The Long Weekend
It had seemed like a very long week, having made business trips to Yorkshire, London and Birmingham so it was off to Braunston on Thursday after work. We had dinner at the Boathouse pub before getting to the boat around six. We had brought the ‘new’ chairs with us so spent an hour swapping them over with the old ones. That might seem like a long time but it did involve a bit of carrying between car and boat as well as dismantling the old and assembling the new.
Next morning, I was up and about and off to work, leaving Sue to give the boat a thorough clean through. I returned to the marina at four and by five o’clock we were out on the cut. Sue had some news about our mooring, following a visit to the marina shop earlier in the day. When we return on Sunday we will be berthed on the same pontoon that Phoenix III occupied but on the other side where Caliburnum used to be before it was sold last year. It won’t change our decision to leave the marina in the autumn but it will make the remaining months at Braunston easier for access to the facilities. The main thing is that we will have ringside seats for the historic boatshow in three weeks time.
We motored on around Braunston turn in the direction of Napton and found a great mooring close to bridge 103. We spent the rest of the evening just lounging in the cratch or as Sue has taken to calling it, the conservatory!
Saturday morning brought heavy rain, so heavy in fact that by eleven o’clock we were pretty much resigned to staying put for the day. An hour later and the weather had changed so we decided to untie and press on. Of course there was no pressing reason to do so, it was just about playing with the boat and all too soon we reached Napton. We turned Caxton and tied up for an hour, the sun was out and it was hard to believe that only a few hours earlier we had been sitting inside being battered by the rain. Our rest over, we untied again and started our journey back to Braunston, the weather was absolutely glorious and after we passed under bridge 103 we saw that the spot that we had occupied the night before was still vacant so we pulled over, tied up again and enjoyed another sunny evening out in the cratch conservatory.
Sunday brought more blue skies but since we knew that we were only 90 minutes away from base, we were in no hurry to set off. Eventually we did set off though but only as far as bridge 99 where we stopped and had one of Sue’s succulent cooked breakfasts – Mmmmm
We did more lazing in the Conservatory and then set off again around half past one, this time we only got as far as the Boathouse pub mooring where we pulled up again and spent a couple of hours more in the cratch / conservatory (delete as applicable). We’re going to eat in the pub in a while and then return to the marina where we will stay overnight before going home and then to work in the morning.
Of course this means that we have slept more than half of the week on the boat rather than in the house and whilst that was inevitable at some point, we hadn’t really expected that it would happen as soon as it has.
What a bargain.
Sue here again.
We don’t often blog when we are not on the boat but we did something last night that was boat related. Our new boat Caxton is a beautiful boat and has been very well looked after by her previous owners so all we have done is changed a few bits which are just down to personal taste. The two leather reclining chairs were still comfy but were well worn and the leather had rubbed off in places, so I have been looking at new chairs on Amazon, Ebay and a lot of different furniture shops. I had not looked at all this week and then when I opened up my Ipad last night I decided to have another look on Amazon. I looked through the chairs and saw just what we wanted at nearly £800 for the two, I had wanted navy coloured leather because I thought that it would go with the blue painted walls on the boat but I could not find navy ones anywhere so I settled for a chestnut colour. Before I made the purchase of the chairs I thought that I would have another look on Ebay. I clicked on new listings of recliner chairs and someone had just listed two navy leather recliners with footstools which were said to be in excellent condition for an unbelievable buy it now price of £75 for the two. The chairs were at Stafford which is only about an hours drive from us and very close to where we collected our new boat from so I clicked on the ” Buy it now ” and off we went to pick them up. The couple who the chairs belonged to were downsizing from a large house to a retirement apartment and when we saw the chairs, we were amazed because they are top quality chairs. They are now sitting in our lounge waiting to be taken to the boat which will be done when George finishes work on Thursday.
The reason that I have put this on the blog is because I think that these bargain chairs were a reward for us because we saved the Alvechurch boat from sinking in the lock on Sunday. As the saying goes ” You reap what you sow “.
Scary moment
Hello everyone
I am Sue and today I am doing my first blog on this site.
We went over to the boat at Braunston for the weekend to clean the boat and do some other jobs that we needed to do and even though we did not clean the boat several other jobs got done.
The reason that I wanted to write on the blog today was because I had one of the scariest moments ever on the canal system today and we were not even out boating.
We got showered and dressed this morning and then about 11.45 we set off to walk along the towpath with the intention of sitting outside of the ” Admiral Nelson ” to enjoy a leisurely drink. As we sat there enjoying our drink an Alvechurch hire boat went into the lock to start their descent. As they were descending George said ” That boat is starting to list” and within seconds we realised that the boat was in trouble and looked like it was stuck on the cill. I shouted to the lock winders ” Drop the paddle now” and they looked bemused. We ran over and George took the windlass out of the man’s hand and dropped the paddle. The boat was leaning badly by now and we were afraid that the three elderly people on the front were going to fall out of the boat but because the lock was leaking badly at the back it righted itself with a massive swing and really shook up the people on board.
We were both shocked by the incident and dread to think what might have happened if we had not been sitting outside of the pub today.
It’s been a long short week!
No, I’m not trying to write a new Beatles song, it’s just that despite being a short working week, it seems to have been a hard slog getting from bank holiday monday to this weekend. It hasn’t helped that I have had a cold/man-flu and that I have had a fair bit of travelling to do. Sue did some “half-term grandchildren visiting” and stll managed to go for a tune up at the pacemaker clinic.
We decided to leave our trip to Braunston until Saturday morning so there was time on Friday evening to deliver a car boot full of pallet blocks to Jim who was moored by Trinity marina, he won’t need to burn many in the coming months (we all hope) but it’ll give him a good start on the autumn.
Saturday morning dawned and I felt that my cold was on the way out, sadly it seems to have found Sue who awoke feeling the effects of the early symptoms. Nevertheless, we stuck a few bits and pieces in the car and were on the road just after nine o’clock. We stopped off in Rugby to do a bit of shopping and then completed our journey by eleven.
We had brought and bought cleaning materials to give Caxton’s paintwork a good going over but neither of us were really in the mood for it, both being a bit under the weather.
We did, however get a couple of other jobs done in the early afternoon. Silicon spray on the brass runners to make the slide glide easily, the Desmo bases removed so that they can be countersunk into the oak floor and a proper mobile internet connection installed. We did this before on Phoenix III but in that case we had a fixed antenna. This time around, we have used an antenna with a magmount so it sticks to the roof. This has saved drilling a hole in the roof and the antenna can be brought safely inside when we are not living on board. The cable was threaded from the lounge to the cratch by attaching it to the end of a redundant tv aerial cable and gently pulling it until it emerged at the front of the boat. Once in place, it was only a matter of connecting the antenna at one end, the Huawei dongle at the other and switching on the TP-Link router. Once activated, I tested the connection and was pleased to see a very healthy 4MB/s download speed.
After clearing up and enjoying a celebratory beer, wine for Sue of course, we went for a stroll around the marina where we dumped the aforementioned redundant cable in the skip before walking up the towpath to the bottom lock. We took a quick look in the chandlers there and then returned to our boat for dinner.
And so back to Braunston
Another peaceful night’s sleep before early morning coffee and then up and ready for our voyage back to the marina at Braunston. That was as exciting as it got, the weather had turned drizzly again but not so heavy as to make the trip an unpleasant one. The steerer was kept fortified with bacon sandwiches and tea being passed out from the galley by the Chief Steward, she certainly knows how to keep the crew motivated! There were a lot of boats on the move including a widebeam dutch barge that we met near bridge 107, it was absolutely massive thankfully we didn’t meet it at the bridge! The only other bit of excitement came when a dog being walked along the towpath decided to rejoin its owner on his narrowboat by jumping in and swimming over to it. A heartstopping moment for everyone (except Sue of course, who is now bionic in that respect!) as the steerer was trying to position himself near a bridge to let an oncoming boat through. It all worked out in the end with the mutt being dragged out of the cut by the scruff of his neck.
It has been the weekend of the Crick boat show and once again it seems to have had terrible weather. I have looked back through the blog to check out the weather on the spring bank holiday weekends.
2008 High winds and heavy rain, Crick show cancelled for 2 out of 3 days.
2009 Sunny and Warm
2010 No record
2011 No record, boat in paintshop
2012 Queens Diamond Jubilee, heavy rain
2013 Sunny
2014 Two days rain, one day of sun
Maybe the Crick show organisers should consider moving the show to a later date or perhaps as a nation we should move the Bank Holiday?
Too much excitement for a Sunday!
We awoke to more heavy rain but by eight o’clock it had all stopped and the day was shaping up to be a nice one. After the obligatory cup of coffee, we got up and attempted to leave our mooring at nine o’clock. I say “attempted” because as I untied Caxton, four boats passed us in convoy also heading towards Wigrams turn. We took our place in the convoy and were soon joined behind and in front by boats leaving their moorings and travelling in the same direction as us. Despite the number of boats on the move, our trip to Napton was actually an uneventful one and we reached the winding hole below the locks an hour and a half after we had untied. The boat behind us waited patiently while we turned Caxton and then we found our mooring just one boat length back from the post marking the no mooring area opposite the hole.
The entertainment began immediately with a Canaltime boat reversing back from the bottom lock and then thrashing its way backwards and forwards at full pelt, crashing into every available bank until it finally managed to escape the winding hole with its red faced, embarrassed crew.
We locked Caxton up and walked to the Folly Inn, dropping a bag of rubbish at the bottom lock facilities along the way.
After a quick wander around the little shop we went into the pub, ordered some drinks and enquired about lunch. The girl behind the bar seemed almost apologetic as she told us that they were “only” serving roast dinners. Reluctantly we ordered two roast beef dinners and then sat down outside. Within ten minutes we were presented with two large plates filled with roast beef, yorkshire pudding, roast potatoes, new (jersey royal) potatoes, red cabbage, cauliflower cheese, carrots, peas and gravy with a small dish of home made horseradish sauce. It was a bit of a hardship but we managed to scoff the lot! It was actually one of the best, if not the best, pub lunches we have ever had!
We walked back to Caxton hoping to settle down for the afternoon in the sunshine but unfortunately we had to endure even more entertainment around the winding hole. The problem is actually a restriction of passage up and down the flight due to a collapsing lock wall meaning that some boaters are changing plans and turning around, mainly hire boaters with limited time. First on stage was a Viking narrowboat who made the earlier attempt by the Canaltime boat look quite professional. They completed their crash-bang-wallop manouvre by mooring opposite the winding hole. We sat hoping that the next boat to turn would be as inept as they had been and therefore include a bit of boat crashing too. We were disappointed, the next boat to turn was another Viking boat and they knew what to do, after they had turned, Viking number one also left, leaving the winding hole clear again. Save for a conversation with a couple from Bedworth who were on an Ashby boat, our afternoon basically consisted of us just dossing out on the front deck of our beatiful boat in the late May sunshine.
Busy doing nothing
It rained hard during the night but although noisy, it didn’t prevent us sleeping until almost 8 am. A couple of cups of coffee saw us through the next couple of hours before we got up, showered and dressed. A few boats passed by in both directions, crews suitably attired for the pouring rain. We’ve been there and done that but not today, instead we listened to the radio and had a big brunch at eleven o’clock. Afterwards we have just lazily relaxed inside the boat. I’ve set up the internet router and ordered a new antenna so hopefully next weekend our on-board high speed mobile broadband will be fully operational.
The rain stopped around three o’clock and we contemplated walking up to the pub in Flecknoe for dinner but decided against it because the menu didn’t appeal to us, probably because we were still full from our mid morning meal.
As the afternoon wore on, the weather improved but we did no more than open the hatch on the wet side and let some fresh air trickle inside.
So that was it, we have busied ourselves doing nothing, just like in the Bing Crosby film.
Braunston to Flecknoe
The day started with the alarm clock going off at 6am, reminding me that I had to get up and go to work. We very often did this when we owned Phoenix III but getting up and going to work then wasn’t a great experience because of the lack of space. Today was a completely different prospect, in fact my departure wasn’t too different from any other day at home.
I did my work and then returned to Braunston where Sue had also been working hard cleaning and tidying Caxton from stem to stern and very good the boat looked too. No sooner had I boarded Caxton than the heavens opened and we had a good downpour for an hour or more. We decided to wait until after dinner before making our final plan for the day, we were hoping for enough fair weather to let us escape from the marina.
By six thirty we had eaten and the rain had stopped so we made our preparations, untied and left Braunston marina, heading towards the junction.
We turned left at the junction and boated in the direction of Napton. It was still cool and overcast but still dry as we pulled up and moored just before bridge 102 near Flecknoe. We fed a duck and her brood of ten ducklings before settling down for the evening.
The weekend starts here!
It’s a bank holiday weekend so of course the weather is a bit mixed but we’re spending it on Caxton anyway. Despite the fact that I have to go to work on Friday, we decided to pack our stuff and drive to Braunston after dinner at home.
We arrived at the marina just after half past six and carted all of our stuff to the boat. With Caxton being much longer than Phoenix III, we have to moor in a different part of the marina and park in a different car park and as a result we have to carry our stuff much further than before. Anyway, we moved our stuff then nipped up to the village shop and then returned to the boat.
Sue put most of the bits away and re-organised the fridge using some new containers while I installed a USB charging point which utilises a spare 12 volt supply under the bench seat. My kit built bedside clock from Phoenix III got a new plug and is now in place too. All in all a productive evening!
Sue is planning a big clean up tomorrow while I am at work and when I return in the afternoon we will set off for the weekend.
Mission Accomplished
I woke at half past six to discover that Sue had been awake for ages and was now getting dressed. I got up too and we were ready to tackle the locks by ten to seven. Not only were we first up the flight, all the locks were our way with the result that we were leaving the top lock twenty minutes later. We met a few oncoming boats near the Hungry Horse pub but other than that we enjoyed a nice cruise in the early sunshine. Sue had a shower and then while pottering around in the kitchen, produced a couple of breakfast rolls stuffed with bacon and sausage – just the job for a hungry steerer!
A little bit of congestion at Willoughby called for a bit of deft manouvering but we all got where we wanted to go. There was a similar encounter by the services near Braunston turn but again it all worked out in the end. We tied up opposite the Boathouse and walked to the marina where we checked out our new berth. After returning to Caxton we drove back along the cut and under the cast iron bridge that spans the marina entrance. There are currently a lot of boats moored here making it almost impossible to turn into the main area and as a result I managed to clip the end of the dockside with Caxton’s bow. Ah, well if it hadn’t been that it would have been one of the other boats! Anyway, we made our way into the second basin and reversed on to the berth. We drove to Midland Chandlers where we bought a few bits and pieces and after we returned to the marina we carried the two bags of stuff that had lain in the car since we left it there almost two weeks ago. After that it was a bit of the usual stuff, fill the water and empty the cassette as well as some new stuff, putting the canvas covers on the cratch, the houdini hatches and over the back deck.
As we drove out of the car park we realised that this was the end of our adventure, we had completed the mission that we started on May 6th and Caxton was safely ensconsed in Braunston.