Tag: Lee and Stort Navigation

And Back again, from Stortford to Limehouse

Its 33 miles and 29 locks from Bishop’s Stortford to Limehouse Basin, so we took a week to build up some steam, enjoying the prettiness of the Stort, cruising at our leisure,

River Stort

Taking it carefully as instructed,

Roydon railway bridge

Making friends with the locals

Lucy the lock keeper

It was looking a bit congested around the M25

Rammy Marsh lock, with M25 behind us


With the daunting prospect of no mooring.

Around Tottenham


So someone thought they needed to check in early

But at Tottenham Marshes we struck gold. With a space that wasnt just big enough, it was in full sunshine

Tottenham Marshes

We now had 7 miles and only 3 more locks to complete our journey, thats roughly 3.5 hours travelling for us….. we could see the City looming ahead

City skyline in the distance

At this point we could have taken the option of turning right onto the Hertford union link canal to get us back onto the Regent’s Canal. But we thought it would be fun to take the half hour detour and cruise around the olympic park ring.

The Olympic stadium which is now home to West Ham


We had teamed up with another boat who had the same intention as us, we’d checked our maps and yes it was now permitted to cruise but not to moor. As I was on lock duty I had the advantage of looking around the corner, and saw a clump of branches at one side. I dutifully called out a warning. “Go very slowly, there’s a tree down and I can’t see how much navigation its blocking. …..” hummmmm turns out it was blocking the navigation completely. Luckily we were able to reverse in and pull them off, as they were well and truly stuck.

It could have been worse, but perhaps “tug of boat” ought to become an olympic sport

It was pity not to be able to do the ring, but we weren’t short of other interesting sights, with some creative boat design

And most buildings reaching for the sky

We cruised past the Bow Locks which we are not sure if they are still operational to allow cruising on Bow creek or if it is just for tidal management only now.

Bow Tidal locks

And after 5 long hours we reached the end of this section of our journey by entering Limehouse Basin

From Hertford to Stortford

We managed to find the last available mooring in Hertford for 2 nights, so I could hop onto the train back into London to meet up with Amanda and a few friends. I’d have liked to explore Hertford a bit more but the need to run the generator, whilst being moored next to a block of flats isn’t neighbourly so we moved on.

Hertford


Back the 6 miles through Ware and Stanstead Abbot,

Stanstead Abbot


to Feildes lock, and the confluence of the river Stort which becomes the Stort Navigation. In a matter of minutes we felt like we were in a completely different environment. Although the Stort was canalized in the 1760s, it still retains the characteristics of a rural river.

The River Stort

Its 14 miles of very pleasant cruising, although the 15 locks are a frustrating dimension, only 13 foot/4m wide, which makes them just a bit too narrow to take 2 narrowboats side by side, yet still requiring a double locks worth of water, and effort, but at least they are very pretty. And a local boater informed us that it is customary not to close the gates on exiting a river lock, which did make them a bit easier to work.

Brick lock

We meandered happily along enjoying the buildings along our way

Roydon

Ducking under the overhanging willow trees, and infact narrowly escaping a potential catastrophe, as a large branch broke and fell into the canal seconds before we passed by. I was too shook up to take a photo, but we were lucky it had remained attached to the tree by a thin slither and blocked the towpath rather than the canal.

Duck!

We enjoyed a few nights moored at Sawbridgworth, which is where I believe Beckingham Palace is, although the Beckhams no longer live there. All this lovely countryside isn’t the usually the first image that you think of when you realise we were cruising through Essex


But after a week of tranquillity we were back in Hertfordshire and moored at the end of navigation in Bishop’s Stortford

End of Navigation, Bishop’s Stortford

Bishop’s Stortford has been voted one of Britain’s best places to live, although it seemed nice enough, its not the first town that springs to my mind to claim this title. We arrived on market day, and I was amused to see the same Cheese and Pie man that regularly visits our home town in Suffolk. We had quite a good chat reminiscing about people in common that we knew.

(Heading photo north of Harlow Mill)

Onto the Lee and Stort Navigation

With our week on the Eco mooring drawing to a close, we decided to move on to explore the Lee and Stort Navigation. But first we had the treat of being joined by my cousin Diana and her children for the last remaining 3 miles of the Regent’s canal. First stop the water point

Thats Diana awarding Eric 5 points for his dancing skills

Then the excitment of working the locks

I think this is one for the caption competition

And the thrill of being permitted to drive the boat

I think Eric’s worried he’ll be out of a job soon


And finally the reward of lunch together

Diana, Rose, Gabe and Bea


Before they had to say goodbye.


It had taken us nearly 3 hours to do less than 2 miles, but it was a perfect start to the day. We glibly thought we’d moor up soon….

….but that was before we had fully comprehended the dire state of mooring on the Regent’s canal. We were crawling along past double moored boats for as far as the eye could see, past Victoria Park and onto the Hertford Union Canal. With the infamous Hertford Union Bottom lock to transit. We had been warned it was flooded….

Yes thats all from the overflowing lock

But usually the bywash of a lock has its own dedicated offside channel not shared with the towpath.


I had no choice but to wade through this dirty canal water, not knowing what was in it, or if i would be able to empty enough water out in order to open the gate.

Hertford Union Bottom lock

Miraculously, we managed to get through, sympathizing with the local’s who informed me, with resignation that “its been fixed”
At least there were still some things to smile about,

Street Art at the Junction

but we were now on the Lee and Stort Navigation, heading north. We ploughed on, which seems an inappropriate word for a canal but the density of duckweek and debris meant it really was hard going, the double moored boats continued but eventually, 3 hours after we had wanted to stop, we found a 60′ gap to squeeze into, baton down the hatches and fall asleep exhausted.

Around the top of Hackney Marshes