TRIP REPORTS

SUMMER 2005
Our last long cruise in Felis Catus II

Part 5 : A slightly longer trip as far as Ashwood.

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We resume the story with Felis Catus II in the Saltisford Arm.

The final leg to Ashwood

Wendy came up to do the provisioning & launderette (she used the facilities for the latter at the Canal Centre) and got an engineer to look at our engine which had been producing a lot of judder at low revs. He tightened up the engine mounts and said we ought to check them in a couple of weeks. I was going to come up after a day at the museum, but had a bad foot so decided to leave it till the morning.

My arrival was further delayed because my foot didn't feel up to use for a while. Once I arrived we set off, but it was already 15:30. At the bottom of Hatton locks we waited a while for a partner, but to no avail. We made a slow run up Hatton in blazing hot weather. We were running single and working the locks one-sided. That works well on these 1930s locks, as it holds the boat nicely into the side. At the top of the flight at 20:18 we were too hot & tired to go any further, so we tucked the boat in between the water point and the first boat on the long-term moorings. Too tired to walk to the pub, or to eat more than a light supper. There was a handsome tabby cat hunting on the towpath.

We set off at 06:23 on what started as a chilly, grey day. Our original thought was to stop by The Boot at Lapworth for breakfast, but we decided that was too far, so stopped at Turner's Green instead. There is now a proper visitor mooring here with mooring rings. The Tom o' the Wood has changed its name and is now The Wood. We went through the Kingswood Branch and had an uneventful run up Lapworth locks, with a bit of downhill traffic to assist. Soon after the top of the locks we were caught behind the hotel pair Dawn & Dusk who appeared to be having considerable problems with tight bends and shallows. This was fairly hair-raising for Wendy at our helm. We stopped at the Blue Bell, Waring's Green partly to let the hotel pair get well ahead of us, and partly because I'd always wondered what this pub was like. We weren't impressed, especially by the refusal to take food orders a moment after the advertised time. So we had one drink there and then soup & lunch on board.

When we set off again, we hoped we'd given the pair plenty of time to get ahead, and we passed them moored up just past Shirley drawbridge. By King's Norton junction it was raining. And once of the Worcs & B'ham Canal we only went as far as Bourneville visitor moorings (tied up 19:44). Our original plan was to head for central Brum, which I was still keen to do, but when Wendy saw a proper visitor mooring here, she persuaded me to stop. We hoped that the weather would keep the reputed vandals away, but there was no sign of them even when the weather turned into a pleasant evening "Red sky at night, Birmingham's alight".

Wendy was up very early and did the weed-hatch before setting off at 05:55, with me still fast in bed. We were very aware that we had a rendezvous planned with our friend Ben (an excellent lock-worker and fellow BCN enthusiast) later in the morning. An ominously bright start to the day gave us pleasant conditions for the run to central Birmingham. We tried to get onto a mooring just past Old Turn junction, but ropes at front & middle to the last two bollards weren't enough to hold us against a strong side-wind, so we reversed back to a mooring the other side, by the Sea Life Centre. Wendy cooked breakfast while I went for a photographic walk. Central Brum's canalside is now remarkably full of flower tubs etc.

We set off again in deteriorating weather, to our rendezvous with Ben at Galton Bridge, Smethwick, where it proved very difficult to moor because of lack of edge-dredging, We tried backing into the new tunnel and found enough depth to get the back end to the bank, just as Ben's voice hailed us from the bridge. A few moments later he appeared on the footpath and we were off again.

The weather continued to get wetter and wetter - at times quite torrential.

We turned off the BCN main line at Dudley Port junction and went through Netherton Tunnel and Windmill End Junction onto the Dudley No.2 Canal, then at Park Head joined the Dudley No.1 Canal. We stopped at Merry Hill and Ben & I went for a pub lunch (not very remarkable) while Wendy make a quick trip to Sainsbury's and ate on board. We resumed the journey at 14:36, still in filthy weather. Ben (as always) was a tower of strength through the locks. There was a boat ahead of us down Delph, and drawing further ahead all the time, so they were working even more efficiently than we were, but it still meant that we had a bad road for the whole flight. Shortly after Delph junction (now on the Stourbridge Canal), we passed the boat that had been ahead of us - Whiskered Tern from Alvechurch, flying an ensign we didn't recognise. By the time we reached Leys Junction the weather was alternating between quite pleasant, almost sunny, conditions and torrential showers. We had a good road for the first half of the flight, but not thereafter. From Wordsley junction our original plan was to go into Stourbridge Basin and for Ben to go home from there. But he decided it would be quicker for him to walk back up the flight as far as Glasshouse Bridge and catch a bus to the station. So we moored immediately past the junction in a brief sunny spell. Very soon there was a boat coming down the locks, and Whiskered Term appeared. As they came past, I enquired about their ensign and learnt that it was that of the Royal Norwegian Sailing Club.

We made a leisurely start at 09:21, in sunny conditions after we'd had breakfast and I'd taken some photos. We had a bad road down Stourton locks, but we met a pleasant lock-wheeler from another boat at the bottom lock. We emerged in to the Staffs & Worcs in the middle of a procession, in which we replaced a boat that had turned up the Stourbridge. Two locks northwards, we turned into Ashwood Basin and pottered slowly through the main marina to Orion's section (Orion Narrowboats, who were building Felis Catus III, lease one section of the marina). I helped Richard Ibbotson (boss of Orion) move another boat to create a gap the right size for us to moor in. Then we looked at progress on FC3 and had a talk with Richard before he took us to the station