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Canal Voyagers Hotel Boats 2010 Map
Posted on Wednesday, 30 December 2009 at 20:05 Comments (1)
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Thank you to all our customers, friends and family for your support throughout the year. |  |
I'd arranged to help John and Fi on Epiphany climb the locks towards Birmingham and the BCN last week. |  |
Unfortunately Fi wasn't too well and was unable to help but John and I made good progress up the Stourbridge Sixteen and the Delph locks. |  |
Christmas is not far away and if your stuck for a idea for a present then look no further than our great selection of DVDs. |  |
One reason the stop gates were being maintained in the last blog was probably because of the new work at Selly Oak, just a few hundred meters away. |  |
When it's finished it will be put back onto its original alignment passing over the new aqueduct. |  |
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There are stopgates positioned under bridge 82 on the Worcester and Birmingham Canal, between Edgbaston and Selly Oak. Most of the time they are folded back, out of the way an nobody notices them as they steer through the bridge. |  |
They work rather like lock gates, and look rather like them and, just like lock gates they need maintenance and occasional replacement. |  |
Unfortunately, drawings of what was built hundreds of years ago don't always match what you find then you drain the water out and there's a little head scratching going on here. I'm sure it will all be fitting well before too long, but, unless there is a breach, nobody will even know they've been here in a few weeks time. |  |
The winter stoppage season is a good time to do these works and there's a particular reason for working on these gates now and making sure they work - but you'll have to wait until the next blog post for that. |  |
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With our increasing range of DVDs it's gradually becoming harder and harder to find the one you want.
Experience boaters looking for the Middlewich Arm, for example, might spot it's covered by the Four Counties Ring quite quickly but newcomers might not.
First we've added a list of canals and branches and which DVDs they appear in.
Then we've added a search box, which appears on the top right of the page to help you find anything on our website and blog.
Give it a try, it surprises me how much it finds.
It’s 25th November and Christmas is just one month away on 25th December. | |
The latest dates for ordering for delivery before Christmas are:- |  |
 Another great pair of canal DVDs are released from Waterway Routes in time for Christmas. |  |
 Now these DVDs are the only way you can reach the terminus of the Leek Branch with a boat. |  |
For some time the bridges around the centre of Birmingham have had temporary signs stuck on them. Mostly encapsulated paper ones but large enough to read and adequate for a sign that wasn’t to last long. |  |
On my last trip to Birmingham I was pleased to see the temporary signs had been replaced by permanent ones, but very disappointed at how small they were. |  |
 Another pair of DVDs have just been released by Waterway Routes. | |
 You can see extracts from the DVDs on YouTube from the links on the right. | |
Andrew Denny, in his Granny Buttons Blog entitled Jumping Joe Darby, and who’ll be the new Baron De Coubertin of the waterways? mentions an archive video from 1972 and asks where it was taken - hoping a blog reader can identify where. |  |
The pictures show four extracts from the video paired with four pictures from today. Some things have changed since 1972, while other are unchanged for hundreds of years. |  |
I thought it was about 3/4 mile from Tame Valley Junction on the North bank between Jones Bridge and the former Railway Bridge. The pairs of shots seem to match pretty well. |  |
3. Look at the reflection of the pylon and the corner of the building, matched in the two shots. |  |
Once we pass 25th October, with 2 months to go, I start to think about Christmas. I think others start much earlier, and some are already planning their holiday for next year. |  |
In our last post I mentioned how busy we had been since our return from the Caldon Canal with editing the DVDs for the Caldon Canal, and one other. |  |
These were filmed from a hire boat, rather than our own, but still include all the useful information to describe a trip along the canals, including a rotation in the Falkirk Wheel. |  |
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We've been busy since our cruise along the Caldon Canal in September. We were there to film for a pair of DVDs in the Waterway Routes Series and we've almost finished the editing of the Popular and Bowcam versions. |  |
We've also been busy with another pair of DVDs which are also approaching completion but more about those next time. |  |
Another trip on the train today took me to the Stourbridge Canal Festival held at the Bonded Warehouse, and along the canal side.
There were lots of people there and it was starting to get crowded as I left.
I spotted the Birmingham Canal Navigations Society (BCNS) stand proudly selling the Waterways Routes range of DVDs. I hope they do well.
It was an early start for me on Thursday to catch the train to Manchester, then the bus to Fairfield to reach lock 65 of the Rochdale Canal.
This was the meeting point for Epiphany and Gypsy Rover who were to descend the Rochdale Nineteen locks into Manchester. BW staff would meet them at lock 65 to unlock the gates and let them through, then help from time to time during the passage before reappearing to unlock lock 83 to let them out at the bottom.
Most of the journey was uneventful, just a little hard work at times. Some of the locks have only one paddle – and have only had one paddle since reopening so they were a little slow to operate.
There was a little rubbish in the canal resulting in the occasional trip down the weed hatch, but no worse than other urban areas. Derek was sceptical when Dot said the boat was becoming impossible to control and there must be something around the propeller.
Derek tried steering and announced that "Dot might be right".
As soon as the boat was in the lock he opened the weed hatch and he was still there when the lock was empty and was towed out by John on Epiphany.
The photo shows the pile of rubbish removed from the propeller when he was only half way through. There was just as much more to come off the propeller.
Eventually closing the weed hatch and looking at the large pile of rubbish he announced that "Dot was right".
So, 15th October 2009 will go down in history as the day Derek announced that Dot was right ;-)
The other problems centred around the excess of water flowing down the canal. The paths along both sides of the canal were flooded in two of the pounds, although the weirs at the bywashes were clear of rubbish – so either the weirs are built too high, or the paths too low.
A few of the locks were difficult to operate when the water was coming in the top faster than the paddles could let it out of the bottom but we eventually managed to open all the gates.
I don’t know what has happened at lock 73 but the end of lock beam nearest the camera has been sawn off, making it rather short and hard work to push it open.
3 boats worked down, and 2 boats worked up so it was a busy day on the Rochdale Canal.
A little detour on the way home today took me to Todmorden station and then to the Rochdale Canal.
Walking upwards I soon caught up with Gypsy Rover and Epiphany who were heading towards Walsden.
The broad locks are a little heavy, with some of the paddle gear rather stiff so they all appreciated another pair of hands.
There’s great views of the Pennine scenery as the canal climbs up through the narrow valley and the Rochdale Canal is the only one to cross the Pennines without a summit tunnel.
That’s why there’s so many locks and, being a broad canal, they are all broad locks making them just that bit harder to work.
After being treated to lunch at Grandma Pollards Fish and Chips shop – and amazing place – I headed home.
« Windsong |
An opportunity to cruise a little nearer home today.
Canal Voyagers Hotel Boats were cruising from Bath to Bristol and I had the opportunity to accompany today.
This gave me the chance do a little filming for some publicity material and to see a stretch of river that I’ve never seen before – the Bristol River Avon, not to be confused with the Stratford River Avon or any of the other River Avons.
I caught the train to Bath when I was welcomed aboard and cruised with them to Bristol.
They stayed breasted up throughout with Neil steering the motor and with Corinne also steering the butty at the tighter turns on the river. The butty’s tiller can simply be left in the centre on the straighter sections with the steering done entirely from the motor.
At Keynsham Lock there was a little excitement when the boat coming out of the lock lost its drive.
Fortunately Neil was able to manoeuvre the hotel pair away from the landing stage for the other crew to haul their boat out with the ropes.
The journey was unusually exciting for narrowboat cruises with lots of rowing boats, several groups of yachts on the river and a surprisingly large number of boats moving in all directions once we reached the Harbour at Bristol.
It was a great day out and I was well looked after with their regular guests and I left them safely moored in Bristol Harbour.
We’re still catching up on the blogging from our trip on the Caldon Canal and the bloggers we met on the journey.
We’d been to the end of the Leek Arm and moored while Christine and Susan went shopping and I went filming.
When we say we’d been to the end we really meant it, and we were using our bow thruster to steer as we backed out.
With the narrow channel and the wind blowing sideways I was suddenly surprised by a head appearing from Windsong and Roger shouting "we read your blog".
We usually have to reverse back when caught like that, but this time we went forwards to say a few words to Roger, and to Pip who had appeared by then.
They are more up to date with their writing and have already blogged about our encounter on their site.
Windsong » |
It was a trip on the train this morning to reach Northampton for a short walk down to the River Nene where No Problem was just arriving.
After spending summer on the rivers they were returning to the canal system for the winter and I was to help them work the 17 locks of the Rothersthorpe flight on the Northampton Branch of the Grand Union Canal.
There was just time for a little (or was it a lot of) shopping before leaving Northampton.
The first few locks near the town had anti vandal devices fitted. I’ve seen many variations before but these are the first I’ve seen fitted with a Yale key rather than a handcuff key. I assume it makes them harder for the vandals to get around.
With Sue and Vic taking turns steering and working the locks and with help from Anne (from Moore2Life) and from me, we managed the flight in reasonable time.
I left them at Gayton Junction, shortly after the top lock to walk to Milton Malsor for a bus to Northampton and to return home by train. Sue had already written her blog by the time I had returned home.
On our recent trip to the Caldon Canal we passed several bloggers and we’re a little behind in posting about them. Here’s one that took us by surprise. It’s Northern Pride.
I was on the roof filming the bottle kilns alongside us and only looked at the passing boat when I’d taken the shot.
I was just in time to take a still picture of them disappearing into the distance.
Fortunately our Bowcam was running so I was also able to extract a still from that, although not such good quality.
We just had time to shout hello as we passed. Hopefully we’ll have a longer chat next time we pass.
They were much prompter blogging about us. Their picture shows me on the roof of our boat, with a tripod so I could see over the wall at the side of the canal for a better shot.
There’s been rather a gap in our recent blogging as we managed to moor in a location with poor mobile reception every night on our recent trip. One night there was no mobile, no data, no Freeview and no analogue TV. It was lovely and quiet at Consall Forge.
We’ve been filming along the Caldon Canal and wondering how far we would get as Froghall Tunnel, near the end, has an unusually low profile and many boats simply don’t fit through.
As you exit Flint Mill Lock, the last on the Caldon Canal there’s a gauge made of plastic sheets so you can check the profile of your boat and see if you fit through the tunnel.
We had stopped at the last water point to fill up the tank in our bows and had only one third of a tank of diesel at the stern to keep the front cabin corners, which are the highest part of our boat, as low as possible. We just touched the plastic gauge which is said to be a few millimetres pessimistic so we might just fit.
With two crew members sitting at the front, and just the steerer at the stern we went in under electric power so we could go very, very slowly.
The tunnel gets narrower inside, as the photo shows if you click to enlarge it, and I’m pleased to say we got through the tunnel without touching the roof at all. I’d been expecting to have to touch up the paintwork on the front corners.
The only problem was kneeling on the floor to keep my head low enough and holding a torch to shine along the roof to watch the front corners.
Having passed through the tunnel we could make the right turn onto the first part of the restored Uttoxeter Canal and descend the one lock to moor in the basin and take a photo to show we made it.
We passed lots of bloggers on our journey so now we’re home with lots of bandwidth I can publish some more posts to show who we met.
Now I’ve got a summer’s worth of filming to start editing to produce the next batch of DVDs during the winter. Which shall I do first?
Having just returned from the IWA National Festival at Redhill and checked our stock back in we’ve found a discrepancy which we think we can trace back to Saturday 29th.
If you bought a DVD from us at Redhill on Saturday 29th and your receipt number ends in 0005 then please get in touch as we think you may have collected the wrong DVD and we’d like to post you the correct one.
Please email us (paul@waterwayroutes.co.uk) or phone us (07961 701 702) and we’ll sort it out.
As you paid cash there is no way we can trace you, so please contact us.
Sunday and Monday at the IWA National festival seemed similar in terms of overall numbers, but on these days there seemed to be more locals keen on a fun day out rather than boaters.
They were enjoying the displays in the main ring, and the opportunity to meet the owls close up afterwards.
The occasional light showers drove a few visitors into the marquees but otherwise it seemed rather quiet.
We were packed up quickly on the Monday after closing time, it was just a question of remembering how it fitted into the car when we came and packing it the same way.
Here’s the empty space between our two neighbours after we’ve finished.
We’re looking forward to next year’s IWA National Festival 2010 at Beale Park.
Thank you to all the visitors who introduced themselves – it was great to meet you face to face.
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