Having left Eric safely moored in Newark, or so I thought, I caught the train back to Suffolk so I could enjoy some precious mum and daughter time. Heather and I had booked our annual outing to indulge our creative souls. 
We were going to Fibre East; a 2 day extravaganza and shopping paradise for yarnies like us. We have a thriving and exciting independant fibre industry in this country and although it might not be going to make many millionaires, it makes a lot of people very happy. Sadly commercial sheep farmers have a hard time making money out of selling fleece due to the cost of shearing etc, and a lot of the yarn we see in shops is imported acrylic. Which I hasten to add has it’s place in the knitters world, it’s cheap cheerful and accessible. But if you are prepared to pay a bit more, you can get soft easycare woollen blends. But still being commercially dyed the colours are precise neat and tidy. 
The past 20 years and the advent of online sales has seen small independent companies, often kitchen table affairs grow, preparing, spinning and dying fleece and fibres in an array of colours way beyond the rainbow. And as knitting is now a hobby craft done for primarily for pleasure not just to keep the family warm and clothed, using exquisite quality materials just adds to the pleasure. And yarnies are sociable people, we ply our craft in small social groups, where we “knit and natter,” we join guilds to learn and help teach our skills to others and we recognise that we are healthier, happier and more content when we are immersed in fabulous fibre. 
Both Heather and I dye spin knit crochet and play with felt. Heather also weaves. And for us acquiring “stash” is an important part of the enjoyment. We’ll often buy a skein purely because the colour shouts buy me buy me. And because handproduced yarns and fibres aren’t cheap we rarely buy enough for a big garment so they sit in a colour candy box waiting for just the right pattern. And this weekend lived up to our expectations. Not only did we meet friends from around the country, including Martina from narrowboat Burnt Oak, and several sellers who work from their narrowboats. 
Heather also met friends who combine their hobbies, who are glass lamp workers as well, like she is.
We were very restrained this weekend knowing that storage on a narrowboat is limited and I am trying to work on a one in one out principle, and that Heather was on course to have enough fibre to add a layer of insulation in the house. We both came home happy.
Sadly the same couldn’t be said for Eric. Our perfect mooring, beneath the castle, within easy walk of all the essentials, turned out to be too tempting for the local hooligans. And as we’d had to moor against the wall the roof of the boat was parralel with the towpath, it was just too much of an invitation to the thoughtless, that they found it amusing to jump onto Firecrest and run along at 1am in the morning. Other boaters had their ropes untied. The police were called and the flashing lights scared the villians off. Eric was equally scared and along with the other boaters moved to what they thought was a safer mooring. Only to have more trouble the next night, and again after another relocation for a third night running. We have repairable damage to the boat, but the damage done to our confidence has been huge. Boaters will always be more vulnerable than those inside bricks and mortar, and what seems to be petty intimidation to the hooligans, potentially has serious consequences to the boaters. We weren’t impressed with the police support. The culprits ran and hid, which seemed part of the game and certainly no deterrent not to do the same again to the next lot of boaters. On a positive note, we spoke to other boaters who had never had any trouble in Newark and likewise we have been moored where the doomsayers had warned us about areas that we felt safe in. We won’t let 3 nights trouble spoil the many many that have been idyllic and perfect.
Eric eventually found safe harbour a couple of miles upstream. Close enough for him to be easily cruise back into Newark to collect me when I returned from my jaunt.
We approached Newark apprehensively because we had heard that there was a festival that weekend and all the moorings were taken. 
However, much to our great delight, we found the 14 day wall mooring alongside Riverside Park was completely free, and what’s more it was opposite the castle. I don’t think we have ever had such a pretty town mooring before. 
But a good job the townsfolk werent defending their castle because they also had a good view of Firecrest from their windows.
The Morris dancers were jingling their bells and shaking their sticks, 
we got fish and chips and best of all, the Notts spinners guild was demonstrating. 
These were the people we had met the previous weekend at Greens windmill so recognising each other, 
Knowing my wheel is portable I scurried back down to firecrest to fetch it, as I was invited to join them for the afternoon. 
Most of the spinners had to leave at the end of the session, but Sue and Rob sat talking and as we watched the evening light creating the most gorgeous of reflections, our traditional folk evening appropriately ended up in the 15th century coaching inn, the Prince Rupert Pub.
Try as we might Sue and I failed to identify the true Prince Rupert.
And oh boy, were we glad we made the effort. Not only were we able to contact the lock keepers easily to ascertain if we were able “pen down”. But we were also able to hear what other boats were doing and plan accordingly. And ok, all this isn’t essential for the Trent and we could have made our contact by mobile phone, but for us, having that reliability and extra source of information has made river cruising less stressful and more interesting. 
There’s a bit of a misconception that VHF radios are just for calling for help in an emergency, they’re not. They are an easy way to communicate, and once we’d got over our initial nervousness at following the protocols we quickly relaxed when we realised everyone spoke the same language, not everyone followed the prescribed protocols and most of all, no one minded.
River cruising is different to canal cruising. There are sandbanks and shallows lurking beneath the surface which mean the cruising channel can meander from bank to bank. The outer curve is usually deeper than the inner curve because of the natural erosion. 
The Boating Association publishes the Trent Cruising guides, an absolute must, for safe navigation. The cruising line is overlaid in red and useful information is highlighted. River locks are operated by lock keepers and known as pens. So we ask to “pen” up or down. These locks are huge, hold a whole marinas worth of boats. 
This was Stoke Lock and besides us on the left, there were 2 wide beams 2 cruisers and another 2 narrowboats.
Having sorted our radio out. Eric also had to connect an appropriate navigation light. Boats travelling on tidal waters, including tidal sections of rivers, boats need to be seen in all conditions to avoid collision. The COLREG rules state that for a boat our length means having a mast headlight visable for 3 nautical miles, red port and green starboard side lights and white stern light visable for 2 nautical miles. (Disclaimer, there are more regulations and criteria than I have listed here) The logic being that although we might not choose to travel at night, tide times might make it necessary to be on the water at dawn, dusk or in poor conditions. A lot of narrowboaters simply choose not to venture into this territory, we’ve decided to explore as much of the system as practical so we’ve done our best to rig up a temporary mast. One day it will be sturdier and taller, but as we know we’re only going to be doing the very first section of tidal water between Cromwell and Torksey in very calm conditions it will surfice for now. Added to which, the river has so many bends chances are we can’t be seen in full daylight beyond half a mile so we’re happy.
This rather non descript side arm besides the Nottingham EA building is actually the lock entrance onto the Grantham canal. At this point it doesn’t go beyond the the length of the lock, but work is on going to restore the whole navigation. And if and when it does open we’ll certainly be back to explore. 
One of the drawbacks of big river cruising is the lack of pedestrian bridges, this is Radcliffe rail bridge, with 4 cruisers hurtling towards us. We’ve come to the conclusion that cruisers generally hunt in packs and their challenge is to get from one lock to the next as quickly as possible. Pootling, obviously isn’t in their vocabulary. Having said that, it isn’t a criticism, because if we had lived beside the Trent we might have had a cruiser, a narrowboat is not the obvious or most appropriate form of river transport, just as we don’t think cruisers are the ideal for canal cruising. 
We’re finding the scenery along the river quite different to the canals, beach life is the thing.
And in some sections, desert life seems the current norm. River levels are low but at least cruising hasn’t been restricted because of lack of rain, like some sections of the Leeds and Liverpool canal. 
Actually despite us hitting 30 degrees some days, we’ve had the benefit of a few heavy downpours and quite a few cloudy days. On the whole though, the weather has been fantastic cruising weather.
Holme Pierrepoint which is where the 
oh boy did I want to have a go, but Eric insisted that Firecrest was too long to take the turns and twists. Can’t think why. 
So while he stayed on our mooring, polishing the brass, I went to find out how I could get my adrenaline rush. 
Frustratingly the event they suggested would be suitable for me, a complete novice, wasn’t available until the weekend and I knew we’d have moved on by then. 
So I kept my dignity intact and just enjoyed watching others risking life and limb. 
The whole site has several activities on offer, a proper mile long rowing lake, an adventure lake/river and the rapids, plus some land based activities, high wires, climbing walls and obstacle courses. 
I could easily have spent another day here watching it all. Eric has promised we can come back one weekend. But is still insistent that Firecrest won’t be joining me.
There were the large. Several huge floating gin palaces came past, full of happy people, the later the hour, the noisier and flashier the lights, but they were travelling sedately so didn’t cause firecrest to rock, so not a nuisance at all.
Not like these maniacs on their hover speedboat. They were ‘playing’ with a jet skier, racing round like Vettel drawing donuts. Don’t get me wrong speed can be great fun, but they weren’t wearing life jackets and the consequences didn’t bear thinking about if they had crashed into each other. And they created a huge wash. 
There were a lot of rowers or skullers, I’m never sure how to tell the difference. Some were obviously in training with coxes with microphones and coaches on bikes racing along side on the bank.
Some like the Dragon boats looked ready to take on the speed boat.
Some just prefered to sit with a fishing rod watching the world go by.
These girls had brought their picnic so stopped paddling for a bit to eat.
I chose to wander into town, West Bridgford is the rather attractive town separated from Nottingham by the river. About 5 minutes walk from our mooring, I found the thriving buzzing high street. Lots of rather nice street cafes, not that we could afford to ‘take lunch’ in them. And itC turns out to be where one of our best friends was born, and his parents had married at the parish church, St Giles.
I went to the Sunday morning service and received a warm welcome, Bridgford is lucky to have such a lively thriving parish church. Definitely one I’ll return to. 
While we were moored here, our friends Ian Joy and Kate joined us. Trad sterns aren’t the best place for 5 people to stand whilst cruising so we let the fellas do their stuff at the helm.
The fete was to be officially opened by the Sherrif of Nottingham. For some silly reason I was quite disappointed to see an ordinary lady Sherrif instead of a villainous greedy Walt Disney character. 
We took the tour to the top of mill and guess what, we could still see Nottingham Castle, on the left of the picture. I could also just about see Trent bridge, but not good enough for a photo. 
Greens mill is one of the recognised attractions of the area and the lovely park around it makes a perfect picnic spot.
So we came through lock 1, and turned south to go upstream instead. There is about 2 miles of navigable river before we would have to turn around. 
Passing by the Nottingham Forest football ground, and under Trent Bridge itself. 
Now it’s a beautiful 3 arch stone and iron bridge, painted in blue and gold, built in 1868. The first was built in 970 but I couldn’t find any photos. The second built in 1156 had 20 stone arches and a chapel dedicated to St James. But they continued to be destroyed by flood. 
Here the river is now contained by concrete steps on either side, which not only greatly widens it’s flood volume, but makes Victoria Embankment a very attractive place for us to moor and a real asset for the local community. It was packed with people from the County Hall taking their lunch breaks.
Sir Jesse Boot, founder of Boots chemists, had the memorial gardens built on this section but sadly they have suffered from lack of maintenance, so despite these impressive gates, the gardens were weedy, and the grand rockery was starting to fall apart. But the grounds are expansive and beyond the formal gardens are fields that double as a car park for the nearby sporting venues.
On Thursday we looked out to see hordes of people doing so because the most famous sporting venue here is the Trent Bridge cricket ground. And England were playing India. The atmosphere was party like all day so we couldn’t have guessed from the demeanour of the crowds going home who had won. We could hear the roars of the crowd cheering. I took a photo in the morning for a family who were obviously of Indian origins, so I asked who they were supporting- mum and dad instantly said India, the children England. India won. 
This was taken from Wilford Bridge. The flood lights and curved roof on the right are the the Trent Bridge cricket ground. The green roofs are the County Hall. Notts Forest FC is behind the scaffolding on the left. And that’s the bridge itself on the left. Firecrest is the 7th boat from the right.
Perhaps the sunshine has helped but this has proved a very sociable mooring, one we will use again. Lots to explore.
Fellows Morton and Clayton had a big warehouse and wharf here which is now a thriving bar selling craft beer.
One good thing about town centre canals is that there’s often a supermarket close enough for me to surreptitiously take a full trolley right back to the boat. And there was a super view of the castle from the retail park. Mooring was unrestricted by Sainsbury’s but we moved on around the corner to take advantage of an over hanging tree. Although there were a lot of people using the tow path and some rough sleepers, it was a quiet night. We set off the next day to complete the last two miles of this section.
Quite a mix of old and new buildings to catch our attention. Nottingham is a tall city. 
This one particularly caught our eye.
And some lovely bridges.
although not every one agrees with CRT’s recent rebranding, spending goodness knows how much on promoting the canal network to a wider audience. Not sure how wide an audience this sign will reach being underneath the bridge.
The castle was full of atmosphere, and history. William the Conqueror built the castle in1067 but it became dilapidated and was demolished in 1649. The Duke of Newcastle built the ducal palace in its plac, but in 1831 rioters burnt it down. The Duke was paid £21000 in compensation but didn’t rebuild his home and eventually in 1878 Notingham council rebuilt it as a museum and art gallery.
The castle was built in a huge sandstone rock and overlooked an array of old and new buildings. The one that looks like a stadium is actually the HMRC offices, (which is right next to the canal.)
We wondered which building Robin Hood would be frequenting now.
One of the other things Nottingham is famous for is that it is the home of Torvil and Dean and their Bolero costumes from their 1984 are on display in the castle.
The Castle dominates the city and as we cruised through Nottingham we could look up through the houses we could see it. 
The castle was a good place to spend the day, but I hope when it is re opened in 2020/21 it won’t be known as the castle because sadly it is not a castle any more.