Blue-top boating booked ... and playing the train fares game

For a week next month I shall be helping friends move their blue-top boat Kew from Stourport to Braunston. To that end I have bought my rail tickets - most of them anyway.


Not only am I saving money by buying the tickets in advance, I am also saving a considerable amount by breaking the journeys into discrete legs.

The quoted fare from Wymondham to Kidderminster is £41.50 (advance) but I'm doing it for just £20.00 over the same route. How? By splitting it into Wymondham to Liverpool Street (£8.00); Euston to Birmingham New Street (£6.00); and Birmingham Moor Street to Kidderminster (£6.00 "anytime" fare - not yet bought).

I shall be taking my folding bike, so will cycle from Liverpool Street to Euston and Kidderminster to Stourport. Coming home I'll cycle from Braunston to Long Buckby and get the train to Euston (£6.00 advance); cycle to Liverpool Street; and then get the train to Wymondham (£8.00 advance). Total for the homeward journey: £14.00, saving £7.20 on the quoted "one hop" fare.

One more ridiculous anomaly: if I wanted to go by train from Long Buckby to Milton Keynes and bought the cheapest ticket for that journey it would cost me £11.20. However I could get a ticket to Euston for only £6.00 and get off at MK. I pity visitors from overseas who are not used to this malarkey. I'm sure they wouldn't understand how it is that it costs twice as much to go half the distance. I don't.


I'm looking forward to steering Kew again. It has an air-cooled Lister engine and a large wooden rudder - it is a converted butty. Now, what do I need to pack? Bike, windlass ...

Sandiacre to Ilkeston

Easter Cruise day 6, 6th April 2013

At Sandiacre there is a junction with the now derelict Derby Canal.


A short time earlier we saw our first ducklings of the year.


On the outskirts of Ilkeston, on the bridge by Gallows Inn Lock, is a plaque commemorating the bicentenary of the opening of the Erewash Canal in 1779. The plaque was unveiled on 26th May 1979 by Sir Frank Price, who was then chairman of the British Waterways Board.


And this is Shadow under the bridge waiting for the lock to empty. The graffiti is appropriate, given my cruising guide of choice.


Our destination today was Barker's Lock, where our friends Alan and Hazel had a lovely canalside house with offline moorings and a boatfitting business.


I say "had" as, although they were still there, they were in the middle of moving. That night we had an excellent curry in the Shah Jahan restaurant.

Long Eaton: moored boats and chimneys

Easter Cruise day 6, 6th April 2013

This was the climax of our Easter Cruise. We'd not been on the Erewash Canal before, so this was a voyage of discovery for us on Shadow. The sharp left turn from the River Trent brought us immediately to Trent Lock, which we had to empty before going in.

Nicholson states that Trent Lock should be left full, so that flotsam coming down the canal will escape over the bottom gates. Fair enough, but every subsequent lock was also full, i.e. against us!


You don't see many boats like this on the canals.


I remember seeing similar-looking house boats on the Grand Union below Bull's Bridge Junction, and on the Thames.


The first couple of miles was slow going, as there were moored boats all the way to Long Eaton Lock.

Trains were a constant feature of this lower end of the Erewash, mostly freight, looping around all over the place.


We were obviously holding up our locking partners on Jack Daniels, so we let them go ahead. This was a mixed blessing for them, as this meant that they got the work of turning all the locks. By the time we got there they were either ready, or very nearly so.


There are lots of lovely old chimneys along the canal in Long Eaton. I wonder if they are all listed buildings.


This chimney had an amazing brick industrial building to match.



I don't think I'll be able to condense this trip for the blog - there's just too much to show!

Pulling strings at the fête

A nearby village held its summer fête today, so Jan and I went along to join in the fun and help raise money for the church.

I found a new test of skill. I don't know what it was called, but you had to pull on a string in each hand to manoeuvre a marble up a surface with more holes than an Emmental cheese. If the marble fell through a hole that was it. Game over.


I pulled on the strings ... eased the marble up the slope ...


... and got it to the top! My prize? A mini pack of mini cheesy biscuits.


We enjoyed tea and cake ...


... and then it was time for the real challenge. Getting as many marbles into the upturned flowerpot as possible in a set time. This had a twist: you were allowed only one marble on the spoon at any one time.

Jan had a go ...


... and so did I.


My competitive nature meant that I got the highest score of the day (by one marble!), and won two day passes to the local fitness centre.

(I also won a similar event at Jan's school fête last week, the prize for which was a box of chocolates. So the two prizes complement each other.)

Top Thirty, 2013 week 21

There's a message from Tony Blews below this week's chart ...

Here is the UK Waterways Site Ranking (top thirty places) as it stood at 2125 on Sunday 19th May 2013. This is taken, with permission, from Tony Blews's UK Waterways Ranking Site.


1 Canal World Discussion Forums (=)

2 CanalPlanAC (=)

3 Pennine Waterways (=)

4 Jim Shead's Waterways Information (=)

5 Boatshed Grand Union (-)

6 Living on a Narrowboat (-1)

7 Water Explorer (-1)

8 Retirement with No Problem (-1)

9 UKCanals Network (-1)

10 Waterway Routes (-1)

11 nb Epiphany (+1)

12 boatshare (-2)

13 Towpath Treks (-2)

14 nb Waiouru (-1)

15 BCBM Ltd (=)

16 Canal Shop Company (-2)

17 M. B. Willow (+9)

18 Captain Ahab's Watery Tales (-2)

19 Narrowboat Briar Rose (+1)

20 NB The Manly Ferry (+4)

21 Narrowboat Chance (+1)

22 Milburn Boats Ltd (-1)

23 Baddie the Pirate (-5)

24 boats and cruising (+5)

25 Rock n Roll (-6)

26 boatrent (-3)

27 Halfie (+4)

28 Boats and Canals Forum (-1)

29 Seyella's Journey (+3)

30 'Eileen Inlanding' (+3)

31 Narrowboat Starcross (-)

32 Narrowboat Dreaming .... Parisien Star (-15)

33 NABO (-8)

34 Contented Souls (-6)

35 The Real Life of a Narrowboat Wife (-)

36 Herbie (-)



The figures in parentheses denote the number of places moved since the previous chart;
(-) denotes new entry or re-entry into the chart;
(=) denotes no change.

There are 106 entries, up from 94 last week.

If your website has been using the old piece of code linking to Tony Blews's UK Waterways Ranking System then you will find that it no longer works. You will have to update your website to use the ukwrs.co.uk address instead of the coobeastie.co.uk one.

To update my Blogger blog I logged in to ukwrs.co.uk; clicked on the Manage Site option in the top left of the page; and copied the code from the appropriate box. Then on my blog I clicked on Layout; found the HTML/Javascript "gadget" corresponding to the ranking position; and replaced the code there with the code I'd copied from UKWRS.

Onto the Trent and the Erewash Canal

Easter Cruise day 6, 6th April 2013

After Shardlow, where we didn't stop, we went down Derwent Mouth Lock ...


... and Sawley Lock.


We shared Sawley Lock with Jack Daniels, who were also headed for the Erewash Canal. We saw a lot of them over the next day or two.


They let us out of the lock first, and we zoomed along the Trent.


Shadow liked having plenty of deep water, and a bit of current helped too.


It's not often that 1600 rpm gives 5 mph on this boat.

And I said there was still snow around: here it is on the right bank of the Trent.


Moments later we arrived at a watery crossroads. Straight on and slightly to the left is the Trent's Cranfleet Cut; slightly to the right is Thrumpton Weir; further to the right is the River Soar (which we would be going up later); and sharp left, hidden behind the sloping masonry wall, is the entrance to the Erewash Canal.


I could see from Nicholson's that it was a sharp turn, but it was even sharper than I was expecting. We had no problem, though, as there was plenty of room and benign conditions.


Here we were at Trent Lock and the start of a new waterway (to us). Exciting!

Watering up; Shardlow; and a request for a bed

I'll get the cheeky request in first: we're going to Crick for the boat show next weekend. We had hoped to take Jubilee, but we can't throw Ally and Ben out for a week just so that we can stay at Crick for one night. So ... can anyone put us up on Saturday night 25th May? If not we can commute from Milton Keynes.


Easter Cruise Days 5 and 6, 5th and 6th April 2013

At the end of Day 5 we stopped at Weston Lock where we watered up before reversing to a mooring.


We looked for The Old Plough, a pub in the centre of the village according to our Nicholson's. Except that now it's a new development of houses. We didn't fancy the expensive hotel, so we ate on board.

The next day we locked down and admired the name picked out in bricks below the lock. The same thing was done at Aston Lock a mile and a half further on.


And then the entry into Shardlow, down the lock ...


... and past the amazing collection of old warehouses.








We're almost onto the Erewash! Next post, probably.

Stenson Lock Cottage

Easter Cruise Day 5, 5th April 2013

I think I'd better get through this photographic record of our Easter cruise a little quicker, or I'll still be writing it up next Easter. Perhaps tomorrow.

Meanwhile ... here's Stenson Lock Cottage ...


... with its reminder of where you are.


A bit further on we saw snow in the field.


Despite the bitterly cold wind we endured for most of our fortnight I'm sure the daytime temperature was actually above freezing. There was quite a lot of sun, too, so the snow must have been in the shade most of the time.


The next photo was taken in the Swarkestone area, probably just east of Bridge 12.