Mike Stevens' UK Inland Waterways Pages

TRIP REPORTS : THE FELIS CATUS II YEARS

Spring & Early Summer 1992 :
FOUR WATERWAYS EVENTS

PART 2 : CANALWAY CAVALCADE TO MAY HALF-TERM

Click here for information about our boat , Felis Catus II

We resume the story at Little Venice

CANALWAY CAVALCADE

We came back to the boat on Thursday evening for drinks with Ann Tilman, Bob Bush & Peter Jackman. Wendy went back to work on Friday while I was busy on Cavalcade preparations, including tug-work. At one point I was manoeuvring FC2, with another boat breasted alongside, and simultaneously recording an interview with a local radio journalist who was perched on the gunnel beside me. Wendy came back on back Saturday morning. I tried my hand in the boat-handling competition on Sunday without much success. I appear to have been too busy working at the event (FC2 was the Press Office and I was also incharge of the PA) to take any photos.

Wendy went to work on Tuesday morning, while I stayed clearing up. After a long pub session with various folk including Graeme Heap (motor barge Azolla), I decided to leave the boat on Rembrandt Gardens again. The fuel filter was leaking again.

A WEEKEND TRIP NORTHWARDS

We came back to the boat on Rembrandt Gardens and set off at 1520. Very windy conditions produced a hard but interesting run. Before Bull's Bridge we stopped for a chat and cuppa with Graeme on Azolla, then went on and joined the Grand Junction main line. We locked through Cowley with nb Sir John. Above Cowley lock we tied up at 20:55, with help from David Daines. We were outboard of Albatross by arrangement, since we were cruising with Dave Dent (single-handed) the next day. He had a broken leg, which he got in a fall at Cavalcade. He'd actually worked the rest of the day as Pageant Master before realising the leg was broken! He arrived at his boat just after us.

Dave got up before us to do a car-shuffle. There was a lot of rain (to the delight of the water boards, suffering for the lack of it) & wind. We set off at 09:35 just ahead of Albatross as we needed to stop at Uxbridge Boat Centre to buy some Coalite. There we moored outboard of Jackdaw, whose crew was over-protective of their new paint. Dave passed us and was joined in the first lock by another boat with a maiden crew. At Widewater the other boat decided to let us leapfrog them. We shared three locks with nb Sir John (again), whose cat, they told us, had decided to stay on a posher boat for the weekend. We moored for the night above Hunton Bridge locks at 17:25. Dave had been remarkably vertical all day . The weather cleared up at the end. We moored arse-out, with a plank at the bow. Dave was luckier & found some depth. Ann arrived & Dave cooked dinner on Albatross. Later Chris Port arrived for a drink.

We set off at 08:23 in good sunny weather and now 4-handed for the two boats. Chatting with Ann in one of the locks, we realised that the sign-writing on our two boats was obviously from the same hand, so we now know that ours was done by Dave Moore. We stopped at Castle Wharf, Berkhamsted at 13:40 while Albatross pressed on to Tring. We had a chat with Lindy & arranged for me to come up on Wednesday for some work on the BW General Powers Bill. Roger will sort the fuel leak for us.

WHITSUN HALF-TERM CRUISE
(INCLUDING WENDOVER ARM RALLY)

Wendy & the cats came up in the morning for shopping & the (long-range) launderette. I joined mid-afternoon. Roger Alsop (one of the boatyard staff) had repaired the fuel-leak & pumped out the bilges & the loo. Lindy had a noon appointment with the BW Chairman in connection with the Bill. We set off at 16:02. It was so hot that we decided to keep the cats in their travelling boxes in order to have all doors and windows open. We found ourselves locking first with Tom Tiddler, then with Malandra. We used the sani station at Cowroast lock. Bulbourne water-point had been moved from the junction to the lay-by (which we'd noticed the previous year, but forgotten), so we missed it.

On the Wendover Arm we winded at the feeder, then went backwards (after Wendy had misunderstood the harbourmaster's directions) between other boats to a good mooring (at 21:23) by the pump-house. The width available between moored boats was not much more than one boat's width, so I was at the bow fending off alternately left and right, while Wendy steered. My standard greeting to boats as I fended off them was "I said I wanted a bow-thruster, not that I wanted to be one". Dave & Ann arrived later. Their daughter, Sam and her boyfriend Ian were due tomorrow.

We were stationary at the Wendover Arm Trust rally in very hot, sunny weather. The site seemed well-attended, but Wendy thought the craft tent wasn't as good as the previous year's. We were entertained to dinner on Albatross on Saturday night. Somebody dropped a shirt in the water and Sam swam to retrieve it, but failed. Ann slept on FC2 on Saturday night, Anne & Dave did on Sunday, as they had an over-full boatload of folk. By the second evening Ann was less worried about the cats' hunting victims, as she then knew they were left in the kitchen or our back cabin rather than being delivered to her in the front cabin. The pumping station's running times were very unpredictable: it first started 04:00 Saturday and woke us up!

On Sunday Dave went into Aylesbury to buy eggs. There were a lot of big fish in the cut who seem to enjoy eating our coffee grounds. We did lots of socialising. I started cleaning the brasses & painted roses on the side-hatch lids. We had booked for the barbecue on Sunday evening, but it came on to rain hard, so we cooked the barbecue packs on board! Arlecchino went hunting a lot. Dido sat posing whenever she could collect a fan club. Both cats were in and out a lot at night (when it wasn't raining).

It was very hot & sunny again and we did more socialising & brass-cleaning at the Rally, until we decided to make a move, as much as anything for the cooling effect of the draught. So we set off at 15:59, turned right at Bulbourne junction and went on to Cowroast, where we used the water point, loo point, and rubbish bins. Then we came back to a nice shady mooring in the cutting by Tring station bridge, much approved by the cats.

The cats had a very lively night. Known score: cats 5, mice 0. In the morning I cleaned the brass, while Wendy hoovered in the cabin, which drove Arlecchino outside. Ian joined later in the morning, but Arlecchino was still on walkabout, so we couldn't start. I started the roses & castles on the back cabin side-hatches. Arlecchino came back in the evening but not to stay, so we stayed overnight.

Arlecchino was still away in the morning, so I went home to do some work on Excalibur & go to an IWA Committee. Wendy & Ian shopped in Tring: not very good. Ray Dunford went past on Ellington but only stopped for a short chat as he wanted to deliver to the Ship Stores at Marsworth in their opening hours.

Arlecchino came back at 03:30. Wendy closed the last door, with difficulty because Dido has taken to jumping out whenever Wendy wanted to close anything.

They started at 08:00 but by Bulbourne junction were stopped by the engine boiling. On investigation it was found that the alternator belt was dead. so they limped to to Bulbourne Dry Dock for a replacement. That sorted out, they were locking with Lark Lady, which stopped at Marsworth but later caught them up at Horton lock. I re-joined as the boat arrived at Leighton Buzzard, where we dealt with shopping, loo point & rubbish. Then we winded and headed back southwards, mooring ½ mile above Church lock at 20:10 by a thick hedge and a rape field.

The day started with rain, forecast to last all day, & at least one soggy cat so we decided to make the best of it and set off at 09:13 We shared locks until Pitstone Wharf, and stopped outside the Ship Stores, Marsworth, for brunch on board. We resisted the temptation of the Red Lion. In the afternoon the weather had dried out. Our next stop was at Cowroast Marina for a pump-out & a chandlery visit to buy some new waterproofs for Wendy. Then we went on in mixed weather. to Castle Wharf, Berkhamsted, where we tied up at 18:25. Geese stopped Arlecchino venturing. Jim & Mig Macdonald in nb Elizabeth moored opposite soon after us. There was a very dramatic thunderstorm in the night.

Elizabeth went away while Wendy was off buying milk & papers. We set off at 08:04, hoping to catch them. At Topside lock we were close enough for them to see us, re-set the lock and wait for us, so we locked with them the rest of the day. Hot, sunny weather again, despite the forecast. There was so much water in the cut after last night's storm that we were able to make very good speed in what are usually shallow pounds. We were also speeded by the fact that Jim & Mig had a young crewman who lock-wheeled by bike.

We encountered difficulty at some locks as the water was weiring over the top gates so fiercely that we couldn't get a level. Bourne End lock was an especial problem in this respect, with the water above the lock walls when we arrived, but fortunately there were several folk from the moorings there willing & able to lend some muscle to get us through. A further delay came when a power cut (caused by lightning bringing down a pylon) had made Winkwell Swing Bridge inoperable. Among the boats trapped there was Roger Burchett on Nackered Navvy. We moored at 15:20 below Cassio Bridge opposite Jim & Mig's home mooring. Ian & I went over to socialise with Jim & Mig in the later part of the evening. The bank was OK for the cats, but not fascinating.

We made a start at 08:48 with a good road. Moonfleet waited for us at Batchworth lock. The old chap we'd thought of as "Black Jack's Grandad" for some years was still in evidence, but looking years older than he used to, so we assumed he's not a ghost after all. At Uxbridge Boat Centre we bought diesel & gas, then continued to reach our Cowley Peachey moorings at 14:50.