not a day for Lady Godiva
Woke up to an ominous stillness. Yup - we were iced in. The arm of Coventry Basin in which we'd moored the previous day, which we'd chosen because the other arm was beginning to freeze over, was itself now covered with a 1/4" to 1/2" layer of ice. Oh dear - that meant we'd have to break ice to get back to Newbold-on-Avon. And we had to get there to be sure of getting back to Stockton Top the next day. (Besides which, we'd been invited to Alex and Amanda's new year's eve party).
At 1000, after waiting and hoping in vain for the ice to melt(!), we set to with the shafts breaking the ice around the boat so we could manoeuvre past the two other boats in the arm and out onto the cut. I was very glad I'd reversed in the previous night!
Our initial progress was very slow: Ben was doing a valiant but very tiring job breaking the ice in front of the boat with the shaft. It didn't take long for us to realise this was futile, and I set the revs to 1200 and we crunched through. Our speed, according to the GPS, was 2.0 to 2.2 mph (where on the ice-free Oxford Canal the previous day this engine speed would have resulted in a boat speed of 2.5 to 2.7 mph).
carving out a channel
At the A444 road bridge Alison and Ben disembarked to get a bus to Newbold to pick up their car. Here a following boat overtook us and took on the job of breaking the ice. Hooray! This didn't last long, however, as he stopped at Tesco's and we ploughed into the ice again, as far as Hawkesbury Junction/Sutton Stop, where there had been more boat movement. So no more ice breaking for us.
a frosty and icy Coventry Canal (1)
a frosty and icy Coventry Canal (2)
My reluctance to break ice was because the hull had only just been blacked! Sorry, fellow owners, but I did the bare minimum, and I had to get the boat back to the marina before the possibility of being stuck in ice in the middle of nowhere.
our route through Coventry
this fridge seems to have been working overtime
Attention now returns to Ally and Ben. We left them getting a bus to get their car. At the car the engine started, but then clouds of smoke (I'm told) poured from uner the bonnet. Oh dear (again). Neither Ally nor Ben seems to be very mechanically minded, so they invoked the breakdown cover. It transpired that the alternator belt had snapped, probably because the water pump was frozen solid! (Why don't young car owners think antifreeze is important?) The breakdown man apparently didn't have the right tools to fix the problem (what sort of breakdown mechanic is one who can't replace a fanbelt?) so he winched the car onto his truck and drove people and car to Ansty to meet us on the boat so we could unload all Ally and Ben's luggage. What would we have done before mobile phones? As it was, we arrived at Ansty only a few minutes before the recovery vehicle, and transferred belongings. They were then driven all the way to Southport!
Meanwhile we cracked on, doing a bit of less-than-daylight cruising, to arrive at Newbold at 1820. Jan was surprised when I started tying up: she hadn't noticed that we'd gone through the tunnel! After Sutton Stop, by the way, there was a good path through the ice; after Ansty there was barely any ice at all.
after a day's cruising in sub-zero temperatures the tiller arm had frozen to the swan's neck
Having moored up, we went in search of coal as we'd almost run out. The Co-op had closed early, so we walked most of the way to a garage before deciding that it would be better for me to get my bike. So we walked back to Shadow, I got my bike, and got the coal and presents (for it was Alex's birthday) from a Texaco garage in Rugby. Then the fire was lit, showers were taken, and it was off to the new year's eve party. We got to bed at 0145, most definitely on the late side for us!
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