Month: October 2026

Setting off on Pastures New

Having had so many plans thwarted this year, we have come up with a route that will take us somewhere we haven’t been before, but not too far from where we want to end up.  The plan is to go up the Wolverhampton flight…. 21 locks, onto the Wyrely and Essington Canal  along the Daw End branch, down the Rushall flight, through Perry Bar, under Spagetti Junction and back onto the Birmingham and Fazeley canal through the Curdsworth locks.

Screenshot from CanalPlanAC

CanalPlanAC  suggests this is 42 miles and  57 locks which will take us 8 days travelling for 3 hours per day. This gives us plenty of time and we can fit in days off for the 3R’s, rest and rain and restocking. I’ve done a bit of research, about the route, asked a few boaters, although, its a bit of a back water so not a lot of up to date info. I’m a bit apprehensive it’ll be weedy, but CRT say the water levels are OK and there’s no restrictions in place, so what’s to loose, off we go.

Day 1, up the Wolverhampton flight. We were expecting this to take us 3 and half maybe 4 hours. But as we turned the corner at Aldersley junction…

Turning onto the Birmingham Canal Network, at Aldersley Junction

We found ourselves immediately behind another boat going up the flight, what can you do, except shrug and make friends, 5 minutes earlier it could have been them following us. Of course the worst thing about following a boat is that every single lock had to be refilled, doubling our workload. But our new friends were a lovely couple and we worked as a team helping each other climb the mountain.
However our enthusiasm was very nearly thwarted on lock 2 when we got stuck on the bottom and Eric had to haul the boat through.

Its a bit worrying when you cant get your boat out of a lock

Once we got through this lock things improved and we realised what a beautiful stretch of canal this is. The water is unusally clear allowing us to see the fish and the plant life

And some seasonal vegetation growing on the lock gates

We were lucky enough to run into 2 volockies, who treated me to seeing the the lock from the boat instead of the bank. In fairness to Eric, I am happy to admit I prefer working the locks than being on the boat usually.

A rare sight for me

But these guys only worked locks 1 to 15 and we only met them at lock 13. The locks on the top section of the flight are much closer together and after 4 1/2 hours we cruised under Littles Lanes Bridge into the top lock.

There is a beautiful little terrace of lock cottages at the top. I would love to have been able to peep into their lives as workers rather than cruisers.

Top lock cottages

Thankyou James Brindley for building this flight in 1772.

So what happened to summer

What happened to summer, we got thwarted by a heatwave and a drought, but it wasnt all bad.

Stanthorne Woods, Middlewich

When I left you, we were heading up to Chester, Eric had a business trip so I had a fortnight to explore that beautiful city on my own. As usual I spent half my time in the cathedral listening to heavenly music, and the other half walking around the walls. This visit I decided it was time to climb up the cathedral and do the tower tour. And as I expected the views were magnificent.

The looking towards Wales from Chester Cathedral

When Eric returned to Firecrest we set off south again. But the writing was on the walls or should I say water, or lack of it. Even in June we were finding mooring difficult because the water levels were dropping. But we had a family wedding to attend on the south coast so whilst we had a holiday in Sussex, Firecrest had a holiday in a marina.

A day worth celebrating
And Eric and I got to dance at the party

On our return we reassed our cruising plans. We had planned a route that would take us onto canals we hadn’t cruised before, up the Wolverhampton flight, through Birmingham and down the Tardebigge flight, and through Droitwich towards Worcestershire and we’d return towards the east of England in the autumn after coming up the Avon.  But dire warnings of the summer being worse than that of ’76 and restrictions already being impossed, we knew we had to plan to cruise to a place of safety.

The combination of the extreme heat and the uncertainties ahead of us zapped the enthusiasm for cruising. CRT’s reluctance to publish cruising restrictions, in order to protect the hire industry is understandable, but when its staring you in the face that the resevoirs are empty, it makes it very difficult for liveaboards. We knew we wanted to overwinter in the east of England, but how were we going to get there. The Atherstone flight was bound to be closed but for how long and could we get ahead of a closure. And for that matter would we find enough water on the other side. After last summer’s lockdown, we decided to cut our losses. we knew there was a safe space in Fazeley that was deep enough for Firecrest to moor at. But we had to time our arrival, such that we didnt fall foul of any of the standard mooring restrictions, and maintain a secondary plan just in case lockdown didnt happen.

Peel’s Wharf, Fazeley

We made it, this may look like an identical photo to last summer, it probably is, we were in exactly the same spot. Even the lovely people we had met last year came out to greet us. Now we just had to hold our own amd wait for CRT admit defeat. Which they did, only instead of lifting all the mooring restrictions like they’d done last year, they only lifted the 14 day restriction, meaning anyone on a 2 or 7 day visitor mooring had to respect them. And guess what, even though theres no signage this location turns out to be a 7 day mooring. We entered a discussion with CRT explaining our deep draft and they begrudging gave us permission to stay. The mooring officer checking the boats was completely understanding and gave us his permission to stay. How come such a peaceful way of life can become so stressful. But once we’d got the burocracy out of the way, we settled down to bake in the sunshine. Eric was busy working so I decided to jump ship and return home.
The  bricks and mortar isnt such a bad place to be, I dont get to enjoy  misty mornings but I often get a fabulous sun set.

The view from the back garden

And the bird life was somewhat unexpected when I found an interloper had moved into the neighbourhood.

Meet Rio, we’re told he had escaped from the local equestrian center, although I cant imagine trying to saddle up.

And our plans to celebrate our Ruby wedding anniversary in style was someone postponed in favour of an autumnal party yet to be announced- but didnt we make a lovely couple in 1986.

Ah, young and in love, and we havent changed a bit.

Back to today, I am back on board Firecrest, and we are cruising again. We’ve escaped from Fazeley and we are going to attempt a cruising route that we’ve not done before.

Somewhere on the Staffs and Worcester

We are loving being able to cruise again. Our love of this lifestyle is not diminished.

above the Radford Bank, Stafford

The summer wasn’t a write off, we didn’t get to to do the things we set out to do, but we spent more time with friends and family. And we took the opportunity to go places by road instead of water.