Droitwich cruising ring

[Dave_P]

On the Droitwich marina website, it says:

 

"The 'short-break' circuit from Droitwich will take appropriately 20 hours of cruising with 41 locks to negotiate, making it possible to complete over a long weekend. This is the ONLY cruising ring in EUROPE to be completed in such a time frame."

 

As I have a mooring in Birmingham, I know that this is a load of nonsense as there are plenty of circular routes on the BCN and nearby which can be done in a long weekend. Are the marina owners just ignorant or are they trying to make deliberately outlandish claims?

 

Interestingly, this 'uniquely short ring' is referred to on a few different websites I've seen. Are we leading to one of those received wisdom things which end up as accepted truth until someone actually looks into it properly. Like the myth of drinking 8 glasses of water a day.

 

From my moorings, in a long weekend or less, I could go down the Birmingham & Fazeley, up the Tame Valley and Walsall canals and back down the BCN mainline. Or I could go down the Worcester & Birmingham, The North Stratford, Lapworth Link, and back up the GU into Brum.

 

If I moored at Hockley Port, I could do a nice little cruising ring round the loop in around half an hour or so.

 

If I moored at Sherborne Wharf, I'd could do a lovely ring in about ten minutes!!!

 

Is there an official definition of cruising ring, or is Droitwich marina inventing a definition to suit themselves?

Edited October 30, 2013 by Dave_P

[IanM]

We've done Birmingham to Stourport, down the Severn to Worcester and back up to Birmingham in a Friday, Saturday, Sunday before

[Puckle]

You could do the Droitwich ring easy in 16 hours or if you had a crew and in the summer I reckon you do it from dawn to dusk.

[Paul C]

There's no official definition of a cruising ring but I'd have thought that one can't exclude rings just because they're short - so the 10 min and half hour ones around some of the loops of BCN are valid, in my book.

 

Figure of 8s are fun, especially if its short and you pass (say) fishermen in the middle bit - twice - in the same direction.

[Tim Lewis]

The Lapworth ring is my favourite

 

Tim

[magpie patrick]

 

"The 'short-break' circuit from Droitwich will take appropriately 20 hours of cruising with 41 locks to negotiate, making it possible to complete over a long weekend. This is the ONLY cruising ring in EUROPE to be completed in such a time frame."

 

 

That claim is full of holes, I don't know how they get 41 locks for a start, I make it 33, and cruising rings in Europe, whilst possible, are not commonplace nor promoted as such.

 

One of the points for marketing the restoration of this canal to those who would fund restoration was that it would be a short break ring. Ring cruising has always been popular and a large proportion of the hire boat fleet of the canal system is based on six interlocking rings - Cheshire, Four Counties, West Midlands, Warwickshire, Avon and Stourport. However a declining market for longer holidays and a burgeoning one for short breaks fuelled the appeal of a ring via Worcester and Droitwich as being economically worthwhile. The other rings named could not readily be done in a weekend.

 

The marina's claim is a bit overdone, but I'd argue a ring that can be done in ten minutes isn't a holiday route