Leaving the Nene for the canals

 After two and a half months of cruising the East Anglian rivers we have finally come up the Northampton locks and back onto the Grand Union Canal. Here are some highlights from our last few days on the Nene and of our climb up the 17 narrow locks from Northampton:

On Monday (30th August) we moored on a delightful grassy mooring (FOTRN - Friends of the River Nene) at Woodford and walked up to the village. This photo of the church though was taken as we cruised past on the river.

One thatched house in the village had some wonderful animals also made out of thatch.

Another gable from the same house has hares and a spider. The thatcher certainly had a creative surge here - perhaps the thatcher lives in the house?

A friend in France sends us pictures of fields of sunflowers, so this was the best we could do to copy him. We found these in some allotments at Woodford.

On Tuesday we carried on just a short way to Irthlingborough where we knew there was a level EA mooring ideal for completing part of the present painting project, namely painting the rails on the top of the boat. Having done the starboard rail (a long job in every sense of the word) we went for a walk, passing through this tree tunnel which is between the mooring and the lock.

We crossed the river by the lock and came into Stanwick Lakes park. There are quite a few giant frogs there!

Stanwick Lakes has attractions for all the family including this 'beach' area. The children's play area was excellent - Helen tried one of the slides.

Just above the mooring at Irthlingborough is the bridge shown here which could be quite tricky to navigate if the river was flowing fast. Fortunately it wasn't and some reaches lately have been almost stationary as there has been no rain for quite a while.

At first glance this may look like one of the many guillotines at locks on the Nene, but look closely. This is Ditchford Lock which has a radial gate which turns on a pivot to open and close. It is the only one on the Nene though we have seen this arrangement elsewhere.

A couple of places on the Nene were full of floating weed which was not the case when we came down the river a couple of months ago. This weed above Wellingborough is not the usual duckweed but something with a small lobed leaf that we didn't recognise. It didn't seem to interfere with the propellor too much so that was OK. It does however give the impression of cruising across a lawn.

Here is Leo above Earls Barton Lock. The expectation with these locks which have a guillotine gate at the bottom of the lock and 'V' gates at the top is that you should leave the guillotine lifted when you leave the lock. That's fine going down but going up means you have to moor above and lift the guillotine (which takes quite a while) before we can move on. It's a bit of a faff.

On Thursday evening we moored on the Northampton Washlands above Weston Favell Lock but then walked back to look at the motte at Clifford Hill which is close by the previous lock. The castle mound (or motte) is clearly shown in this photo, though unfortunately it is on private land with no public access to explore further.

More weed, this time it is duckweed, below Rush Mill Lock on the approach to Northampton.

We came into Northampton on Friday (3rd September) but only stayed a short while to do some shopping before continuing up the first lock of the Northampton Arm towards the canals. Here we are turning off the River Nene into a short channel from which the lock leads up. The blue sign is for Canal and River Trust marking the change in licensing authority from the Environment Agency on the river.

And here is the Carlsberg brewery just by the turn. We moored just above the first lock of the Arm and the aroma from the brewery was delicious. It kept Ian going while he spent 2 or 3 hours painting the port side rail of the boat.

Here is our mooring next to some flats.

And here you see Ian, paintbrush in hand. He had started from the stern so at this stage there was a long way to go! We've now done both rails and are well pleased with result.

On Saturday we climbed the remaining 16 locks of the Northampton Arm back to Gayton Junction where we rejoined the Grand Union Canal. In this photo we are approaching Lock 16 (they are numbered from 1 at the top) - Hunsbury Lock. Lest you are concerned that Leo is about to 'nudge' the second gate open, Helen is walking round to open it before the boat reaches the lock. We don't touch gates with the boat if we can help it!

Looking back from Hunsbury you can clearly see the Express Lift Tower in Northampton. Originally for testing lifts it is now used for abseiling and is a listed building.

Here we are approaching Lock 13 and the M1 or at least one of the feeder roads to the motorway which has a junction here. The Arm goes under 3 bridges at the motorway junction.

Much of Lock 12 is hidden away below the motorway. It is a bit gloomy.

In this view, I think from lock 11, you can see the flight stretching ahead of us. Helen is preparing the next lock with the assistance of a passer-by while Ian will close up the present one before going on up. It was a delight being once more in narrow locks, just 7 feet wide and what narrowboats were made for. No broadbeams or big cruisers up here.

And here, after over 3 hours of locking we are in the top lock. We met only one boat going down but a couple followed us up later. The locks are well maintained and we had no issues with water levels but the longer pounds at the bottom of the flight from lock 17 to lock 13 were shallow and weedy and consequently very slow.

Here is the signpost at Gayton Junction. Having come from Northampton our choice is left towards London or right for the Midlands and the North. We turned right.

And here is an interesting photo to round off our relationship with the River Nene that we have been following for more than a week. On Sunday we stopped at Weedon (more about this in our next posting) and here is Helen about to paddle across the River Nene a few miles upstream from Northampton. It is little more than a shallow stream here. The prominent wall in the background is part of the Royal Ordnance depot that we will explain more about in the next posting on the blog.

From here we will be wending our way slowly north to Nottingham where Leo will be spending the winter. This entails more narrow locks at Watford and Foxton and then slowly down to Leicester to join the River Soar leading to the Trent.