnrowe said:

Hello everybody, before leaping into a boat purchase, what would you reckon is a good canal to practice with a hire boat for a few day?

I live near Leeds but I'm not sure we're up to Five-Rise standards yet!

Cheers all.

 

I wouldn't worry too much about the five rise, the locks are manned full time and all you have to do is follow instructions.  

 

The Leeds Liverpool is probably a good choice if only because there is plenty of space.  So many folk head for the Llangollen for their first trip when in fact it is in my view the worst canal to start on, for all sorts of reasons, but for an apprehensive novice there are just too many boats.

 

The drawback to the Leeds Liverpool is that it is a "heavy" canal, it's all wide locks, and most first timers would probably want to start with a "friendlier" narrow canal, in which case I would say the Trent and Mersey.  You could do a lot worse than start at Stone, heading south either towards Rugeley or turn right at Great Haywood for the Staffs and Worcs, there's nothing particularly challenging on that stretch but it's full of interest and very attractive.  Plus, because the first lock is right by the Canal Cruising hire base they will take you through it.  (I don't have any connection with Canal Cruising by the way).

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PIck up a hire boat at Tardebigge or Alvechurch.  Head towards Stratford on Avon and then come back.

 

No locks for quite a while, then a big flight but one which is pretty and the locks are straightforward.  In that stretch you also get to experience a big tunnel, an electric lift bridge, 2 manual lift bridges.  So lots of useful experience.  If you had a week you could get to Stratford and back so you'd get to experience a big aqueduct too.

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11 hours ago, jandnrowe said:

Hello everybody, before leaping into a boat purchase, what would you reckon is a good canal to practice with a hire boat for a few day?

I live near Leeds but I'm not sure we're up to Five-Rise standards yet!

Cheers all.

Leeds Liverpool is perfect for you. Local and with plenty of hire boat companies.

If you want really good tuition from the hire company then you've got Bear Boating at Apperley Bridge who have a set of locks right by there moorings. Then you've got the Skipton pair of Pennine cruisers and Snaygill Boats. From there you can go towards Leeds with plenty of Bridges then eventually bingley 5 & 3 or the other way towards Liverpool, starting with 5 swing bridges then the 12 Locks through Gargrave in Bank Newton, the scenery this way is stunning. 

I've purposely left out Silsden boats the largest fleet with over 20 boats as tuition seams very light.

 

 

 

 

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The Monmouth and Brecon maybe a thought, it all depends what you want to taste I guess.

 

Staffed locks, and an enjoyable cruise- The Thames

Enjoyable short cruise little locks if going a bit further - Long pound round Braunston, Alvechurch into Birmingham or  Ashby (latter no locks) 

Narrow locks with enjoyable scenery not too busy- Staffs and Worcs

Narrow locks enjoyable scenery a little busier Stratford, Oxford parts of the Trent and Mersey  

Narrow locks lovely scenery very busy Llangollen  

Fairly hard work but lovely scenery though wide locks so you boat may bash about a bit- Leeds & Liverpool or Grand Union (moderately quiet L&L fairly busy GU  ) 

Very hard work with locks plus shallow water  but fab scenery and very quiet- Huddersfield

Very hard work quiet lovely scenery wide heavy locks shallow canal - Rochdale

Theres many other iterations too 

Some of these morph into others and others on here will probably disagree with my summary busy depends on the day and the time of year too. 

 

  

 

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10 hours ago, jandnrowe said:

Looks like NB. We visited the Crick boat show to confirm thoughts. Went on some lovely new boats waaaay above our budget!!!

Also have considered GRP but not sure  petrol is convenient on canals - any thoughts?

Petrol isn't convenient on canals,as you will have to walk to the nearest petrol station which Google will show .

Unfortunately they are not always within easy walking distance of the canal.I have a little collapsible sack barrow as a 20ltr jerrycan gets a bit heavy if you have to carry it very far.

I am thinking a folding bike with a suitable rack might be better for the job.

As for storing the jerrycan,a landrover type of jerrycan rack bolted to the transom as I have done,is in my opinion the best place to keep it.

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13 hours ago, The Happy Nomad said:

 

Welcome.

 

The Leeds and Liverpool is a great place to cut your teeth as  narrowboater. Its where we cut ours before hiring on other canals and buying (then eventually selling).

 

The Five (and three) rise is a doddle as there are lock keepers who help you through.

Step 1: take a trip to Skipton on a nice day. Take a skippered trip with Pennine (short) or Skipton ((longer/further) - sit and watch the scenery/ducks go by. Even have a meal  on board if you fancy.

Step 2: try and book a day boat. Pennine, Skipton and Snaygill all have well equipped day boats. Great for a half-day, day or evening out. You can see a fair bit in a day + no luggage required (take food/refreshments).

Step 3: short break on a full sized boat from any of the above +Silsden. You'll work out whether you can live on/steer a biggun.

Don't worry about L&L locks and bridges. If you get stuck there'll be another boat along soon - could be an experienced skipper or total amateur. You'll work it out between you - that's half the fun of narras.

Go for it!

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My favourite is somewhere in the Napton/Braunston area to the Ashby and back. I would suggest from Calcutt because they will see you up the first wide lock so you get some idea about lock working, then you get the three separate Hillmorton locks so not a staircase, a mini-tunnel and a day's cruise to Sutton stop, including a swing bridge. Then onto the Ashby.

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18 minutes ago, Tony Brooks said:

My favourite is somewhere in the Napton/Braunston area to the Ashby and back. I would suggest from Calcutt because they will see you up the first wide lock so you get some idea about lock working, then you get the three separate Hillmorton locks so not a staircase, a mini-tunnel and a day's cruise to Sutton stop, including a swing bridge. Then onto the Ashby.

I've just been that way.  It's like the M25 at rush hour.  I won't be returning that way any time soon.

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