I’m now well and truly on my way to London. The plan is to stop near Watford, north of the city, to visit the Harry Potter (Universal) Studio once Rianne and the boys arrive. In the meantime, I’ll scope it all out, find the best mooring spot(s) and easiest route from Heathrow so when they get here, all jet-lagged, it’ll be as smooth as possible.

The Grand Union Canal has been very pleasant for the most part. It’s somewhat different than northern canals, there’s few spots with ‘Armco’, the metal sheet-piling used to make mooring easier. I’ve used my pins more here than in the last 5 years up north. This means I’ve had to pound stakes into the towpath to tie to which can be a bit uncertain. They tend to pull out when a boat goes by too quickly (don’t worry Chris, I remembered your foolproof trick and it’s been working great!). On Armco, there are chains (my favourite) or hooked pins that can be used to moor more (lol) securely.

The whole canal has a similar feel to the Kennet & Avon, my first canal in 2018, although that was even less ‘developed’, with lots of mud-banked mooring locations and almost always on pins. Also here there are many live-aboard boats and very few hire boats. But the people are generally great and very helpful. It’s got a real community feel.

One thing I’m getting a bit tired of down here is the broad canals. There are two ‘types’ of canal, broad and narrow. Broad canals are generally wider (obviously) and have locks that are about 14′ wide. They can accommodate two narrowboats at a time (like mine) or one wide-beam (usually 10-12′ wide). These are only found in the south or the north, not in the Midlands. And there’s no actual canal connection between these areas for wide-beams, only narrowboats. This is a quirk of history that I must look into, I’m not sure the reason.

The problem is, for a solo-boater, they’re a bit of extra work to use unless you can pair up with another narrowboat (it also really helps if they have crew). The gates are very heavy and they take a longer time to fill or empty, and with the extra room in the lock the boat should be securely tied to one side to avoid banging around with the water rushing in or out. Mostly just slower and somewhat more work.

In other news, here’s an interesting story:

From the Chiltern Canal Boat Holidays’ page:

“This genuine Canadian totem pole is located next to the Grand Union canal in Berkhamsted. Commissioned by William John Alsford from the Canadian First Nations artist, Henry Hunt, as a thank you to Vancouver Island locals for saving his brother, it was erected in 1968 and stands at a whopping 9m tall. Made of western red cedar it is one of just a few totem poles in the UK, and can be admired when you cruise along the canal near bridge 140D.”

Apparently Mr. Alsford’s brother fell on hard times and was saved from starvation by a local First Nations village near Tahsis (I’m not sure which one). This is an example of a certain level of respect and understanding, something not always obvious here with regard to First Nations. I came across this day-trip boat (and had a chat with the management about how inappropriate it was):

I’ve written and talked about the Crick Boat Show before, it’s the biggest inland waterways show of the year. In addition, they have a bunch of music acts (mostly tribute bands and solo artists), a beer and cider festival, and lots of stuff for sale! Well, more about that later.

In 2018 I attended the show, before I actually had my boat ready to go anywhere. It was still in the marina in Reading where I was busily buying all the little things that are necessary for life these days. Dishes, linens, stuff like that. My broker Jamie was going to be working at the show so offered to drive me there, which I unhesitantly accepted. I had camping gear with me so I rented a tent site and when I was setting up the people next door invited me over for a drink. We quickly became fast friends and have remained so to this day. And guess who I was meeting at the show THIS year??

It really was the highlight of the weekend for me, spending time with Chris and Julie. They are such wonderful people, and have recently bought their own dream boat! We had a fantastic weekend of chatting, looking at boats, listening to music, and testing the cider offerings. It was very special to see them and catch up on all the GOOD news.

The show itself was completely typical, nearly a carbon copy of my previous visits. Some sun, horrendous downpours, thunder, and mud everywhere. The music was considerably better however. After suffering through Abba and Dolly Parton (who seemed to think she was ACTUALLY Dolly Parton), this year’s shows were both fantastic. Young Elton John was high-energy, talented, and lots of fun…

The second night was Fleetwood Bac, actually endorsed by Mick Fleetwood himself. They were excellent as well, it was a bit unfortunate that it was a somewhat marred by the wet and mud. It made dancing and even standing up rather uncomfortable. But a great show nonetheless.

As for the vendors, most needs were represented. Electronics, chandlery, crafts, and everything in between. Unfortunately, most of them didn’t actually bring much stock with them to sell. It seems that they’ve switched to the ‘order and ship’ model. I needed several items but couldn’t get any of them. I don’t have a convenient spot for them to ship to, nor can I ‘just drop into the shop’ to pick something up. I might as well use Amazon, they ship to many more places! Including car parks at many pubs..

So as I write this I’m on my way south toward London. It’s so nice to be at a more relaxed pace, stopping when I feel like it, for as long as I feel like it (within reason!). There are several ‘sights’ to see on the way, museums mostly. It’s a very historic canal, the Grand Union. Passing through many villages and towns and lovely countryside, it’s a very friendly and welcoming area.

One of the highlights was a visit to Bletchley Park. This is the place where the Enigma machine was deciphered, what Churchill called the ‘Ultra Secret’. By breaking it, the Allies were able to read almost all of Germany’s secret messages by the end of the war. It’s a fantastic museum and well worth a day out.

Most of the boats seem to be people living aboard, searching for a different life perhaps. So many smiles and waves, I’ve really enjoyed it so far. I’ll write more and post pictures of some of the sights soon…

Skiing is now done for the season, and what a yawner it was. Days and weeks of sub-par conditions, it never truly took off. The resort did do an amazing job with grooming and snow-making just to stay open, especially in December. And, as always, a bad season skiing is still better than any other season. Although this boating season might just rival it…

My planning has been more extensive and detailed this year than ever before. I usually just have a vague idea where I will go and when, but this year, May in particular, is planned almost to the day.

The intended route will take me south from Nantwich, skirting around Wolverhampton and Birmingham, traveling on the River Severn for a time before turning east on the Droitwich Barge Canal. This section includes the famed Tardebigge flight, a series of 30 locks that need to be done in a single day (no space to stop and moor). The whole area has a lot of locks, so I’ll be busy. A few days later I’ll be on the Grand Union Canal, in an area I have been on previously but it was way back in 2018, my first year on the canals. I’m curious to see if I remember it the same now that I have more experience, it might not seem so interesting!

I’ll have some company on these sections, Rianne’s mum and niece are joining me for a few days, including the River Severn, and good friends from 2018 (Kennet and Avon canal) Guy, Bob and Cate are going to help me through the Tardebigge locks and get me home from some pubs!

Soon after that I’ll turn onto the Oxford Canal (actually still the Grand Union but it’s called both). From there it’ll be through Braunston, left at Norton Junction and north to the Crick Boat Show.

I was at the boat show in 2018 and 2019 but (for reasons you can probably guess) I haven’t been back since. This time I plan on taking full advantage since I need a few parts and some work done. Hopefully I can find some deals and the appropriate skills while they’re all in one place. Also, the music should be somewhat better this time. Fleetwood Bac and Young Elton John versus Abba and Dolly Parton look-alikes. I’ve also just heard that my oldest canal friends Chris and Julie are going to be there, I haven’t seen them for a couple of years and we’ll have a great catch-up! We actually met while camping next to each other at the same boat show in 2018.

Once all that is out of the way, I’ll be heading south toward London. On the way, I’m hoping to stop at the Natural History Museum, Bletchley Park, and a few other spots of interest. The highlight of this section is the Universal Studio in Watford, where Harry Potter was filmed. It’s an amazing tour, lots of the sets and props are there and it should be a good time. The best part however, is that’s where I’m meeting up with Rianne and her two sons! We’re planning about 10 days of visiting, including a week in London itself. I’ve booked moorings for us in Paddington Basin. You can’t get much more central without spending hundreds of pounds (per night) on a room. Plus it gives us the ability to eat aboard whenever we want, saving even more. We’re going to see at least one show (Harry Potter and The Cursed Child, of course), several museums, a traditional pub lunch, and many architectural highlights.

The boys have to return to Canada for other summer fun but Rianne’s staying on and we’re planning to go on to the tidal Thames. This is a huge waterway with lots of large and fast vessels so it’ll be exciting, to say the least. Normally narrowboats go in guided flotillas but due to our timing, there’s no chance of that. One of the boat club experts has offered to join us as we cruise past all the iconic locations in central London. The Tower and the Tower Bridge, Parliament, the Eye, London Bridge, the Millennium Bridge, and many others. A very close family friend is going to join us for this section we hope.

Once off the tidal portion at Teddington, we’ll cruise upriver. This is much more sedate and passes both idyllic countryside and very posh estates and royal lands, including Windsor Castle. When we reach Oxford, Rianne will have to fly home, leaving me to head north to my winter mooring and get back to Canada to enjoy some summer at home as well.

Sorry if this isn’t all that interesting, I’ve written this as much as a confirmation of my plan and almost like a diary entry. It will be very interesting to see how close the actual summer adventure follows it.

Projected totals: 450 miles, 394 locks

I have been asked several times lately about how my UK canal adventure started. After 6 years of telling the story I thought I could post something that I wrote after my first summer to help explain some of it. It’s not really about the why, more about the how. I’m not even clear on the why, it was partly a way to keep boating without the stress and partly just wanting to do something different in a different place.

So, here is a copy of an article I wrote after my first summer, in 2018. It was published in Water Ways World, a glossy magazine that covers all aspects of the inland canal system. If you have any interest in this world, it’s a great resource and is available online at waterwaysworld.com.

I think many of you have seen this article so I’m sorry for the repeat. I’ve also written a couple of shorter ones for an online magazine which I’ll be sharing in the future.

I took so many pictures last summer that not all of them fit into the blog posts. Here are some of the ones that didn’t make the cut at the time.

As both of my readers probably know, I’m back in Canada having come back a bit early. The weather over there was pretty bad throughout July and I heard August and September weren’t much better. Meanwhile we have had a glorious late summer and autumn here on the west coast. We’ve been working on Rianne’s place, having lots of great family visits and hikes, and just enjoying the time together.

I’m now getting ready for the ski season, which basically involves thinking about, planning, and preparing to work out. I might even actually do a workout since Jessi is holding my feet to the fire.

I suspect my next post will be from the mountain, unless something interesting happens before then. I hope everyone is doing well and, as always, please take good care of each other. Always feel free to send me a comment or just a hello, it’s great to know that someone is still reading this.

One of the main reasons I cruised to Liverpool was to visit with my friend Wendy and her family. She is from the Wirral originally, across the Mersey River from Liverpool itself. It’s sort of considered “Liverpool” by everyone except the locals (on either side!). Presently she’s living in Port Sunlight, a community built by the Lever brothers, of Sunlight soap fame. It’s a Model Village they began building in 1888 and envisaged as a decent place for their workers to live and work. They moved their soap works to the land, hired many architects (each to design a block of homes), built a school, a hospital, a train station, an outdoor pool, and many other recreational and social facilities.

The Lady Lever Art Gallery was my first stop, and is one of the best private galleries I’ve ever been to. Paintings, sculpture, furniture, anything artistic can be found in the huge collection. Even the building itself is beautiful.

The museum details the history of the village, showing how the lives of the workers were changed by having decent housing and a safe community. Many went from living in one or two rooms housing as many as 10 people and having a single toilet down the alley that served several homes, to living in a two level attached house with indoor plumbing, several bedrooms, a sitting room, kitchen and bathroom. The toilet remained out in the back garden but was for just their own home at least! They are often still there, converted to garden sheds but identified by the vented door.

Each block of homes was designed by one of nearly 30 different architects. In the back of the blocks were allotments where residents could grow their own vegetables. Many of the buildings built for the community are still there, often repurposed. The hospital, built in 1907 was reopened in 2008 as the Leverhulme Hotel. Hesketh Hall (formerly home to the Royal Legion) is now 13 flats and a pub. The former children’s school is now a working men’s club. The open air swimming pool is now a garden centre and cafe.

William Lever himself rose through the aristocratic ranks, eventually to be known as the 1st. Viscount Leverhulme in 1922. He saw the community as an early form of profit sharing, but where he invested the profits back into the community rather than giving them directly to the workers. It’s fair to note that all of these amenities are for the workers, those living in the community. It’s only in recent years that outside visitors have moved in. Port Sunlight has been suggested as a World Heritage Site, and contains 900 Grade II Listed buildings (meaning there can be little or no alterations). It was his very profitable soap business that originally funded the village, and in fact the company is now bigger than ever, presently known as Unilever. They produce many things besides soap and have over 148,000 employees worldwide. Obviously something worked. It’s a lesson that many present-day companies could learn… (can you hear me Walmart?)

Some of the many styles of homes in Port Sunlight:

There are many more interesting and beautiful buildings and locations in Port Sunlight than what I’ve shown here. If you are ever in Liverpool, it’s an easy train ride over the river (well, under it actually) and is well worth the trip. I may sound like a promotional advertisement, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Hey, did you know that there was a really famous band from Liverpool? If you ever go there, you can’t miss them. It’s impossible to go far without a reminder of Echo and the Bunnymen. Oh, wait. I mean that other band. Here’s my adventure getting to (and from) Beatleland.

My first choice to get to Liverpool from Swanley Bridge Marina was to go north on the Shroppie through Chester and Ellesmere Port (where I went last year) and then across the Mersey River. I knew it would be a bit daunting, not just because it’s a large, tidal waterway with ocean-going ships plying it. I had no idea, however, that it would be quite so much trouble. It requires permissions from at least three bureaucracies, hiring a pilot, having the boat surveyed and the fuel polished, and probably other organizational items. That’s far too much paperwork for an ex-government employee. Plan B was needed…

The other choice was to go north past the Anderton Boat lift and skirt Manchester on the Bridgewater Canal. This is a very historical waterway, the first purpose-built canal in England. The Duke of Bridgewater built it to carry coal from his mines to the docks of Manchester. It made him fabulously wealthy, the richest man in England at the time. He is credited with starting the canal-building craze throughout the late 18th and 19th century which ultimately resulted in over 6000 miles of canals during the height of the Industrial Revolution, of which over 2000 miles continue to survive.

I can’t say I enjoyed the trip. I had made a reservation in Liverpool for my boat, in Salthouse dock. This is a CRT boat basin in the very core of Liverpool, next to the world-famous Albert Docks but my mistake was making the reservation without enough time to easily get there, given uncertainties and weather along the way. I found I had to push the boat, and my endurance, with long days in sometimes pretty awful weather. Wind and rain every day made it, um, annoying. In addition I was unfamiliar with the area and found it difficult to find adequate mooring locations. The route went through some pretty industrial and sketchy areas, not very inviting.

In the end it was fine, I found good moorings, met some great people, and arrived in Liverpool pretty much uneventfully. Entry into the South Docks is dramatic and amazing.

You realize you’re entering history before even arriving at the main South Docks. The route passes right by the ‘Tobacco Warehouse’, which is still the largest brick-built building in the world, containing more than 27 million bricks. It is being repurposed as high-end residences and businesses, as are many of the older buildings.

After exiting the Stanley Docks, the first thing you see is the iconic Victoria Tower with its 6 clock faces. It was known as the Docker’s Clock as it was used by mariners leaving (or arriving) to set their chronometers to the correct local time.

Travelling deeper into the docklands, the route passes through huge basins with massive bollards and locks. Sailing cargo ships, and later steam ships, would find secure landings here in order to fuel the immense trade flowing in and out of England’s largest northern port.

The world-famous Royal Liver Building, with it’s Liver Birds looking out to sea and inland, is the first of the Three Graces the route passes. Next is the Cunard Building (Customs House), and finally the Port of Liverpool Building.

The time I spent in the centre of Liverpool was pretty cool. I have been to the city several times in the past but being right in there, for almost no cost (as opposed to hugely expensive hotels with the same view) was a bit of alright! While there I visited several museums and galleries, bought some souvenirs, ate at a couple of restaurants, and just enjoyed myself. However, the highlight (and main reason for going) was visiting Wendy across the river in The Wirral (Merseyside). As it turned out, visiting her and her lovely family was not just worth the long cruise up there, it was worth it’s own blog post. Stay tuned…

As usual, here are some random images from the trip.

It has been a bit of a whirlwind June. Once I got back to the marina from the River Weaver, I headed to Ottawa for Robbie’s convocation. Needless to say, that was one of the happiest and proudest days of my life. It all went well, no problems with flights or schedules. We had a nice few days to visit.

Rianne and I then headed to the boat. It was her first time on the canals so I had planned a special trip. A couple of you will remember the route (if you’re still reading this blog!), up the Llangollen, over the Pontcysyltte aqueduct and into the basin at the head of the canal. It’s an iconic route, offering all the best of the inland waterway and we couldn’t have asked for it to be any better! The weather cooperated, very hot at the beginning, a great thunder and rainstorm, a Father’s Day treat, and moderate weather for the longer cruising days.

It was truly an amazing time. Everything went so well, seemed like magic (hehehe). And again, thanks so much to Phil and Angela for the great company and all the help getting back and forth! We can’t wait to return the favours once they come up the mountain in the winter!

My time down on the River Weaver was quite a good experience. I’d forgotten about river travel, the Thames in 2018 and the Trent in 2019 were the last big rivers I had been on. The width (being able to turn around almost anywhere), the huge locks (and lock keepers), and the flow were all good reminders of the difference between a river and a controlled canal. I can’t see the Weaver Navigation staying the way it is though, it’s costing a fortune to maintain and run such a short section. They should probably automate the locks so the boaters can run them (like on the Thames), which would allow more flexible travel without having to keep to ‘their’ schedule. This might entice more people to go down the boat lift and experience it and save on lock-keepers’ salaries. It’s not nice to think about workers losing their jobs but it’s inevitable if things continue as they are.

Going back up the Boat LIft again was still an interesting experience. As much as I enjoyed the river, it was a bit of relief to be back on the ‘regular’ canal. There seemed to be almost constant problems on the Weaver, from the boat lift itself having issues to locks failing and causing delays. On most canals that usually means just turning around and going the long way around. That’s almost impossible on the Weaver, it’s dangerous and expensive to go along the Manchester Ship Canal to Ellesmere Port. It sure would be fun though!

On my return journey, I stopped at Bramble Cuttings, one of the waterway’s nearly legendary mooring locations. It’s on the ‘offside’, opposite the towpath, so doesn’t have people, dogs, or bikes going by. Only three boats at a time too, so very quiet and peaceful. It’s set up nicely with benches, picnic tables, and BBQ stands. Loved it…

Once leaving Bramble Cuttings (2 day maximum stay) I headed back toward my regular stomping grounds around the Nantwich area.

To make a long story longer, I got back onto the Shropshire Canal (Main Branch) and went as far south as Audlum. There I got some allergy medicine from the ‘chemist’ and got more work done. I’ll soon have the hatch cover acceptably de-rusted and painted. As the title hinted at, the days are becoming warmer and make it feel like summer is here. However, the nights are still very cool, getting down to 4 ℃ one night. Luckily as the days go by it seems to be getting a bit warmer, daytime and night.

After a couple of pleasant days at Coole Pilate, and having a visit with Gary and Linda on NB Watercolour, I moved north to beyond Barbridge Junction. Most cruisers head up the Middlewich Branch at this point, as I did previously, but this time I went straight on toward Chester. I got some water and dropped off the garbage and spent a quiet night before returning to Barbridge. Mooring outside the Barbridge Inn, I had a great Sunday Roast and met Phil and Ang for a drink later!

Nothing much after this to report, just idling to the marina to prepare for the return to Ottawa. I’m so excited to see Robbie get his degree, it’s been a tough road for him (and all the other students) having to navigate the Covid restrictions. It wasn’t easy to do lab work remotely. Of course, I’m also very excited to have Rianne fly back with me and experience the canal life!