Tag: Friends

Reflections on the skyline, Birminham

Perhaps Easter Weekend wasn’t the best time to travel through Birminham- it was busy, but its when we arrived so off we set. The trip from King’s Norton Junction starts off depressing, with seemingly miles of graffiti,

Mindless graffiti, although the reflections ahead of us do at least look colourful

But it isn’t all bad as we made our progress north,  “look at all those roof tops” Eric said

Bournville village

So I dutifully turned my head to the right to look, only to realise he was cruising as fast as he could (metaphorically  cause 3mph isn’t fast) past what was on our left, a chocolate factory,  and at Easter, but I suspect the Easter bunny was as busy as Santa’s elves so we didn’t stop.

Just imagine the smell, if you lived here

We’d arranged to pick up our friend James at Selly Oak, because he used to work at the University, in an office overlooking the canal. It was his dream to look up rather than look down. Of course we were too busy chatting to record the fantasy with a photo. But he enjoyed the experience. And Eric and I were still enjoying our lock free stretch, although this meant more tunnels

Seeing the light through Edgbaston tunnel

Edgbaston tunnel isn’t too long and as there is such a high footfall the towpath is always lit, which creates a rather weird impression that the the canal has run dry.

Where’s all the water gone

Many years ago Eric also used to work in Birminham, in the BT tower which we could see in the distance, although as an 18 year old I doubt he commanded a penthouse office with a view of the waterways.

looking up at the skyline -whilst we were being snapped by a gongoozler

We rounded the corner past one of my favourite buildings The Cube

The Cube (rooms from £130 a night)

And straight through Birminghams icon canal quarter

End of the Worcester and Birmingham canal and start of the Birmingham Old line canal

Where old and new seem to complement each other artistically,

Gas street Basin

Where we negotiated the giant plug, and tempting though it is to pull it out, who knows where we might end up if sucked down the vortex

Old Turn Junction

And moored up just beyond St Vincent St Bridge.  We prefer a quieter mooring, and we got full sun here.

Where the daffodils outshine the graffiti

And it was a good time to stop for a bacon buttie

Next time we’ll make sure there are some locks to work us through

Helping hands at Hatton

With the mighty Hatton Flight looming ahead of us and with the prospect of company we didn’t linger to enjoy the delights of Royal Leamington Spa. For such a historic Georgian spa town, the canal through Leamington is a bit of a perfunctory back water. At one point we wondered if we would actually get through when we saw this leviathan looming ahead. Ok, we knew we’d fit, but there wasn’t clearance for a similar 14foot widebeam to pass. We really don’t know how they would have handled that situation.

Nice to live in, just not ideal to cruise in


The mile or so between Leamington and Warwick is a gift for boaters with Morrisons, Lidl and Tesco all having mooring right outside. We languished at Lidl whilst the passing storm clouds attempted to deal with the water shortages

myton visitor mooring, (aka outside Lidl)

We cruised through Warwick only stopping one night. Another place where the canal is not valued as an asset to the town if the state of the towpath is anything to go by. Until you get to the Hatton Flight, which is a real gem for gongoozlers and historians. Although boaters know it as the Stairway to Heaven because 21 double locks is such hard work. We struck lucky, no rain and finding ourselves a lock buddy to start the day.

We’d planned to moor up on the armco after the fourth lock so our family could join us, but the lock keeper told us to moor after the eleventh, on the bollards at Asylum Wharf. We were a bit reluctant because it was the lock landing, and it’s not good etiquette, but he assured us traffic was light and he’d make sure the gates were open so if anyone came through they wouldn’t need to stop. And a spectacular view


Heather and Ant were just passing through so they stayed for breakfast and we were on our way an hour later

I cant think why, but they didn’t offer to crew for us up the remaining 10 locks but we had another secret weapon. Friends who live locally. Ironically because of how well maintained the flight is, and the willing volunteer lockies, we flew up the remaining locks in super fast time

and James only arrived in time to do the last 3 locks, but never the less, we set him to work.

He’s a willing volunteer

As his reward, he was allowed to take the helm as we cruised

on through the haunted Shrewley tunnel.

no ghosts today

All in all we’d had a fantastic day, all our stars aligned

5 miles, 21 double locks, 1 tunnel and 2 lots of visitors- we slept well that night.

Visited on the Wey at Wisley

Looking down the rockery

There have been so many highlights during this years cruising, its been hard to keep up with our adventures. Many years ago, we lived in Surrey and had membership to the Royal Horticultural Society, Wisley. So when we realised we could moor only 30 minutes walk away, we leapt at the chance to visit. And also to meet up with our family to relive some of the happy memories of mum and dad who used to come here most weekends. Wisley is full of iconic vistas which will be very familiar to people who visit often.

Looking up the rockery

But its not a garden that stands still in time. So much had changed since our last visit. They are currently digging a huge new reservoir which will be disguised as a “lake” to help them manage that most precious of resources. And as Eric is from a family of engineers , this was worth a close inspection.

It just looks like a giant sand pit to me

And despite the general current shortage of rain, the gardens have been maintained and the borders are spectacular.

The cool Herbaceous border

And much to my amazement, the big glass house was pleasantly cool to walk around even though it looked like a dessert

and we spent some time chatting in there, and wondering what they had done with the old orchid house that we all remembered

Just some of the family

Its not really orchid season, but still some in flower in their new tropical home

And it wasn’t all cactus

Once we left the glass houses we were treated to a walk through the South African velt

The Heather garden had only just been planted 30 years ago and at the time it looked, quite frankly, boring, but not any more, although there’s not too many family gardens that are big enough to copy this in its entirety.

One of the places Mum and Dad used to love spending time (besides the cafe) was the rockery

Which again is on such a scale that you couldn’t transplant it all into the average garden, but when Eric and I moved to Suffolk, and attempted a bit of landscaping in our new garden, we took a lot of inspiration from the Wisley rockery.


One of the things I miss in our boat home is not having a garden to grow vegetables so we were fascinated by the concepts being researched at Wisley in their “veg plot”. They are currently trialling a “no dig” policy for their veg, and these two comparison plots showed just how beneficial it can be to avoid digging. Mind you I think the benefit is enhanced by the amount of good quality mulch applied each year.

Identical planting, but the top bed has been dug and the lower one has been mulched

But as all the gardeners world presenters remind us gardens aren’t just for working in, relaxing with friends is just as important. Not only did we enjoy a day on our own, and a day with family. We were also treated to a surprise visit from our good friends from Suffolk

And a day with one of Eric’s work colleagues and his family

Wisley isnt the cheapest garden to visit as a one off, but it offers exceptionally good value membership deals, which give access to several other RHS gardens and partner gardens. And as Wisley covers such a huge site, its definitely worth breaking a visit into 2 or more days to be able to appreciate it all.

But as I frequently remind Eric, you can never see too many roses.


And what’s more the mooring is next to the Anchor pub who did very good wood fired pizza.

We werent the only ones who enjoyed visiting Wisley our friends and family did too, and we even got the youngsters to help out with the locks when we took them for a mini cruise

I think thats next years holiday idea sorted

apologies for the number of photos today, this is only a fraction of what we took.

To Bollington and beyond

We had the good fortune to be approaching Bollington at the same time as the weather forecast was predicting 4 days of thunderstorms and torrential rain. We had the even better good fortune to find a space on the aqueduct in time for us to hunker down and watch the world go by.

The Bollington Aqueduct and embankment


Bollington is a largely unspoilt little place that grew out of 3 small farming communities into a thriving, but small victorian mill town. Nestled in the foothills of the Pennines, on the edge of the Peak district, the canal straddles the wooded valley of the River Dean on a 60′ high aqueduct and embankment.

Palmerston Street below the canal


Perhaps not the most spectacular on the system, but one of my favourites because there’s mooring and a wide towpath, and an interesting town below to explore.

The Spinners Arms,

We had the added benefit of being joined by Sapphire, another Braidbar boat and it’s always good to share cruising notes, especially over a pint. No wonder it is also known as Happy Valley.

Firecrest and Sapphire

The Macclesfield canal was completed in the 1830’s and provided the incentive for local entrepreneurs to take advantage of the Macclesfield silk and cotton trade. Several mills were built, but only Clarence and Adelphi mills are still standing, both as residential and creative hubs with cafes, perfect for gongoozlers. Bollington seems to attract good food, and the day we arrived we only just missed the Hairy Bikers filming at the Indian Goat for a Christmas special. Needless to say we also had to sample the menu, not once but twice.

The Indian Goat, street food worth having.

To compensate for our excessive gluttony, we also took advantage of some great walking trails. The Middlewood Way, (from Marple to Macclesfield) runs through Bollington, along the disused railway line. Just like the canal, straddling the valley also required some skilled engineering. The west side of town is dominated by a long stretch of arches. The weather was against us completing the full trail although it’s one of Tim’s favourite cycling routes.

The Middlewood Way, above the playground

The other local landmark is known as the White Nancy, found on the Kerridge ridge. It’s a folly built in 1817 to celebrate the victory at the Battle of Waterloo. Apparently it used to have a door into a single room inside, but that’s no longer there. And at certain times of the year, it could well be dressed up as father Christmas, or sporting various other commemorative symbols. One year vandals painted it pink, can’t think why….The views from the top are spectacular, even with the cloud, we could see over to the Welsh hills, Merseyside, and the Peak District. We could even see Sapphire moored on the aqueduct. And we could see the White Nancy from the aqueduct.

The White Nancy

All in all we managed to avoid most of the heavy showers and the canal didn’t quite overflow. We are once again heading south.

Heading south towards Macclesfield, hope the blue sky comes too

Cheshire, Derbyshire, Wimbledon, France,Tokyo…. where have we been?


I’m not the fittest or most energetic of people and I’m certainly not sporty, but with one or two exceptions, I love watching live sport on TV. I even watched the penalty shoot out at the Euros. So instead of keeping up to date with our meanderings, I’ve been unpicking the intricacies of cycling competition, modern pentathlon, tennis tournaments and boxing bouts. But in between the joy and despair shared with various athletes and the extremes of British summer weather, we have continued to cruise the Macclesfield and Peak Forest canal.

We moored on the Braidbar spot for a few days, filling in James and Donna with our adventures of the past 4 years, whist asking James for his assistance to channel in some news wiring for our ever increasing Solar panels.


Tim and his friend have taken advantage of our close proximity to their homes and cycled out on several occasions to join us, and to share a birthday cake.

I’ve hopped on the train to visit my mum up in the Lake District

And Eric has dutifully returned back to Suffolk to complete some emergency repairs on our Bricks and Mortar. Leaving me with time to explore the walking trails around New Mills and to reaquaint my friendships with Kate, Annie and Martyn who run the Wiseheart and Wild creative Studio in New Mills, Furnace Vale and Disley.

We’ve worked hard in Bugsworth Basin, where we fixed the last two possible solar panels on to the roof.

And we’ve made friends with many boaters as we have taken the opportunity to moor for several days in the same place.

We had thought we would cruise onto pastures new, by continuing down the Marple flight, and through Manchester onto the Bridgewater canal before heading towards Chester. However there have been on going issues with some of the locks on that route, so we revised that plan and are now heading back south down the Macclesfield Canal and have a coin ready to toss when we get to the next junction.

Dallying around Derbyshire, (and East Staffordshire)

It’s always nice to meet up with friends on the canal and we took the opportunity to spend some time together. Eric was offered a ride on the stern on NB Tenacity as we cruised in convoy for the day. Eric and I both commented on the water levels on the river Dove aquaduct. The top photo was taken earlier in the week and we’d laughed about having to duck to get through those arches. We’d had some heavy rain but only for a few hours so hadn’t thought it amounted to much. A week later we’d still have struggled due to lack of water. There’s no pleasing some folk. Fortunately the T&M hasn’t suffered to the same extent as the northern canals. Our bridges still remained navigable and pretty as everBack in Burton there’s some good mooring by Shobnall Park. And we took some time to stretch our legs and raise our pulse by climbing up Outwoods Hills.Burton itself was dominated by brewerys. But the view was panoramic and great reminder of the vastness of our countryside. Unseen from this angle is a vast new housing estate being built behind us.Back in Burton, Burnt Oak with John and Martina cruised by, so they moored up next to us. Martina and I had a serious discussion about our spinning exploits as we are part of a team raising money for Air Ambulance through a spinning marathon. (More about Britspin later) I’m not sure if John and Eric are having a serious discussion or not, but it was either about rope or beer.

A Hectic Week

Cheryl has been off the boat so I could have a quiet week working.  But this is boat life, and my social life this week has been hectic.  After a very enjoyable day helping Jo and Laurence down the Atherstone flight, they picked me up as they passed through Rugby hoping I’d help them down the 3 Hillmorton locks as well.  Jo was only a few hours from her new home so keen to get going so left Laurence and I chatting, it was nearly sunset before I arrived back on Firecrest.

Then I met Malcom and Barbara from Ampere, on their way to Crick to represent the Electric Boat Assosiation .  They kindly invited me to a BBQ, something Cheryl and I used to enjoy regularly when we were land based so this was a real treat. The next day I saw Laurence again.   Continue reading A Hectic Week