Mike Stevens' UK Inland Waterways Pages

TRIP REPORTS : THE FELIS CATUS IIYEARS

FELIS CATUS II IN NORTHERN WATERS, 1998

Part 3 – Home from Longport

We resume the story at Longport Wharf, Stoke-on-Trent.

AUTUMN WEEK-ENDING

We collected the boat from Longport wharf and set off at 11:29. We noticed that for a long way after Longport the towpath is solid concrete with no mooring rings. After the first turnover bridge there are some places with rings. The weather was very changeable, needing rapid swapping between peaked cap for the sun and hood for the rain. At one point in the Meaford flight, it was raining in two adjacent locks, but sunny in the (short) pound between them. Rain set in solidly at Stone. We moored at Carr House Bridge, not far below Aston lock, at 18:58, glad to get out of the weather. We'd both noticed the Morse control feeling a bit odd and wondered if a cable was about to go?

We set off at 7:51 in much better weather. There was lots of water about, both in the cut and on the ploughland, but the bottom was still very near the top. We passed a field of what Wendy thought might have been llamas, or extra-supercilious sheep.

While picking Mike up below Haywood lock, horrible noises came from the gearbox, which we recognised as drive plate trouble, and sure enough, we had no drive. We arranged to take the boat back to Anglo-Welsh at Haywood junction to be sorted out (we were planning to leave it somewhere for a month in any case). We tried winding below the lock with ropes & pole, but were short of about 2" of space until another boater bounced our bows up the bank. We bow-hauled back up the lock, then found not one but two other boats waiting to tow us to the boatyard. Dunelm did the tow. Our tug dropped us in the junction, and we poled into the basin and moored up by the bridge at 12:22.

Later in the week, we heard from Anglo-Welsh that the problem was the drive-plate, but it had been caused by wear on the shaft from the gear-box. This meant replacing either the shaft or the whole gearbox: we decided that the latter made most sense.

We didn't come back to the boat for a month, but I wasn't without boating in that time because I went as commentator on two day-trips on Pride of the Lee round the East London Ring.

We came up from home late afternoon / early evening. We'd hoped to come the previous weekend but the boat wasn't ready. We paid Anglo-Welsh for the work they'd done (sorting out a diesel leak & resulting messy bilges, and replacing one of the engine bearers as well as replacing the gearbox).

After a dark & stormy night, it was dry by daybreak and we set off at 07:23, soon after first light. The low-revs vibration was quite a bit reduced, but there was a new noise from the gearbox, possibly due to its newness. The way we were moored, and the fullness of the moorings meant that we had to come out pointing the wrong way, reverse through the junction bridge and then wind.

The weather remained dry but windy. The bottom was very near the top all the way: not shortage of water but lack of dredging. We stopped at Rugeley to shop at Safeway: mainly to replenish the booze cabinet so as to be sociable this evening, but also to stock up on other non-perishables to save carrying next weekend.

At Fradley junction the weather had turned wet & even windier as we joined the Coventry Canal (detached section) Between Fradley & Streethay Wendy saw some huge picture-book toadstools, red with white spots, the first she'd seen for about 40 years. At Whittington brook we had a quick exchange of greetings with Eric Wood as we went past his home. We passed through the B'ham & Fazeley section, went onto the Coventry Canal proper and moored at Amington at 17:52, just before the light failed. We managed to find a spot with good depth. The various sections of the Coventry had proved much deeper than the Trent & Mersey.

The weather forecast had talked of heavy frost and mist: both true. We started at 07:15. In the more sheltered spots the mist was very thick. By the foot of Atherstone locks the sun was burning it off quite well, and by the top of the locks it had turned into a sunny, crisp Autumn day, without the previous day's high winds.

We stopped at Hawkesbury junction for rubbish disposal & water and rang Jeff Dennison to say we'd be at Ansty in something over an hour. We joined the Oxford Canal and went on to Ansty, where Jeff met us and showed us the good mooring spot past the bridge (good depth, piled bank, rings, 14-day mooring), where we tied up at 17:00. Then we had drinks on board with him & Joe Jones before a rapid clear up. Jeff gave us a lift to Coventry station.

AUTUMN HALF-TERM

There was too much work for us to be able to get away from home the previous night, so we missed Jeff's concert at the Village Club. We caught an early train up from home and set off from Ansty at 09:30. The weather lived down to the forecast, with fierce blasts of wind and hard, cold, prickly rain. The cats settled down together near the stove, much closer than we've known them before, with a lot of mutual grooming, and sleeping in a bundle. We made a shopping stop at Brownsover Tesco then went on to moor at 17:29 before Braunston Turn, glad to find a mooring sheltered by a hedge but without any tall trees. It was a very blustery night.

We started at 07:12 on a clear sunny morning, with daylight earlier than we had expected, so we missed using the first of it. We joined the Grand Junction Canal and went up Braunston locks with a Rose Boat heading for Market Harborough. Then we went down Buckby locks with nb Kerry Blue, 2-handed and with three dogs, two of whom actually were Kerry Blues. They had a good experienced crew, so we made good time down what can be rather slow locks. The wind was still fierce, but there was almost no rain. We saw remarkably thick clusters of holly berries, rose hips and haws.

We suffered a hearse-race through Blisworth tunnel: I had to keep taking the engine out of gear so as not to ram the boat ahead. Behind us was a day-hire boat that sounded as though it was electrically powered. We reached Stoke Bruerne at 16:30. The moorings were busy but we found a gap that we fitted with only inches to spare. I went to the pub before supper & chatted with some of the locals.

We moved off at 07:38 and had half-an-hour's wait for the top lock while one of the local boaters (off nb Green Howard which we'd seen up at Sherborne wharf earlier in the year) ran water down to top up the long pound (2 locks down) that regularly loses water overnight. A couple of hire-boats were aground there.

We had rather a hearse-race after Cosgrove lock until the slow boat let us past at Bradwell. We moored at The Plough, Simpson at and I went off by taxi to Milton Keynes Central to go back to London for a conference with Counsel (for work) and Cavalcade Committee. We were immediately visited by a strange cat. It was another dark and stormy night ......

.... and a dark and stormy day too. I was delayed in London by necessary bits of work. There's no shop in Simpson any more: from the village one has to cross bridge 91 and turn right through an underpass to Tinkers Bridge where there's a dreary rectangular store (very limited) by the Tinkers Bridge Meeting Place. There's a more direct route via the towpath.

We set off at 14:05. If we hadn't been worried about the timing to get home, we probably wouldn't have cruised that day. It was extremely blustery, but not very wet. At Willowbridge Marina we dealt with pump-out, gas, water and solid fuel (back on Homefire Ovals again, thankfully) .

Despite dark clouds, daylight lasted just about long enough (supplemented by the pub lights) to get up Soulbury locks and we moored above them at 17:16. While Wendy was cooking, Orinthia climbed in through the kitchen window (with the glass in place) from the outboard side. Tilly seemed to go mad once the side hatch was opened. Was she seeking a demon lover on the towpath?

At 06:56 we set off for Tesco, Leighton Buzzard. Was the above-mentioned demon lover Tom, a grey and white cat with a red collar and name disc, who persistently tried to board us here while I shopped?

We worked up Grove lock on our own, then picked up a partner-boat from Gayton, which turned at Slapton. After that we shared with a single-handed elderly gent on nb Alert, heading for Seabrook to moor for a few days en route to Berka for the winter. We moored at the Ship Stores, Marsworth at 14:08, relieved to arrive here after some very mixed weather with persistent strong wind & cold with alternating sunshine and icy, hard rain. I travelled home (taxi to Tring station) for an IWA Branch Committee.

Bev's taxis of Tring (who took me to the station the day before) were very helpful about picking him me from the train this morning. We set off at 10:34 on what was to prove a frustrating and slow day's cruising, some of it behind a pair of boats crewed by a large number of nice but inexpert young people. We were benighted below Sweeps Two at 16:38 after a quick chat with Roger en passant.

We were away at the first glimmerings of light at 06:10. By the time we reached Sewerage lock there was a glorious sunrise with the whole sky interestingly coloured, including at least three shades of green. We were on our own until Boxmoor Bottom lock, when a moored boat woke up and joined us, crewed by a pleasant couple with a sub-teenage son and his school-friend. We did some very efficient locking with them, so made good time and caught up with our original schedule. We moored at the top of Common Moor lock at 13:23 and I went home from Croxley tube station to go to the Mottingham IWA social

I was again delayed by transport, so we were later starting (at 10:30) than we'd hoped. We had foul weather all day. I worked all the locks and managed to get us through what was basically a bad road in remarkably good time.

We reached our mooring at the Club by 16:18, in daylight. I'd cooked a pasta sauce in between the last few locks, and we had plenty of time for supper before the Club AGM. Wendy didn't go to the latter, partly because she was a bit chesty and wanted to avoid the smokey atmosphere, and partly because Tilly was rather un-nerved by loud fireworks.