Entitled Historic Boat Owners

[cuthound]

Some time ago I read a thread about entitled Historic boat owners, here.

 

 

At the time I took it with a pinch of salt but experienced it first hand today.

 

The historic boat owner completely misread the situation ahead of him and then tried to bully his way past me. No chance!

 

A dredger, spot dredging around the entrance of Kings Bromley Marina had become stuck (perhaps he should have dredged his exit route first?) and was stuck across the canal. A boat coming the other way had already stopped and was waiting for him to get the dredger unstick.

 

I stopped and after a short while the dredger freed himself and began to move on. The oncoming boat indicated to me that he wanted to enter the marina, so I let him go as I was likely to be slowed down by the dredger until.we got to Fradley Junction.

 

Instead of entering the marina the boat winded and set off after the dredger towards Fradley Junction, albeit at a fairly low speed 2.5mph according to my Ullysse Speedometers app.

 

Soon I became aware of an historic boat bearing down in me from behind. He positioned himself about 2 metres off my stern, sounded his horn and gesticulated that he wanted to pass.

 

I assumed he could see I was following a slower boat so shrugged at him 

 

He then tried to forcibly overtake me, so I cut him off, not wanting to be further down the queue at Wood End lock.

 

Then the boat in front pulled over to moor for lunch so I sped up and left the historic boat behind, then stopped at the lock, which was occupied by the dredger. 

 

He came partially along side whilst we waited for a boat to come up, but didn't look at it speak to me 

 

I shouted to my wife to close the top gate in front of him if he attempted to enter before me and he reversed his boat back behind me.

 

We went through the locks without him catching me again and he past me soon after I had moored.

 

I asked why he was in such a hurry that he had to try and pass boats approaching and queueing at locks but he ignored me.

 

Spoilt my days cruising.

 

[Jon57]

4 minutes ago, cuthound said:

Some time ago I read a thread about entitled Historic boat owners, here.

 

 

At the time I took it with a pinch of salt but experienced it first hand today.

 

The historic boat owner completely misread the situation ahead of him and then tried to bully his way past me. No chance!

 

A dredger, spot dredging around the entrance of Kings Bromley Marina had become stuck (perhaps he should have dredged his exit route first?) and was stuck across the canal. A boat coming the other way had already stopped and was waiting for him to get the dredger unstick.

 

I stopped and after a short while the dredger freed himself and began to move on. The oncoming boat indicated to me that he wanted to enter the marina, so I let him go as I was likely to be slowed down by the dredger until.we got to Fradley Junction.

 

Instead of entering the marina the boat winded and set off after the dredger towards Fradley Junction, albeit at a fairly low speed 2.5mph according to my Ullysse Speedometers app.

 

Soon I became aware of an historic boat bearing down in me from behind. He positioned himself about 2 metres off my stern, sounded his horn and gesticulated that he wanted to pass.

 

I assumed he could see I was following a slower boat so shrugged at him 

 

He then tried to forcibly overtake me, so I cut him off, not wanting to be further down the queue at Wood End lock.

 

Then the boat in front pulled over to moor for lunch so I sped up and left the historic boat behind, then stopped at the lock, which was occupied by the dredger. 

 

He came partially along side whilst we waited for a boat to come up, but didn't look at it speak to me 

 

I shouted to my wife to close the top gate in front of him if he attempted to enter before me and he reversed his boat back behind me.

 

We went through the locks without him catching me again and he past me soon after I had moored.

 

I asked why he was in such a hurry that he had to try and pass boats approaching and queueing at locks but he ignored me.

 

Spoilt my days cruising.

 

Name and shame then please. 

[Mike Tee]

I had a run-in with four of these arseholes about 15 years ago,  haven't forgotten it and won't,  I have a long memory for such incidents. If I came across any of them now, in trouble, I would gladly watch them struggle. In my case, there were four full length historic boats with multiple crew, I was on a 40' tug on my own so absolutely nothing I could do to stop them. Something big calibre mounted on the roof would have been handy!

[GUMPY]

Twas ever thus

[Slim]

I experienced their shear arrogance some 20 years + ago outside Rickmansworth. I was dropping down through Batchworth lock whilst a whole gaggle of historics and butties were going up following some kind of rally in Rickie. A pair came up as I waited . The moment they cleared the  entrance a couple of their cohorts slammed the gates closed against mè (single handed) whilst another couple raised the the bottom paddles. Lock lost but not  the end of the world. I then looked downstream  only to see the entire canal blocked by a good half dozen pairs crewed by dungaree clad, kerchiefed oiks. With no option I just sat there and watched . Not one individual apologies or thanked me

Edited June 26, 2024 by Slim

[Paul C]

1 hour ago, cuthound said:

Some time ago I read a thread about entitled Historic boat owners, here.

 

 

At the time I took it with a pinch of salt but experienced it first hand today.

 

The historic boat owner completely misread the situation ahead of him and then tried to bully his way past me. No chance!

 

A dredger, spot dredging around the entrance of Kings Bromley Marina had become stuck (perhaps he should have dredged his exit route first?) and was stuck across the canal. A boat coming the other way had already stopped and was waiting for him to get the dredger unstick.

 

I stopped and after a short while the dredger freed himself and began to move on. The oncoming boat indicated to me that he wanted to enter the marina, so I let him go as I was likely to be slowed down by the dredger until.we got to Fradley Junction.

 

Instead of entering the marina the boat winded and set off after the dredger towards Fradley Junction, albeit at a fairly low speed 2.5mph according to my Ullysse Speedometers app.

 

Soon I became aware of an historic boat bearing down in me from behind. He positioned himself about 2 metres off my stern, sounded his horn and gesticulated that he wanted to pass.

 

I assumed he could see I was following a slower boat so shrugged at him 

 

He then tried to forcibly overtake me, so I cut him off, not wanting to be further down the queue at Wood End lock.

 

Then the boat in front pulled over to moor for lunch so I sped up and left the historic boat behind, then stopped at the lock, which was occupied by the dredger. 

 

He came partially along side whilst we waited for a boat to come up, but didn't look at it speak to me 

 

I shouted to my wife to close the top gate in front of him if he attempted to enter before me and he reversed his boat back behind me.

 

We went through the locks without him catching me again and he past me soon after I had moored.

 

I asked why he was in such a hurry that he had to try and pass boats approaching and queueing at locks but he ignored me.

 

Spoilt my days cruising.

 

 

The irony being, the dredger is an actual, working, boat, and is fully entitled to being given priority in your situation. While the "historic"* boat owner is just pretending and is no better than any other boater.

 

*They're not even really historic, they're just old. They're not that rare, and the canals started out and ran a long time with horse drawn boats. They are just a point in time some time after the invention of the diesel engine but before the canals stopped being used for commercial traffic.

[Arthur Marshall]

I ran a ceilidh at a historic boat gathering at Ellesmere Port, many years ago. Most of the folk were there to have a good time but there was one bloke who obviously considered himself a character, in full trad-boat getup, and who kept interrupting the calling of the dances, tried to get the mic off me etc. I finally lost my rag and told him to either get stuck in or go forth and procreate which, rather to my surprise, got a round of applause.

I suspect most of the "working" boaters know it's a fairly daft hobby and have as low an opinion of the plonkers as some of us do. But the plonkers do hit remarkable heights of plonkdom.

[jonathanA]

I don't come across that many historic boats, but did have  a run with one of the entitled on a well known Liverpool short a while back.  He just Assumed he had the bridge hole because.... 

 

That said having read the threads I do appreciate that some of the historic boats are a handful to say the least and I'm prepared to allow for that. 

 

In the OPs case I think he acted with a degree of common sense and I'd hope I'd have the presence of mind to handle that sort of situation as well as cuthound.  Well done I'd say and don't let it spoil your day... 

[cuthound]

17 hours ago, Jon57 said:

Name and shame then please. 

 

The Latin name is Panthera (Pl)Onca.

 

I have been boating for over 50 years, indeed my first two holidays were on camping boats, so I am familiar with their handling, but have not encountered such arrogance before.

 

I know some of the historic boat owners at Alvecote, who passed my mooring regularly and they are nice normal people who exchange pleasantries as they pass.

 

I can only assume that a fisherman must have left his stash of misery pills behind and this individual found them and took the lot in one go.

 

Edited June 27, 2024 by cuthound
To remove a full stop masquerading as a space.

[nicknorman]

Jaguar.

[Tonka]

If you look at Facebook and look at the Canals & River Facebook group there is a person moaning about the historic boats being moored on the water points and lock landings at Sutton Stop last night.

They started departing at 04.30 this morning

[Jon57]

12 minutes ago, Tonka said:

If you look at Facebook and look at the Canals & River Facebook group there is a person moaning about the historic boats being moored on the water points and lock landings at Sutton Stop last night.

They started departing at 04.30 this morning

There's always people moaning everywhere. Just when the weather is great and not raining people moaning it's too hot can't sleep😁. Just get on enjoying boats and boating. 👍

[nicknorman]

So you think it is ok to moor on a water point/services/lock landing, and people shouldn’t object to it? Are you a historic boat owner by any chance?

[Lady M]

I have long thought there could be a case for time limited overnight mooring on waterpoints in busy locations, Napton for example.  Some owners of historic working boats do stop overnight on service moorings but they tend to arrive quite late in the evening and depart early next morning.  This may be due to other moorings being full or to get a better water depth. 

At Hawkesbury, the working boats always used to tie up up outside the Greyhound.  Indeed we did just that on a hire boat in the early 1970s.

[nicknorman]

1 minute ago, Lady M said:

I have long thought there could be a case for time limited overnight mooring on waterpoints in busy locations, Napton for example.  Some owners of historic working boats do stop overnight on service moorings but they tend to arrive quite late in the evening and depart early next morning.  This may be due to other moorings being full or to get a better water depth. 

At Hawkesbury, the working boats always used to tie up up outside the Greyhound.  Indeed we did just that on a hire boat in the early 1970s.

This presumes that everyone only cruises during “office hours” which is incorrect. Especially in winter when it gets dark very early, just because it is dark doesn’t mean it’s ok to moor on services/lock landings etc. At night it is even more problematic to find such things blocked by moored boats.

 

Anyway, it is contrary to the “rules” so why do historic boat owners think they are exempt? What would happen if everyone did it?

[tizzy]

The only time we have moored on a water point was when an "historic" boat manged to get itself wedged under the bridge by the Red Lon at Consall....it took some moving 😀

[Jon57]

15 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

So you think it is ok to moor on a water point/services/lock landing, and people shouldn’t object to it? Are you a historic boat owner by any chance?

Nope. 

[Lady M]

I didn't say that I agreed with mooring on lock landings.  However, I do think that Hawkesbury is a special case and that the lock landing there is a relatively new invention.

[MtB]

1 hour ago, nicknorman said:

Anyway, it is contrary to the “rules” so why do historic boat owners think they are exempt? What would happen if everyone did it?

 

If everyone did it, there would be plenty of room to moor on the normal VMs.

 

And the canal would be totally blocked overnight!

 

 

[Hudds Lad]

Had forgotten Braunston was this weekend, guess we're heading onto the Coventry then to avoid the shenanigans.  

 

Never had any real problems with them personally, always give them plenty of room when passing though.

Only real issue was one we passed on the Cheshire locks, seemed a bit grumpy but thought he must have seen us coming and he'd been kind in leaving the gates open for us as he left the lock. Turned out the next four or five locks we came to he'd left all the top gates open and paddles up as he left  

[Mike Tee]

^^^ The perfect description of a selfish prat

[Rob-M]

The working boats staggered their departure from Hawkesbury Junction over a number of hours so they weren't travelling in one long convoy.

[Stroudwater1]

I’m sad to hear the op had a bad experience. Hope the bad memory will fade.  However wasn’t the boater who held up the op and winded in front of him yet couldn’t let the op past despite obviously going slower than other boats as well as planning to stop for lunch the root of the problem?
 

The Historic owners I know are great, do much volunteering, look after the area help other boaters as well as maintain the historic perspective to canal life.
 

I’m sure we can all come up with stories but compared to historic boats I’ve had many more stories about non historic owners. 

 

[matty40s]

The first one to come past this morning, in a very unusual and non compliant(! 🤪) paint job, was floating past very serenely, with the worlds largest spliff in his mouth.

[Hudds Lad]

1 minute ago, matty40s said:

The first one to come past this morning, in a very unusual and non compliant(! 🤪) paint job, was floating past very serenely, with the worlds largest spliff in his mouth.

Camberwell Carrot?