Mike Stevens' UK Inland Waterways Pages

TRIP REPORTS : THE FELIS CATUS II YEARS

BACK TO THE BCN

August 1996

I was delayed returning. Wendy was visited by a seal-point Birman from the next boat. Nobody was about at Associated Cruisers for a pump-out but two of their people went by on a boat, apparently testing its engine. We decided to take the direct route, straight through the Wyrley & Essington Canal ( if anything on the "Curly Wyrley" can be described as "straight") and set off at 12:59 to Horseley Fields junction. Until a few years ago the Wyrley was clearly fixed in our minds as one of the more rubbish-filled canals we know, but recently it had been improving. This time it started in its old mode : as we came through the junction at Horseley Fields we found the Associated Cruisers boat stopped in the narrows. We each backed off, and we caught a huge mass of cushion foam and rubber matting on our prop which took a long time to clear. While we were clearing it, both cats went walkabout but were fairly easily persuaded back aboard when the time came.

A couple of hours later we stopped at Sneyd BW yardto use the water-point and rubbish bins, and decided to check the blade again as a matter of routine. As well as the usual weed and wire, the crop this time included 10 socks and a skirt, provoking Wendy's usual invective against rich Brummies dumping perfectly wearable clothes in the cut. If they don't have dustmen, why can't they find an Oxfam shop?

That evening we moored on Pelsall Common at 18:27 a very pleasant spot of landscaped once-industrial land around the junction of the Wyrley and the Cannock Extension Canal. It has been the site of some campaign rallies in the past and was to see another in late May 1998. That night we chose (for the cats' sake) a spot before Pelsall Works bridge with plenty of rough grass rather than the municipally-manicured stuff right by the junction.

While waiting for Orinthia to return, Wendy went in fruitless search for a paper. We set off at 11:26 and had a pleasant and uneventful run through Catshill and Ogley junctions to Anglesey Basin, where we were to join IWA Lichfield Branch's barbecue that evening. There were already quite a few boats there when we arrived, and more arriving all the time. We moored to a fairly clear bit of bank, but needed the mooring plank. Soon our friends the Russell family arrived on Auntie Barb and moored outboard of us and we could use their longer one as well. We seemed to end up next to them at a lot of rallies.

Anglesey Basin rally

It was a rare sight to see a whole flotilla of boats in this little-used location. We had visited the basin several times in the past and had never seen another boat, despite the fact that it is a really attractive spot. It was a great pleasure to be here for a gathering. There were lots of interested passers-by, as Anglesey Basin is at the foot of the dam of Chasewater, a lake (built as the reservoir for the Wyrley) which is a great water-sports and tourist centre, so the event was certainly a success as a public relations exercise. The cats posed for 'photos. It was a very good barbecue that evening, although Wendy missed it with a migraine.

Sunday saw the start of the BCN Explorer Cruise, organised by the Birmingham Canal Navigations Society, in which as many boats as wished were to cruise in company around the BCN, ending up at the National Waterways Festival at Windmill End the following weekend. . The first leg was only to Pelsall, so it didn't matter that Orinthia kept us waiting. Auntie Barb was delayed while Alan arranged a repair to his car windscreen, broken by vandals overnight. The rest of the family would take Auntie Barb to Pelsall and he'd take the car & walk to meet them.

At Pelsall junction we turned up the Cannock Extension Canal. Apart from "because it's there" the reason for that visit was because BW had recently installed a boat-counter at the junction and we wanted to give it some figures to think about. We winded at Brownhills Colliery basin because Helen Whitehouse had said that Dennis at the boatyard finds that people winding under power in the mouth of his dock give him problems with silting. Back to the main line and a mooring at 16:16 just past the junction with all the other boats. There wasn't as good depth as where we were a few nights ago as there was the remains of an old wharf wall below water level which prevented boats getting right in to the edge. I went to the pub; nearly everyone was drinking outside on a nice sunny evening. The plan was to go to Walsall Town Wharf next day, and then through the Walsall Canal, but some deep-draughted boats might opt out of that stage if the level's down.

By this time one of the boats in the fleet, Chattel (the Randal family) from the Leeds & Liverpool Canal, was suffering from something heavy on the prop that they couldn't get off through the weed-hatch, so they left the convoy. We saw them again at the "National" and learnt that they had limped to the Gower Branch where they had used the only staircase locks on the BCN. as an improvised dry dock to cure the problem.

The next two days were planned to take the fleet through the Walsall Canal, visiting the newly-re-opened Walsall Wharf. Most of us were fairly apprehensive about this, as the Walsall had taken over from the Wyrley as the prime navigable rubbish tip on the BCN. This was to be real campaign cruising.

Monday's run was to be a mere 5.8 miles and 8 locks to Walsall Wharf at the end of the Walsall Town arm, recently re-opened after a stoppage of many years caused by mining subsidence. We set off at 08:01, neither the first nor the last boat to do so. By the time we had passed Birchills junction and reached Walsall top lock we'd already needed two trips down the weed-hatch. We stopped there for rubbish & elsan disposal. A BCNS member had turned out to lock-wheel for the convoy, which we found very welcome. Down the locks we turned left into the recently re-opened arm to Walsall Town Wharf. We (and others) limped into the basin with muck on the blade yet again. Champion was Eric Wood in Cre-Dal-Wood with about 18" of half-inch steel bar wrapped twice round his prop shaft. A lot of combined intelligence and communal effort failed to shift it, but brute force eventually prevailed.

The flotilla in Walsall Basin

The wharf was still a building site as that part of Walsall Town Centre was being redeveloped., but looked as if it would be good when finished. The old wharf building was being rebuilt. Walsall has good shopping very close to the basin, but no launderette. Wendy found a good bookshop and I found a big branch of Boots which did 1-hour photo-processing so I was able to show people some shots I'd only just taken of the fleet at the wharf and which I planned to use in the newsletter at the "National". .

Tuesday was expected to be the hardest campaigning bit of the cruise, down the main length of the Walsall, and lived up (down?) to our expectations. The organisers were worried that the water level seemed quite low, and several of the deeper-draughted boats almost decided not to stay with the fleet, but solidarity won in the end, and we set off in a number of small batches. At 07:32 we weren't first boat away by any means. For the first mile we were bumping bottom most of the way, and the deeper boats later told us that they had been forcing a channel through the mud. After that, rubbish became the main problem and we had to go down the weed- hatch a number of times. The first two-and-three-quarter miles took us one-and-three-quarter hours. After one weed-hatch stop near Moxley (where recently redeveloped and landscaped canalside land contrasted with the grot-filled cut) it was raining quite hard so we stopped for a hot drink and were overtaken by the next boat, nb Stokie, a modern cargo-carrying boat from the Kennet & Avon.

Being deep-draughted, Stokie was inevitably travelling pretty slowly, so we were close behind them when the next incident happened. A group of boats ahead of us came across a BW mud-lighter blocking a bridge-hole, and the convoy ground to a halt while Brian & Margaret Oliver's Zavalla and somebody else moved and moored it. While we were all hanging around in mid-channel, Stokie was blown by a cross-wind onto the mud where she stuck irremovably. We tried pulling her off backwards, then enlisted some passers-by to pull sideways while we pulled backwards. Then we slithered past them and repeated the effort, now pulling from in front. All this achieved was to stall our engine with some chain-link fencing on the blade.

So we 'phoned British Waterways. John and Brioni on Stokie bet that they'd send one man in a little white van, which (eventually) proved absolutely correct. At least Homo BWiensis had a mobile 'phone. He was worried about the water level, and rang a colleague to let some water down Walsall Locks (at a rough estimate it would have taken several days' running water to make any appreciable difference to the level of this 11-mile pound). He also called for further assistance before himself disappearing. This duly arrived in the form of two green-legged BW types in two little white vans, bringing a Tirfor winch, whose instructions they had to read before using it!

Just as they arrived, Wendy announced that she'd got the last of the fencing off our blade, but we decided to stay around for the end of the show (a) in case any further towing was needed, (b) to assist Stokie through any later trouble spots and (c) to get some photos of the operation for possible use in the newsletter. Eventually, after several attempts and severe damage to some municipal railings, the Tirfor got Stokie off the mud and we were on our way again.

Despite all this delay, no following boats had caught up with us - we later found out that this was because the next group were all deep-draughted and having problems of their own. Once past Tame Valley Junction the going became easier, and we and Stokie were close behind the boat in front when we reached the start of Ryder's Green locks. Stokie stopped here to clear her blade, and we followed Gerry & Maureen on Maelstrom (old acquaintances whom we'd met on the Kennet & Avon Canal a few years before) up the locks and joined the New Main Line.

Maelstrom moored at the top lock and told us they were heading straight for Dudley. By this time Stokie had almost caught up. The original plan was to go up Spon Lane Locks to the Old Main Line and moor overnight by the Engine Branch Aqueduct which the convoy would explore next morning. We were leaving the fleet next morning to head for central Birmingham and then to Windmill End where I was due to start setting up the editorial office at the "National". So we decided to stick to the New Main Line and moor below the aqueduct, which we duly did. We'd discussed this plan with John and Brioni who had decided to follow our example. When we arrived, there was nobody moored on the lower level and only Brian & Margaret Oliver's Zavala on the upper. A final trip down the weed-hatch produced another haul of socks.

At the Engine Branch aqueduct

Eventually the rest of the fleet trickled in, Stokie mooring with us on the lower level and everybody else on the upper. The last boat to arrive (well after dark) was the Russells on Auntie Barb, who had decided to supplement the official itinerary with a side-trip up the Wednesbury Old Canal to where the entrance to the Ridgeacre Branch used to be before the road-building vandals destroyed it. I reckoned it must have been just about dark when they turned into it, but they said not. Somebody called Val had been coming and going for much of the evening looking for Eileen on Artemis, for whom she was supposed to be crewing next day. Eileen is a pensioner live-aboard and single-handed boater. Val finally gave up and went home about ten minutes before Eileen finally arrived. Fortunately she had left a message with us.

The cats had good hunting overnight, and Orinthia had to be retrieved from the upper level before we could leave. We were leaving the cruise here to make a quick dash to central Brum for necessities before going to the Festival site, so Wendy collected our cruise plaque from Martin (of the BCNS). Since then there has been a major clean-up weekend on the Walsall by WRG and other volunteer squads which has made a big difference, as was discovered by those who went to the IWA Campaign Rally in 1998, and by us on the 1998 BCN Marathon Challenge (see separate report here). The really good news is that BW announced that it was to ask Parliament to up-grade most of the BCN. (including the Wyrley and the Walsall) to cruiseway status. This will give allow them to maintain these canals to cruising standard, which currently they're not allowed to do. If we can win the fight to persuade the Department of the Environment to take a more sensible attitude to the Birmingham Northern Relief Road's potential blocking of the Lichfield and Hatherton restoration project, then the future of the northern BCN. will really start to look good. (Later note : eventually, in 2001, the Government agreed to that)

We set off at 09:53 to the St Vincent Street moorings, where Wendy did a big shopping trip to the supermarket at Fiveways, returning by taxi. Eileen arrived on Artemis, and very soon afterwards Val turned up. Then we went into the Oozells Street loop for another visit to Sherborne Street Wharf for a pump-out, gas & diesel. After that it was back to the main line, Dudley Port junction and the Netherton Tunnel Branch, stopping at Tividale sani station to deal with Elsan, rubbish (lots of it!) & water. Then we went through the tunnel to Windmill End junction and headed for our rally mooring.

We were about to go up the Bumblehole Arm to our allotted mooring when Mike West asked us not to as he was bringing Cromdale out backwards having failed to get near the bank at their allotted mooring. So we moored opposite the entrance to the arm at 18:00 until such time as we we were sorted out by the harbourmasters. I went up on site to look at our newsletter facilities and returned there after supper to do some setting-up work with Martin & Lesley.

Eric Wood, one of the harbourmasters, persuaded us to try to get as far up the arm as we could. Hal Stufft, another Harbourmaster who had already moored his Dutch-barge-style narrowboat up there was around to give a hand. At 09:00 we set off to try. Aiming for the end of the arm to wind, we failed to force a passage past two local boats moored abreast, so tried to get in to our proper place. Despite help from several harbourmasters (including the boss-man, Dick Mantle) we couldn't get within comfortable plank-length of the bank, and our blade was thoroughly fouled again. By this time I was late for work in the Black Mail (that year's newsletter) office and had to go there. The boat was finally towed out backwards by Tit Willow (which has a bow-thruster which must make this kind of job a lot easier) and moored at 10:45, just in the entrance to the arm pending the harbourmaster finding a spot for us.

The IWA National Waterways Festival at Windmill End

The harbourmaster found us a mooring before Fox & Goose Bridge, on the off-side to the grounds of the Church. It had good depth and a solid bank, if rather overgrown and was very handily placed for my office (although the nearest gate is closed before the end of evening festivities which makes for a longer walk). We moved there at 12:00 on Friday. For the next few days we were at the "National" with me editing Black Mail and both of us helping on the Branch stand. We were pleased to hear that Stokie won the Cressy Award for the best live-aboard boat, and St Pancras CC won the Clubs section Tom Rolt magazine awards again.