TRIP REPORTS

A VERY INTERRUPTED CRUISE - SUMMER 2007

Part 1 - Great Linford to Hillmorton

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When I came back from London to rejoin the boat at the Black Horse, Great Linford, the season's school visits to the London Canal Museum had finished, so we hoped for some unintertrupted cruising. Sadly that wasn't to be.

We made a late start (at 15:53) because of Tilly going exploring. We moored by Wolverton station at 17:05 for the sake of some shopping.

The weather was filthy.We started at 12:05, when the weather appeared to clear, hoping to get up Stoke Bruerne locks before evening. We stopped at Cosgrove facilities point to take on water & dispose of rubbish. Soon the rain came back and became vicious. We stopped before Stoke Bruerne locks at 15:10 because the rain was making the visibility very bad.

It was a nice sunny day so, by Sod’s Law, Tilly spent it hunting in the hedgerow and we weren't able to do any boating.

Setting off at 11:18, we waited half an hour in the bottom lock, but no partner appeared and some downhill boats did, so we set off up the flight. We reached the top of the locks at 13:47, where the lock-keeper was very helpful and suggested we moor on the “disabled priority” mooring. I went to the Boat Inn and the museum (where there was an interesting temporary exhibition about tracing ancestors on the waterways). While I was away, the boat next to us left and Wendy was able to move the boat off the disabled mooring.

By 11:40 we finally got Tilly on board & set off with both cats (as we thought) settled in the cabin. But as Wendy went into the cabin to turn some inside lights on for the tunnel, Tilly shot out of the cabin doors, leapt onto a moored boat we were passing and ran up the bank. So we moored again, only ten minutes after setting off and just a few yards further. Wendy spoke to the lock-keeper and he agreed to us overstaying on the mooring until Tilly came back.

Tilly didn't come back aboard, although she was on the roof of the boat quite often at night, talking to us. She'd obviously found some good hunting.

We needed both water and a pump-out, so decided to do an out-and-back run to the other side of the tunnel setting off at 11:41. We had an easy run through the tunnel with little traffic coming the other way and no fumes. At Gayton Junction we took on water, then winded and made our way Blisworth Tunnel Boats, where it was a difficult mooring for a pump-out because of other moored boats. So we decided not to buy gas, which was another thing we'd had in mind. The return run through the tunnel was quite unpleasant, with a lot of diesel fumes bouncing the light of our tunnel lamp right back at us, and quite a lot of traffic to cross.

We arrived back near Stoke Bruerne winding hole at 15:10. At first we could only moor rather nearer the tunnel than we'd been before, but when another boat left, we were able to go back onto the same mooring that Tilly knew. We were next to our friends Dennis & Bridget’s boats.

Tilly was still mostly away, although from time to time on the roof of the boat or the fore-peak, but avoiding coming into the cabin. We began to wonder whether she was fed up with living with us, or with boating.

On the first Thursday, Wendy went to Northampton for shopping as what was available in Roade or at the Boat Inn shop was very limited. She travelled in with Bridget, who was visiting her mother. Northampton Sainsbury’s wasn’t very inspiring. Next day I decided to go to London for a few days to do some paper work for the museum and other things, including talking to our neighbours about them buying the flat (they’re going to). Wendy discovered that, contrary to report, Towcester doesn’t have a Tesco, but does have a Waitrose (much better), a Somerfield, a decent greengrocer’s stall (in the later part of each week) and a traditional butcher. It’s also a shorter and prettier journey than to Northampton.

By the end of the second week, we were beginning to despair of Tilly’s return.

Tilly came in and didn’t dash straight out again after eating. So at 10:05 we backed up to the winding hole, winded, and set off through the tunnel, for the third time in a fortnight. At Gayton Junction we again took on water & emptied the elsan. At the foot of Whilton locks we bought gas & odds & ends of chandlery at the boatyard, and a moored boat, Gladys Rose, asked to share the locks with us. It was two-handed, with a very efficient crew delivering the boat to Bristol. As ever the flight felt very slow, even though the clock showed it not as bad as it felt. We were pleased to find a mooring on Buckby visitor moorings at 18:33, just past the water point.

Tilly was AWOL again, so we stayed here for the day. I had a nice lunch at the New Inn.

We set off at 11:59 and had a good run through Braunston tunnel. As we emerged from the tunnel we found torrential rain, so decided to stop for some lunch and to wait until the weather improved or a partner appeared for the locks. Both of those things happened at once abut half an hour later. The people on the other boat were surprised to hear from us and some uphill boats about the heavy rain, hail and thunder as they’d missed it all while in the tunnel. One of the uphill boats was our friend Terry Stroud on Florian, heading for his home mooring at Buckby.

We stopped at the water point between Braunston Stop and Braunston Turn to take on water, then another bout of bad weather started. We turned north on the Oxford Canal, and moored at 18:10 by the Old Royal Oak, Hillmorton, by which time the weather had calmed down. We went to the pub for a meal, but their grill wasn’t working, so we made do with fish & chips. The food was OK, but the pub was big and a bit plasticky. There were canoeists practising quite late in the evening, from a base on the wharf.

Wendy by now was feeling horribly ill with her usual “bronichals” and rather light-headed, so we decide to say put here and I’d travel from here to the National (at least we were close to a railway station).

On Monday we walked to the station for me to catch the advertised train to Nuneaton to change to a direct train to Cambridge or Ely, which former didn’t appear. The enquiries people hadn’t told me that this end of the journey was being covered by a rail replacement bus service. So I had to get a taxi (from one of the pubs in the town) to Nuneaton.

For the ensuing week, I was working at the “National” and Wendy took to her bed for several days, until she managed to get to a pharmacist who sold her a chesty-cough remedy that was OK for diabetics. That helped a lot, Atherstone has mediocre shopping, recycling bins and at least one decent pub with good, unpretentious food. The Market isn’t as good as we remember it from some years ago. I came back on the (second) Tuesday evening, worn out after the “National”.