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1st Narrowboat holiday.... Advice please


HeatherP

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Hello all. We're a group of 5 adults in our 50/60s - two couples, plus 1 and also our dog. My hubby and I have a good deal of river cruiser experience from the Broads (no locks!), but none of us have any useful canal experience.

 

We are hiring from Wrenbury 17th Sept and are soon having a get together to discuss choice of route and catering matters. We have just the week,so doing a ring is not an option. In any event we feel a ring route would put time pressure on us, and being newbies that's not sensible. If we're out/back we can easily revise our turn around point if we're making faster/slower progress than predicted.

 

So, any hints and tips, advice, comment please, such as:

 

Which route to choose?

What is a realistic distance to plan for?

Is it worth taking fishing gear? On the Broads we fish off the boat of a late pm/evening, but of course this time of year it's likely dark 6/7pm

What is the biting insect quotient like in late Sept?

Other than "take your time", which we sure will, any tips on mooring/turning the boat? I've seen odd pics of boats moored so far off the bank they need a gangplank to get ashore - is that likely?

 

Anything else you can think of, please share :)

 

Many thanks for your time and patience!!

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Just remember that you can turn around only in a limited number of places. These are called winding holes. If you pass one you have to go on to the next or you can turn at a junction. How long is the boat? Three miles an hour and twenty minutes per lock is a good rule of thumb. If you set off at 7am and stop at 6pm you will probably feel you've had a long day depending on weather (temp), but you could cruise on until the light fails. Plan your stops near a pub!

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The natural thing to do from Wrenbury is go to Llangollen and back. You get the aqueducts at Chirk and Ponty, and at Llangollen there's a nice town to walk around, with a steam railway. You can walk up to the feeder which supplies the canal at horseshoe falls (don't expect a big waterfall, though -- it's about a foot!). You could also stop at Chirk and walk up to the castle.

 

September is the best month -- the weather is usually good, it's usually pretty warm, and it doesn't get dark as early as you think.

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From Wrenbury it would seem to be a no brainier to go to Llangollen and back, that would be a easy hire week. As long as you start off in reasonable time the days will be plenty long enough in Sept. If you have never been to Llangollen it is quite an interesting little town with a nice steam railway.

 

I don't do fishing, but fishing rights in canals are in many cases leased to clubs, so I don't think you can just fish anywhere.

 

Can't see you needing a plank on the Llangollen, only ever needed to use ours twice, on the rivers Avon and Thames.

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Biting insects are available nearly all year round and can be obtained in quantity on any stretch of water you care to name!

Take Avon "Skin So Soft", not only good for your skin, smells nice, but discourages the nibblers surprisingly well.

The canal after the Ponty aqueduct narrows to one boat wide in places, make sure you know if you are at the half-way point of the narrow section before you have to reverse to allow a boat to come the other way - DAMHIK

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If you end up going firther than planned you could always drop down onte the Monty at Franckton, I think you may need to book Franckton locks 24 hours before so you would have to give them a days notice if you decided to do that. It is a beautiful stretch of canal and much much quieter than the Llangollen so provides a nice contrast.

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Another vote for Llangollen and back here too - stunning canal, scenery and the two aqueducts. Get the Nicholson ( other guides are available ) book 4 guide to the four counties and the Welsh canals. I use a combination of these guides and the canal planning tool ( excellent it is too ) to plan our trips. Good advice on this forum too of course!

 

For the narrow section of the Llangollen we found it a good idea to put one of the crew ashore to walk ahead and check that it was clear to proceed. Mobile phone contact does the job.

 

Enjoy!

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Have you got either a Nicholson guide or Pearson guide book to show the route and where to find water points etc.?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_4_15?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=nicholson+guide+llangollen&sprefix=nicholson+guide%2Caps%2C138

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Welsh-Waters-Shropshire-Llangollen-Montgomery/dp/0992849225/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1469263706&sr=8-1&keywords=pearson+guide+llangollen

 

Although mooring is easy, the Shropshire union canal society have installed mooring rings in many places, in nice spots in the countryside. If you can find these places it makes mooring quick and easy if you want to stop for lunch and there will be enough water to get tight to the bank. There is an interactive map showing the site locations

http://www.shropshireunion.org.uk/the-canals/interactive-map

 

 

Try to load a week’s provisions onto the boat before you start off, especially heavy and bulky items as there will not be many places to stop and stock up. Carrying stuff back to the boat on foot can literally be a pain in the neck. Here’s a list for starters beer, wine, milk, bottled water (if you use it), potatoes, fruit, toilet rolls.

 

Ellesmere is the easiest place to stock up mid-trip. You can go up the canal arm and try to find a mooring. The town, and Tesco supermarket are at the end of the canal arm. There is a good delicatessen in the town Vermeulen & son.

 

Make sure you can make a couple of evening meals, just in case you decide to moor overnight in the countryside or you find that you are running late and can’t get to a pub in time.

 

As mross has already said, the boat will be longer than the canal is wide, make sure you know where to turn the boat when you decide to head back to base. Turning points or winding holes are marked on the canal guides but are not always easy to spot. I’ve met a few hire boats that have missed their turning point and have had to continue to the next point. This added a few hours to their journey and really threw their plans into disarray. Although in your case I assume you will go to the basin at Llangollen.

 

Space on a narrowboat will be at a premium. For your luggage, either try to use soft bags that can fold and stow, or if you have a car, empty your bags and suitcases and leave the empty suitcases in the car.

 

Grindley Brook locks and also New Marton lock can be a bottlenecks with queues of boats, so do allow time for this possibility on the return journey.

 

If you moor in Llangollen there is a ruined castle on a hill that is a pleasant walk and gives good views,

Castell Dinas Bran http://www.castlewales.com/dinas.html

 

In Llangollen, I’ve hade some nice food at the Corn Mill. This is just over the bridge, overlooking the river. http://www.brunningandprice.co.uk/cornmill/

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@heatherp go to top of page and click on 'follow this topic' and select 'instant' or at least come back often to let us know that you are reading our posts! Arbutus says it all in his excellent post!

 

You can make a lovely stew with tinned steak, carrots, potatoes etc if none of you is a keen cook! A lantern style camping torch might be useful plus a good torch for walking on towpath at night. Read the safety stuff given you by the hire company or look here.

 

Don't allow people on the roof, especially in tunnels or going under bridges. Best not to walk along the side of the boat as it is very easy to lip in. Canal water is nasty stuff and may contain sewage!

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Thanks everyone. Some useful thoughts. When 3 of us do the Broads we cook in mostly and have one or two pub meals, so are well used to that. This time we have another couple with us, so it's up for discussion. Good thought about walking ahead to check it's clear - great dog walk! Being used to the Broads I'd forgotten canals have towpaths. Yes, we've been loaned the Nicholson's guide.

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I would second (third? fourth?) the recommendation to Llangollen but I would also strongly recommend a trip up the Montgomery - very quiet and rural and there is a very nice pub there too: http://www.thenavigation.co.uk/

 

However you do need to book passage through the Frankton locks and they are only open between 12 and 2 each day. A call to the Canal and River Trust the day before with your boat name is all you need or perhaps email them at enquiries.northwalesborders@canalrivertrust.org.uk. However it is worth the hassle!

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Unlike most canals the Llangollen has a flow from Llangollen to Hurleston - water is taken out of the River Dee above Llangollen and extracted at Hurleston to be treated for drinking water. It's only a slight flow and in your case it should work in your favour as it should be quicker coming back than going. It's worth knowing as otherwise you might panic and decide to turn round earlier than you need to.

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Oh that's useful To know. We're used to working with tidal flow in the Broads. Incidentally, how do you judge speed in a narrowboat? In the cruisers you go by an approximation from rpm, but have to exceed it to make any progress where the tidal flow or wind is strongly against you.

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Oh that's useful To know. We're used to working with tidal flow in the Broads. Incidentally, how do you judge speed in a narrowboat? In the cruisers you go by an approximation from rpm, but have to exceed it to make any progress where the tidal flow or wind is strongly against you.

 

It's not really that useful to know. Other things like waiting or getting a clear run for locks & swing bridges & getting past narrows & cluttered hire bases add far much more variability in timings than the flow

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Oh that's useful To know. We're used to working with tidal flow in the Broads. Incidentally, how do you judge speed in a narrowboat? In the cruisers you go by an approximation from rpm, but have to exceed it to make any progress where the tidal flow or wind is strongly against you.

 

Why do you need to? For any particular boat on a given section of canal there is a maximum speed you can go, determined by the hull shape and channel cross section. If you increase the throttle beyond this speed you will create a breaking wash, suck the boat deeper into the channel, and possibly reduce your actual speed of travel, while making more noise and burning more fuel. Just adopt a pace that feels comfortable, and you will be fine.

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A couple of points regarding your speed.

 

You will be expected to slow down when passing moored boats and especially ones secured with mooring pins as apposed to rings or bollards. 2mph or 'tickover' speed is the usual.

 

This canal is wonderful but there are a lot of blind bends, especially near bridges. The temptation for inexperienced ones is to keep your speed up to get through them before a boat comes the other way. But narrowboats are harder to slow down quickly than river cruisers (I think), so resist the temptation and slow right down as you approach. That way if an oncoming boat appears you should be able to sort it out without incident.

 

Depending upon the time of day when you pass it, there is a lovely overnight or lunch break mooring just before Ellesmere where you can moor overnight only yards from the lake (I think it's called Blake Mere).

 

By doing a 'there and back' trip you obviously won't know exactly how it pans out time-wise. Sometimes in our hiring days if we were running early on the last day or so we would go past the hire place to use up the remaining time and explore a bit more of the canal.

 

It sounds as if you've got the perfect attitude for canal cruising and I'm sure you will have a great time.

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Watch people walking on towpath. 3mph is a good walking pace, not a saunter. You can also time yourself between mile markers.

When you are passing a moored boat time how long it takes for you at the helm to pass the boat

A 60ft boat will take 40 seconds to pass at 1mph and 20 seconds at 2 mph. I tend to drop to tick over about 2 boats length before reaching the moored boat and find I take about 15 to 20 seconds to pass, so I am probably travelling at between 2 and 2.5 mph. If there is a line of moored boats this will slow further but not much below 2 mph unless the canal is very shallow.

Edited by Mal in Somerset
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