Which Sections

[Guest]

I haven't actually measured it, but will do so at the first opportunity. Serenity is an ex 'ownerships' 's' class. there must be lots of similar on the system. have any of them done the C&H and / or the Huddersfield Broad. I was rather hoping to do one or both next summer!

Although you asked for personal experience I cant answer from that perspective.

 

However I do know it is theoretically possible to do the C&H and the HBC in a sixty foot. We have yet mustered up the courage to try it though.

 

Have a read of this.

 

http://www.penninewaterways.co.uk/calder/locks.htm

 

I do know of people who have done it too but it requires extreme care particularly going down. Forget even trying it with your fenders down or if you are not 100% sure your boat is actually 60ft in length. It is not unknown for errors to be made in length during build or for previous owners to declare a boat to be shorter than it really is. A starting point would be to double check the length.

Edited November 9, 2014 by The Dog House

[Peter X]

If anyone out there is contemplating playing the bagpipes on a canal, other than in Scotland, please have the decency to do so inside a well soundproofed part of the boat with all its doors and windows closed.

[ValandPete]

We have cruised the majority of the waterways. 58' narrowboat was not a problem on the C and H with bow and stern fenders down although some shuffling about to get bottom gates open especially at Salterhebble. It never crossed my mind to share these short locks with another boat and would have declined to do so had the situation arisen.

 

Val

[serenility]

Thank You TDH and V&P.

[Neil2]

If anyone out there is contemplating playing the bagpipes on a canal, other than in Scotland, please have the decency to do so inside a well soundproofed part of the boat with all its doors and windows closed.

Not like this then

 

http://www.newsflare.com/video/5500/travel/bagpipe-player-on-a-canal-boat

 

Ten seconds is more than enough eh.

[MtB]

Reminds me of that old joke about my neighbour who makes an almighty racket including thumping on the walls at about midnight in his flat every night.

 

Fortunately I can't really hear all his noise as this is also when I practice my bagpipes...

 

 

MtB

[Theo]

Alternatively you can go hundreds of miles in a very few weeks. As "Southern" boaters we did a whistle stojustp tour of some of the Northern system last summer, and out passage over both Leeds and Liverpool and Calder and Hebble would have been impossible in a boat much over 57 feet. (Calder & Hebble is probably the tightest visited by many people, I guess).

 

It's a fair point that many people may never get that far, but trips around "rings" in the North tend to always need a shorter boat.

Theodora is 60' between the fixed metalwork. This length is achieved by removing bow and stern buttons and holsing the tiller over. We can just do the Calder and Hebble and Huddersfield Broad Canal but we needed to be a bit creative and SWMBO didn't enjoy it. She didn't like the proximity of the cill when descending on the diagonal and when pulling the bow across the open a bottom gate.

 

The L&L is no problem and was negotiated with buttons in position.

 

N

[Neil2]

Reminds me of that old joke about my neighbour who makes an almighty racket including thumping on the walls at about midnight in his flat every night.

 

Fortunately I can't really hear all his noise as this is also when I practice my bagpipes...

 

 

MtB

Didn't someone once say the definition of a gentleman is someone who knows how to play the bagpipes but doesn't.

 

Living where I do they are the bane of my life. There is a guy next door who practices in the back garden in the summer I wouldn't mind but if I set up my old Marshall JCM 800 outside and started practicing they would have the police round in minutes. Don't get me started on bagpipe jokes I wrote most of them.

[Scholar Gypsy]

We've never had anything longer than 45 foot, the idea of a 57 footer is sheer luxury. More marinas are offering safe storage these days so you really don't need anything bigger, the smaller the boat the greater the fun I am now going to leap behind the barricade just like Steve McQueen in the Magnificent Seven.

 

Just by the way, you cannot practically do the Huddersfield Narrow in a boat over 57 foot even though the locks on the HNC are 70 foot. When you got to Huddersfield you would have to turn round and come back as the Huddersfield Broad canal has 57 foot locks. The Nicholson's guide does not make this clear

 

Not being able to cross the Pennines on the HNC is a good enough reason not to buy a long boat.

 

... and you will be able to get right into Brandon on the Little Ouse - which I can't as the lock is only 45 feet long.