On the top of the Oxford Canal

We are moored tonight (Sunday 19th) on the summit level of the South Oxford Canal at Fenny Compton so here is the story of how we got here:

On Thursday we set off from Yelvertoft and soon came to Crick Tunnel seen here. This was the wettest tunnel we've come through so far. It is nearly a mile long and there were quite a lot of drips from the roof.

Beyond Crick it is just a short way until we reached the top of the Watford flight of locks. There is a lock keeper here so we went and told him we wanted to go down the locks and then waited in a queue of 5 boats which started under the M1 bridge. Below the locks is Watford Gap services and through the Gap of its name the canal, railway, M1 and A5 squeeze through side by side.

Watford Locks consist of a staircase of 4 locks with a single lock above and two singles below, making 7 locks in all. In this picture Leo is coming into the top lock. Behind is the service block for water, toilet emptying and a small shop. The flowers at the locks were lovely as always.

Here is Leo coming across the short pound below the top lock and into the staircase locks. Watford has side ponds all the way down which save water as half the lock full can be left in the side pound at each level.

And here we are in staircase where the bottom gate of one lock is the top gate of the next one.

Beside the pound below the staircase a very large swan family was having a grooming session - the other adult was still in the water.

Here we are in the bottom lock with the old lock keeper's cottage to the left.

After a night near Welford Hythe Marina we stopped at Norton Junction to fill our water tank. one of the differences between boating life and land life is that you have to fill with water every few days and also empty the toilet. It makes us careful in our use of water but we can't do much about the toilet.

 

 

At Norton Junction we reached the end of the Leicester Branch and joined the main line of the Grand Union Canal. Left goes to London but we went right and soon came to the Braunston Tunnel seen here. And yes, that is the light at the end of the tunnel over a mile away.

Just as Birmingham is the centre of the motorway network in England, so Braunston is the centre of the canal network and there are numerous boats, boatyards and a marina below the six locks that follow the tunnel.

This photo looking the other way from the last one shows the bottom lock with a dry dock on the left and a shop on the right.

We moored here after 4 locks with 2 still to go. After shopping in the village where there is a wonderful butcher which also sells fruit, veg, bread and cheese, we decided to have lunch at the Admiral Nelson which is the white building in the picture. We haven't been to a pub for around 5 months so we were a bit unsure but it was fine eating outside on well spaced tables with a one way system inside for ordering food and drinks. And we hope you have noticed the Yorkshire flag which we are flying this year.

After lunch we came down the last 2 locks and this view is taken looking back to the bottom lock.

After a slow cruise past many moored boats through Braunston we came to Braunston Turn - another canal junction where right takes you onto the North Oxford Canal leading towards Rugby and Coventry. Our way was left under the first of the two fine cast iron bridges towards Birmingham and Oxford.

Here is the sign at the junction.

After a night moored near Flecknoe, we carried on yesterday (Saturday) past Napton Junction. Here the Grand Union to Birmingham goes right and we went straight on heading for Oxford. Soon the canal (now known as the South Oxford) goes round Napton Hill where this windmill shown is a prominent landmark.

Once round the hill we came to the bottom of the Napton Locks. Unlike those at Braunston these are narrow locks and we had to queue for a short while until it was our turn to go up. In the picture Leo is on the right with Sandpiper on the left which is first in the queue.

Going up the Napton locks was very slow. We're not sure why but there were a lot of boats which were not a slick as they might have been in working the locks. This view is taken looking back as we climbed six of the seven locks to a mooring place with a view over the fields.

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That evening Helen cooked a wonderful roast meal of pork (from the Braunston butcher) with all the trimmings. Lovely!

Today (Sunday) our friend Maurice, who lives not far away, joined us. Here we are at Marston Doles top lock with Maurice opening the gate to let us out. This lock took us onto the summit level of the Oxford Canal which wanders about the countryside for the best part of 10 miles before the Claydon locks which mark the beginning of its descent towards the Thames at Oxford.

Here is a strange sight - a narrowboat in a field. We've passed this before and can only conclude that a channel was dug to the canal into a pond and then blocked up once the boat was inside. I guess it saves licence fees, but it seems a bit drastic as an avoidance technique.

Maurice was taking some action photos of us on the stern, so we took one of him!

And here we are moored tonight at Fenny Compton. Note the elbow greeting for social distancing.

The only way from here lies downhill, so tomorrow we will start our descent. Our son, David, is coming to join us for a couple of days which should be fun and he will certainly be put to work as there are many locks down from here.

Heading South

After heading north a short way towards Leicester, we turned round and are now heading south on the Leicester branch of the Grand Union Canal. On Saturday our friend Steve joined us as we made our way from Wistow to Foxton:

Here you can see Helen on the left and Steve on the right opening the paddles at Kibworth Second Lock to allow Leo to go up. It was good to have an extra crew member helping up these five wide locks .

A close up of Steve doing his stuff.

Not only was Steve a useful addition to our crew, he even brought scones, strawberry jam and clotted cream - hence the beaming smiles onboard Leo!

Once we'd had our fill of scones we walked to Foxton village and the famous Foxton locks, up the old inclined plane and back down the 10 locks. Here is a picture of the arm which once led to the bottom of the inclined plane. For only just over 10 years from 1899 this inclined plane was used as an alternative to the locks to move narrowboats up or down the hill in caissons on rails with one going up and one going down.

Here is a view from the top of the inclined plane looking down to the arm in the previous picture. The lines of concrete show where the rails were fixed. Going up or down the inclined plane was much quicker than using the locks alongside.

On Monday we were once more with just the two of us. This view of reflections from the porthole on Leo can be viewed either way up - try it!

It was only a mile or so along the canal to the bottom of the Foxton Locks where this photo was taken while waiting for our turn to go up.

Here we are in the second lock from the bottom. The 10 locks at Foxton are arranged in two staircases of 5 locks each with a short pound in the middle where boats can pass. As you can see these are narrow locks.

This photo is looking back down the flight from near the top. The brick building just visible to the right was the engine house for the inclined plane. The 10 locks take the canal up 75 feet to the summit level of the Leicester branch.

Above the locks is this fine brass of a boy looking after the horse pulling a boat. Fortunately Leo has an engine.

Here we are in the sunshine moored a mile or so beyond the locks. Notice that we are flying the Yorkshire Rose this year. Not sure we'd dare if we were on the Lancaster Canal.

Yesterday (Tuesday) we came through Husbands Bosworth Tunnel shown here. This is about 1,100 yards long and was fairly dry.

We turned off the main canal to stay last night at the end of the short Welford arm. We have already turned around in this photo. The turning point is just beyond and to the left of the boats you can see.

We were visited by this swan family of Dad with six cygnets. We never saw Mum so we wonder whether she has died. From what we saw Dad was doing an excellent job training the youngsters to pester boaters for scraps.

We found these cottages in Welford with fine ornamental brickwork.

The Welford Arm has one small lock with a fall (or rise) of only 3 feet 6 inches. Here Leo is waiting for the lock to fill when we left this morning (Wednesday). One key feature of the Welford Arm is that it supplies the summit level of the canal with water from three reservoirs. So the journey back, going with the flow of water, is faster than on the way in.

We passed these strange hummocks of grass on the Welford Arm.

We are moored tonight out in the wilds near Yelvertoft. One reason for choosing a remote mooring is that our horn had stopped working and we wanted somewhere to work on it where no one would object to random hooting as I tested it. I am pleased to say that I found a faulty connection and all now seems to be well (fingers crossed). We later went for a walk over the fields to Winwick and the picture shows Winwick Manor which was built in the 16th century.

We found a pair of lions on the gateposts at the Manor, with our boat called Leo we like spotting lions on our travels.

On the way back to the boat we found this stone building which covers a well which still has water in it, despite being at the top of a hill. It looks very old.

So we are now out of Leicestershire and in Northamptonshire. The next couple of days will take us to Braunston, the centre of the English canal system from where our route lies south on the Oxford Canal.

Start of summer cruising

Well, we've finally been able to set off on our usual summer cruise, albeit three months later than we would have done thanks to the infernal virus.  On Thursday 9th July we left our marina and cruised north towards Leicester where at present only essential boat journeys are allowed. But we have a plan and don't intend to go through Leicester. We set off in the rain and only cruised for a mile or so to find somewhere open to moor for the night:

 

You can see the rain lying on the roof and we even have the back cover on to give us some dry space. Helen is on the bow but we haven't fallen out!

Today (Friday 10th) we've carried on towards Leicester and then turned to moor facing south away from Leicester:

First tunnel of 2020 - Saddington Tunnel which is only half a mile long and you can see the other end in the picture.

First Lock of 2020 - Kibworth Top Lock which is the first of 24 locks which take the canal down to Leicester where it joins the River Soar. Kibworth is the first of five locks in this flight. As you can see the weather has been much kinder today.

This is Taylor's Turnover Lock, so called because the towpath changes sides here. The curious tents seen on the right are at a wedding venue. These locks are broad locks but going down they were quite gentle and we had no problems.

We were surprised that these cygnets were so small given it is now July. I don't think the parents got busy mating until later than usual.

Here we are leaving Newton Top Lock. You might notice that we have left the bottom gates open. This is very bad practice and something that we don't normally do if we can help it. But today we only had one more lock to go down before we planned to turn round and come back up the same pair of locks. We only descended these two locks to find a 'winding hole' where we could turn Leo. Added to this we only saw one other boat moving all day so we thought we'd get away with it, and we did.

And here we are coming back up the same lock a little later on.

We moored at a favourite spot at Wistow and this view is taken from a nearby bridge. You can see Leo on the left side of the canal.

The mileposts on this canal are cast iron and this was the one near our mooring. 11 miles from virus city! The intials stand for Grand Junction Canal Company. This company was an amalgamation of several canal companies and was in turn later absorbed by the Grand Union Canal Company.

And finally on this post here is an interested cow (or probably a bullock) on the far side of the canal from our mooring. The building behind and to the left is Wistow Church which you can walk to across the fields.

We are moored here partly to meet our friend Steve who is planning to join us tomorrow for a day cruising back the way we've come back to near Foxton. But more of that in a future post. Our broad plan from here is to go south, so watch this space!

Boating for the day

At the moment we are not allowed to spend the night on Leo. We struggle to see the sense of this restriction but for the moment we are abiding by the rules. So, not having visited Leo for over 3 months during the lockdown, we decided last Sunday that we would get up early and drive down to see how she was keeping. We were pleased to find the answer was "very well, thank you". The engine (not run for months) started with the first turn of the key and the rear hatch slid open easily, having been stuck fast during the winter. The outside paintwork was filthy and a layer of dust lay inside.

We decided to take her out for a run so these photos show a short day trip to Foxton and along the Market Harborough Arm.

Here we are out on the cut and about to go under Debdale Wharf Bridge. From here on heading south there were lots of visitors along the towpath, presumably parked at Foxton Locks. The plastic ducks were enjoying the sunshine too.

Large blue signs from Canal and River Trust set out the special restrictions on extended mooring around Foxton. Is it a sign of the times that the fear is of people spitting on you from bridges? No such problems today - everyone was very friendly: just glad to be out for the day probably.

To the right of the Foxton Locks Inn (still closed of course) you can see the bottom lock of the Foxton flight of 10 narrow locks in two staircases each of 5. Ice creams were being sold but no chance of sitting down for a meal.

Just round the corner is a well used swing bridge. This one opened easily for Helen and closed after Leo with no trouble. As you can see here and in the previous photo there were lots of visitors around. Notice the dust on the roof and the huge bird splats between the hatch and the first mushroom vent.

A second swing bridge comes into view fairly quickly and this one was a bit trickier. It opened well enough but refused to recognise it was closed to allow the road barriers to reopen and release our key. A passer-by helped Helen sort things out and we carried on out of Foxton to a winding hole beyond bridge 7.

Here we are, having turned to head back. Thunder clouds were now increasing though we only had a few drops so we were lucky.

Having stopped for lunch between the two swing bridges we stopped again in a pleasant spot while Ian thoroughly washed the starboard side and the roof and Helen put up the curtains that we had brought from home. The roof was so dirty that I think we might have grown plants on it towards the stern. A well earned rest with cups of tea then before setting off back to our mooring.

And so back to the tricksy swing bridge. Again it opened but was reluctant to close sufficiently to release the road barriers and retrieve our key. Ian helped as did the chap from the house to the right who often helps out boaters who are perplexed. The large hook that holds the bridge closed only partly engages and until it is fully hooked the sensor does not recognise that the bridge is closed. Anyway we solved it eventually and carried on.

We returned Leo to her mooring and cleaned the port side before driving home. A good but very long day out as we live several hours drive away. Our hope, from hints on the CRT bulletins is that we shall be allowed to stay overnight on Leo from early July so we hope then to make a belated start to our usual summer cruising. Watch this space for an update in the next few weeks.

Boating Plans all changed

Well, after publishing our plans for boating this year that has now all been blown out of the water!

We  visited Leo on 13th March to finish the winter jobs and now just 2 weeks later we are holed up in Yorkshire under Government restrictions during the coronavirus scourge.

We did discuss weathering the coronavirus problem on the boat but finally decided that we would be better placed remaining on land in Yorkshire which is so far not as badly afflicted as other parts of the country, especially London.  Given that Canal and Rivers Trust have now decreed that non-essential movement of leisure boats is forbidden, that was clearly the right decision.

So at the moment we don't know when (or even if) we'll be boating this year.  It's back to doing a list of DIY jobs, so at the moment Ian is painting the railings in the garden and Helen was last seen spring cleaning.  And Spring is certainly here.  We are just back from our daily exercise walk and have seen lesser celandine, forget-me-not, white violets, borage all in flower.  We've even had some small tortoiseshell butterflies in the garden in the last few days.

So be careful, stay healthy and we'll be back on the waterways when we can.

Canal cruising plans for 2020

We're now into March and thinking of spring and summer after a month of lots of rain and even more wind.

Our plans were to set off about mid April and aim first for the Basingstoke Canal which so far we've not managed to get to the end of with Leo.  This is due to its persistent lack of water in the summer.  I say "our plans were" because that aim may be frustrated by the need to get some outside jobs done on the house all of which need warm and dry weather.  At present we are at the stage of getting estimates and dates for these jobs but it may be that one or more of these jobs might frustrate our plans.  We have to make a decision on this by the end of this month when our present mooring contract ends. 

Assuming we get down the Grand Union and up the Basingstoke we will still be having a rest from boating in early June for a couple of weeks when Helen's brother arrives from overseas to spend some time with us, but not on the boat.

So we'll see what happens but there will be entries on this blog sometime this year, so keep an eye open for this.