Mike Stevens' UK Inland Waterways Pages

TRIP REPORTS : THE FELIS CATUS II YEARS

A DISASTROUS SUMMER : AUGUST 2001

Part 1 : The outward journey

Click here for information about our boat, Felis Catus II.

Earlier in the year we'd not done much boating, but had docked the boat for hull-blacking and had it re-painted by our friend Dave Young. The livery is much as before, but with better shades of the original red, green and yellow, and the sign-writing in bright white instead of buff. As new additions we have a feline version of the traditional "mouse's ears" on the back doors, and a legend on the back panel of the cabin saying "Croydon Canal Carrying Company".

We made a mini-cruise locally at Easter, and later took the boat to Canalway Cavalcade, but now we were to start our main summer cruise, whose targets were the internet waterways GIG (Great Internet Get-together) at Normanton-on-Soar and the National Waterways Festival at Milton Keynes. As is usually the case, I had a number of commitments which would require me to travel back to London from time to time, and Wendy would be going down to visit my Dad in Marlborough sometimes.

Wendy was laid up with an ankle injury, and had a meeting to go to next day, so Ian (an old fried & ex-colleague who once co-owned a boat with us) and I came up by taxi. We left the boat's mooring at Hillingdon Canal Club in Uxbridge at 13:11 and ran single to start with, then locked with nb Nutwood (from St Pancras) from Widewater to Copper Mill. Then we were single again. We saw my friends for "Nationals", David & Heather Howarth on Wild Otter at Denham (they had come past us at our mooring earlier). We stopped at Frogmoor wharf, Rickmansworth for shopping, then crossed to the other side for the night. Alan and Trish Akhurst were here with their working pair Archimedes & Ara, both in a smart new blue-and-white livery.

DAY'S RUN : 7.3 miles, 7 locks in 4 hrs 19 min

Archimedes & Ara were at the water point below Batchworth lock as we started at 9:11, but waved us past. I saw a squirrel at the lock. The day started grey and cool but became hot and sunny from mid-morning. We started with a bad road, and were running single. From Common Moor lock we met boats all the way which helped. We stopped at BW Apsley yard to deal with water & rubbish and to buy more supplies of beer at the nearby supermarket. After that we were running single again. At one point in the afternoon we had two Red Admiral butterflies sunning themselves on our water can. We stooped for the night below Bourne End lock at 18:31 and moored fairly close to the lock. There was no sign of Julian Tether's Idleness on the moorings....

DAY'S RUN : 11.8 miles, 23 locks in 8 hrs 35 min

….. because he moors above the lock, as we found next morning when we set off at 09:45. At Berkhamsted we stopped at the boatyard at 11:40 and bought diesel, but everyone there was too busy to help us with a few repairs we wanted seeing to. So we moved over and moored by the Crystal Palace. Ian did some shopping (including at Eastwood's, one of the finest butchers we know) while I was writing some letters, then we went to The Boat for lunch and had a drink with Mike Foster from the boatyard. Then Ian went back to FC2 while I went to see Lindy Foster about some things she wanted to talk about - the Berka Festival and some possibly-impending legislation. I went back to FC2 to eat, then we both went back to Lindy's for drinks later in the evening. Wendy decided not to come up until next day as her ankle was hurting after the day's meeting.

DAY'S RUN : 1.9 miles, 6 locks in 1 hr 57 min

Wendy arrived before we were up - hardly surprising after the late and well-lubricated return from Lindy's last night. Wendy rapidly discovered that we were having problems with the cold tap in the kitchen - it was hard to turn on and impossible to turn off. We set off at 9:20 and stopped very shortly at Waitrose, just above the first lock, for some veg shopping. After that, Ian & I worked all the locks because of Wendy's ankle. At Cowroast Marina we met a bunch of NWF types on their way to the National We had a pump-out, the other boats dealt with various necessities and we set off along the summit in convoy.

Near Bulbourne Ian's head appeared through the rear hatch asking why there was water in the back cabin. We stopped at the junction and traced the water to leak from the calorifier - either the tank itself or one of the connections to it. There was nobody at the dry dock from whom we could ask for help, so we decided to continue with the convoy to Marsworth. Denise Hill was moored there and had come up to lock-wheel for the convoy. We moored just before the former Ship Stores at 16:00. Lawrence Hobson from Pegasus, one of plumbers from the "National" had a look at the calorifier and thought it was the tank itself leaking. Wendy got on the 'phone to Grebe Cruises at Pitstone Wharf and arranged for them to look at the problem tomorrow morning. I went home for weekend to be at the Three Mills Rally.

DAY'S RUN : 7.2 miles, 15 locks in 5 hrs 3 min

Next morning brought a soggy awakening in the back cabin, and a swift run to Pitstone starting at 08:20. There they took the calorifier out, and said they couldn't get a new one (let alone one of the correct size) until Tuesday, but could by-pass the calorifier completely, so Wendy asked them to do that and order us a new calorifier to be fitted on our return journey. They also replaced the guts of the cold tap that was playing up, but couldn't deal with the leak on the spill-rack as their blacksmith doesn't work weekends. Nor could they look at the fridge or the gas regulator as their Corgi chap was crewing the trip boat.

Soon after Wendy & Ian moved off again, they saw our friend Roger Alsop on Comet on his way to Sharpness. FC2 was sharing locks with a 4-handed boat. Archimedes & Ara were ahead of them, but let them past at Slapton. There was a fierce thunderstorm for the last 10 minutes into Leighton Buzzard, where they moored at Tesco for shopping, then moved down to opposite Wyvern Shipping, the first available overnight mooring, where they tied up at 19:10.

DAY'S RUN : 8.3 miles, 11 locks in 5 hrs 10 min

Ian had the idea of putting newspapers down in the back cabin to absorb some of the wet, which helped. The weather forecast was hedging its bets, but Wendy opened the back cabin side-hatch in hope. They started at 08:10 and shared Soulbury & Stoke Hammond locks with a single-hander, then were alone for Fenny Stratford lock, which filled tremendously slowly. The weather was threatening at times but in fact stayed dry. Ian had a long stint steering after Fenny. At Willowbridge Marina they stopped to buy stern grease, then continued to moor at 17:50 before the Barley Mow at Cosgrove (Ricola helped them tie up). They arrived tired & dirty, filled the greaser and both had showers. They'd been leap-frogging Roger all day. I rang to say I was too tired to travel back that evening and would join them in the morning.

DAY'S RUN : 18.6 miles, 7 locks in 9 hrs 15 min

I rang and suggested a rendezvous at the bottom of Stoke Bruerne. Ian & Wendy made a soggy start at 08:50 just after Roger went past. At Stoke Bruerne bottom, Wendy rang me and found I'd just got off the train in Northampton, so agreed to meet me somewhere in the flight, as a potential partner was about to arrive. In fact I arrived while the boat was still in the bottom lock, sharing with Wyvern boat Snowdrop. A very slow Canaltime boat caused a delay, which angered someone from a downhill boat who thought we'd turned the locks round against him - we hadn't, just suggested to the people ahead of him that they should wait until we'd come up. In Blisworth tunnel we crossed several boats including Spey, whose Bolinder was recognisable at some considerable distance. Somewhere beyond Gayton we pulled a Blisworth Tunnel boat off the mud where they'd tried to moor on the off side. We felt too tired for the Buckby flight, so stopped early before Whilton bottom lock at 17:39.

DAY'S RUN : 21.2 miles, 7 locks in 7 hrs 59 min

Wendy overslept, so we didn't make as early a start as she would have liked, (actually 08:38) but were lucky with our partners up the locks - a very efficient crew of first-timers on a Blisworth Tunnel boat. At Norton Junction we turned right onto the Old Grand Union Canal (in modern terms, the first part of the GU Leicester Line). We had no real wait at Watford, just while I walked up & got clearance from the lock-keeper for us to proceed. After the locks I made a dog's breakfast of Husband's Bosworth tunnel and scraped the hand-rails. We tied up at 18:24 just before bridge 60 at Foxton, as at first sight the moorings beyond it looked full (they weren't). We had to change gas bottles (we were having to do this manually as the auto-switch-thingy doesn't work at the moment), but to our surprise the fridge re-lit with no problem. It was a pleasant evening for a barbecue.

DAY'S RUN : 24.3 miles, 14 locks in 9 hrs 46 min

At 08:11 we moved to the top of Foxton locks where Wendy had a chat with Crystal (one of the lock-keepers) while we were waiting for some up-hill traffic. We started down the locks at 08:59 and reached the bottom at 10:02, where we stopped at the boatyard for a pump-out, gas and bits of shopping. Once again the fridge behaved itself. We moved across the junction to take on water while I got ready to leave for a meeting in London, then Wendy & Ian set off again.

They were now on what was originally the Leicestershire and Northamptonshire Union Canal, heading North. Once they reached the locks it was a bad road most of the way. They had a partner, Bluebelle, for the last two locks. They arrived at Kilby Bridge at 17:35 and just found room between the built-up moorings and the bridge, as many of the boats heading for the gathering at Loughborough had already tied up there.

DAY'S RUN : 10.0 miles, 22 locks in 7 hrs 18 min