Narrowboat Firecrest

This is true Yorkshire Dales country. We’re high up and it feels like the  canal is still climbing although this is an optical illusion as we haven’t seen a lock since Bingley. It’s because we’re reaching the top of the valleys.

But we still had a few hundred feet to climb before we reached the summit of the canal and locking up began again at Gargrave.

We were a bit disappointed that the footpath closures meant the mooring in Gargrave was restricted and limited, which is a pity because it’s a pretty village, one that we have driven through many times. But the generous side of my nature says it’ll be a fantastic asset to the walkers and cyclists once it’s finished.

We moored one night but then took advantage of a fellow traveller to share the locks

People aren’t wrong when they say this is the prettiest section of the canal, and I think the Gargrave flight definatelty makes it into my top 10 for views. We were lucky that our dramatic cloudy backdrop held onto the rain until after we had cruised.

We were able to stretch our legs with some bracing walks

Thankful that we didn’t have too strenuous a climb to reach the top.

Sadly the weather didn’t play fair and we had to dodge some heavy downpours before reaching East Marton, though without rain you dont get rainbows and I was able to take advantage of a sunny break to show off my Towpath spinning.

It would have been easy to slip through the tiny village of East Marton if we hadn’t been on the lookout for the water point. And the lock keeper had told us that the Cross Keys pub did a good Sunday carvery.

We could just about see Firecrest nestled below us, in the far left, as we ate the best roast beef and Yorkshire pudding we’d had since I last cooked it in Boroughbridge.

Oh good, I thought as we left Bingley, “No more locks for a while.” What I hadn’t realised was that by following the contours through farm land, was just how many manual swing bridges I’d have to open and close. Some were pretty and pleasant but a lot were simply fiddly hard work, needing a CRT anti-vandal handcuff key and help from passers by to get the heavy compressed mechanisms shifting.

But leaving the awkwardness aside we were travelling through some of the prettiest countryside.

And I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of stone bridges

Or houses that come straight down onto the canal

Even the mills across the fields were lovely

We had to chuckle to ourselves that we used to drive this way to and from the Lake District not knowing there was a canal on the other side. Although we could say the same about our cruise, who’d have thought there was a main road just over that wall.

We were looking forward to coming into Silsden because it’s one of the places we visited, if only because it was on our Lakeland route, when we were designing Firecrest.

But we’d never explored beyond the canal. So it was  a pleasant afternoon walking around this lovely little town, watching the dogs watching the river ducks

And finding out about the nail trade that arrived in 1776 in Silsden from the Midlands.

We also found out that in the 1830s 3 Silsden men were some of the first to be transported  to Austrailia rather than being hung for burglary. So we thought it was time to move swiftly on.

After a few more nights in the countryside

We moored up underneath the Victoria mill chimney in Skipton

We rushed off to have fish and chips from Bizzie Lizzies, another tradition from our 4 wheeled travels. Skipton is overflowing with fine foods, and is the home of several award winning pie shops.

We sampled as many as our bellies would allow. So we burnt off a few of the extra calories doing a bit of walking, and discovered the Skipton woods by the castle, guarded by the Huntress of Skipton.

Our journey westwards continued through some of the loveliest countryside, with the canal following the contours of the land. Land which rolled into hills, farms and valleys with woodland and views in abundance.

And on the whole, we were lucky enough to be traversing this section in good weather. We took advantage of some shady towpath mooring.

We found ourselves next to Low Wood Nature Reserve, which although next to a beautifully manicured golf course to the south,

took us ruggedly upwards through scrambling rocks just begging to be climbed.

Forget the golf course, this was our sort of playground.

And we found plenty of nature around the reserve.

Of course being surrounded by ancient oaks, is an ideal place to build a business if you love wood.  Eric was beyond excited when he realised one of the companies he buys furniture grade wood from was within walking distance of our mooring.

And while he oohed and arred throughout the vast selection, okay admittedly I was also very impressed, he was very restrained and only bought a small piece to do some tweaks to Firecrest.

When we downsized to move onto Firecrest, it was Eric’s woodworkshop that was the hardest to leave behind. Fortunately for me, wool is much more squashable and I was able to sneak a lot more into the hidden corners of Firecrest. So when the weather is as good as it was this week I was able to indulge my hobby and sit on the bank spinning.

While we were relaxing and enjoying the world go by we realised every now and then a sweaty runner with a number shuffled past. I just had to ask about their race as they were so spaced out. It turns out they were competing a mega marathon, one of three CanalSlams, which entailed running from Liverpool along the towpath, all the way to Leeds. Oh my goodness  that’s 117 miles. Not only is the distance mega, they were doing it non stop. After I’d picked myself up off the floor, I had a look at the website.  59 runners started the race, 36 completed it. There were checkpoints every 10-15 miles and they were allowed buddy runners for encouragement, although the buddies were not permitted to run ahead In case that made them pacers. They were allowed to sit in a support vehicle for up to 40 minutes break provided it didn’t move. They left Liverpool at 6am and the winner arrived 22 hours later. The last – I  refuse to say looser- took 39 hours. According to AC canal planner it takes 66 hours for a narrowboat to do the same journey, I guess the runners didn’t have any locks or swing bridges to negotiate. I could have taken photos but I decided I would stand up and cheer as each one went past, I even topped up a couple of water bottles for them. I forgot to ask how they were getting back to the car park in Liverpool.

While we were in this area, we were lucky to meet fellow Braidbar Boaters on Mr Blue Sky. We took it as a great complement that they had designed their boat with a similar style bow as ours and had followed the continuing innovations in using an electric motor.