Category Archives: Architecture

Fizzing Sinks. 12th October

Trent Junction

Trent Junction was shrouded in mist this morning. It got worse as the hours went on, the sailing club opposite becoming a misty blurr by mid morning. No rush to do anything today. Mick was still snotty, but improving and so far, fingers crossed I’ve not succumbed to it. Papers were read in bed as the white mist enveloped more of our view.

Brandy snaps, Potato bobbing, underpass trees, contrary jasmine and frying pan discipline were subjects on the Geraghty zoom. Some people had views of the sky, others didn’t.

Chicken sausage sarnies for breakfast, not as good as a pork banger, but a more healthy treat from the freezer.

I spent much of the morning going through what flora we’d be needing for panto. So many roses and after the near mutiny a couple of weeks ago I’m hoping there will be enough money in the budget for what we need. I put together a long email with links and off it went to the Production Manager, fingers crossed.

Over the weekend Chippy posted a video across their social media with quite a nice view of my model.

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1D8BXXUZQ1

Emails about props started whizzing around again today, so hopefully things will get cracking.

Oleanna’s sinks needed some attention, a clean out of the pipes. A few days ago I bought some bicarb of soda and white vinegar. Reading up about it, you pour the bicarb down the plug hole, then add a similar quantity of vinegar. Pop the plug in and leave it for a while before rinsing everything through with a kettle of boiling water.

I had a go at the bathroom sink first. The bicarb took a bit of persuading to go down the plug, then adding the vinegar created an expected frothing, plug in quickly. I then took the shower plug to bits, cleared out all my hair, then did the bicarb and vinegar trick. This of course on the shower would only reach the section before the gulper pump. It was left to fizz, hoping it was doing what it’s meant to.

An hour later I returned to the bathroom, kettle poured down the plug hole and pump turned on. Well I’m not convinced it’s done much other than a chemical reaction, but it was fun watching the frothing!

**The end of Harrington Mill from the footbridge**

Time for a walk, somewhere I’d not been recently. I opted to walk up the Erewash to Long Eaton Lock. Here a footbridge spans the canal, but to reach it you have to literally walk around the houses to find it. Along Milner Road are a series of single story mills. These mills superseded the larger multistoried lace factories that are across the canal. The large factories were driven by steam and had built in fire breaks and staircases on the outer walls should a fire break out. These smaller factories from around 1903 had DC powered motors to drive the machinery.

Across the bridge into West Park. This is a huge park which gradually expanded through the decades, it started off at 17 acres in 1905 and by 1949 it had expanded to 127 acres. Long Eaton is prone to flooding, so the park is used as a flood plane capable of holding 67 million gallons of flood water which can then be slowly released into the Trent. The flood banks make for a nice walk around the southern side of the park.

I then walked down snickets (ginnels, alleyways). More factories passed and quite a selection of graffiti, the best artist being Soap. Then down towards the river across fields close to Sawley. I chanced walking across the golf course, only one shout of FOUR! I think aimed at me, I had waited quite a while and hoped to be out of all possible areas of golf balls. I didn’t get hit, so that was fine.

Back along the river bank to Trent Lock, the cooling towers looking quite majestic in the lowering sunshine. I came across an article the other day in the AJ about them. The Twentieth Century Society had applied for them to be listed, but sadly their application was denied.

Back at Oleanna there were more props emails to look at whilst I put together a roast pork slop, the last left over pork, onion, red pepper, mushrooms, and tomatoes, brought up to heat and then popped on the stove top. A long chat with Lizzie up in Crick and then the final episode of Blue Lights was watched. Now just have to catch up on Bake Off and start Riot Women.

**Sun setting at Trent Lock for the last time this year**

0 locks, 0 miles, 1 slow morning, 3 freelancers emailing away, 300 plus roses, 26 garlands, 1 box tissues blown, 2 sinks fizzed, 1 not so bothered cat, 99 minutes brisk walking, 1 nearly empty freezer, 1 last cooling tower sunset.

Kind Tissues. 11th October

Jingle Genocide. 4th October

Strop And Crow Bar.2nd October

2 Replies

Stoke Lock

**Containers of oil and stuff and things**

Mick cleared the engine bay before breakfast, anything that might get in the way was put on the bank. A phone call from Kane with his ETA came at just gone 9am and his satnav was pretty much spot on as he walked up to Oleanna at 10:25, a big crow bar in his hand and other tools and a new drive plate in his rucksack.

He set to work removing the gear box to gain access to the old drive plate. This all took a while. Before the last bolts were removed he passed a strop around the engine and suspended it all from his crowbar which was positioned on our stern lockers. Inside I could hear just about everything, as the last bolt was removed I could hear the engine slump just a touch into the strop.

Inside I got on with re drawing the gates for Panto. Once scanned it was sent off to Jamie to see what he made of it. I didn’t hear back from him today. I then turned my attention to a logo that is needed for the show, an adjustment of a very well known brand logo was needed. This was done and shared. Not many little jobs left to do on my to-do list.

Outside work progressed. The drive plate was removed. Yes it had been the culprit, not that you can see that easily without moving it. Time for a cuppa and for Kane to stretch his legs. His estimate the other day of three hours to remove the drive plate halved. Would putting the new one on be as quick?

**Lots of crud where the old drive plate used to sit**

Tightening things up in a confined space, engine suspended almost where it needed to be caused a little cursing from the engine bay. A few bangs occurred, at least he’d warned us they might happen. He’d had to remove the oil sump pump from the engine, this had failed on Mick at the last engine service. Mick asked if instead of putting the old one back on, could Kane install the new one we’d already got. It maybe took him an extra five minutes to fit, but he didn’t mind.

After three hours in our engine bay the ignition key was turned on. Oleanna was put into gear, no grinding noise. Then reverse, no grinding noise. Hooray!!!

Kane said the old drive plate would have lasted a while longer before failing, but best not to find out how long! Mick was given instructions to make sure some bolts were still tight in a week or so’s time with a 17mm spanner. Job done. Kane now headed off into Nottingham to his next job somewhere between Castle Marina and Sainsbury’s.

We had lunch. Should we move on today or stay put? If the river was busy with people looking for moorings we’d have moved, but as we’d only seen a couple of boats so far today and one of them had pulled away from the pontoon mooring this morning we didn’t feel we had to move. Also we were the only boat moored on the visitor moorings and there is space for four. As well as all that, C&RT had given us an overstay approval until 14th October. So we stayed put.

My walk today took me along the road from the lock to Stoke Bardolph. Plenty of anglers and someone being trained in paddle boarding. I then carried on walking along the road on the river bank towards the big bend in the river where I followed the footpath. Here the anglers had set up fences around their vans, I wondered why for a while, but then twigged when I saw a heard of cows. Maybe these cows are known to lick vans like those do to boats at Lechlade on the Thames.

Back along a path that crossed the railway. Was this the crossing where Tilly had been found nearly ten years ago with her siblings? Then into Burton Joyce village. A lovely village hall where the local amateur dramatic society have just put on a show. Several nice looking shops and buildings. I popped into the Co-op for some milk. A heritage trail to follow, maybe next time when it isn’t a five mile round walk. Back in February 2016 my brother gave me a lift to Burton Joyce to a house on the hill here. That was to pick up our little thug Tilly who we adopted from Burton Joyce Cats, they no longer exist.

At the station there is a pebble display to mark the Platinum Jubilee. Lots of local groups and the school contributed to it painting pebbles. I was amazed at the number of cats wearing crowns, then later realised they were actually Corgis! The Beef Eater certainly had very square shoulders.

Back along the road to the boat. Today I’d tracked my journey via the NHS Active 10 app, 87 minutes brisk walking; on my step counter 12110 steps just short of 5 miles; but also with the OS app. The Ordnance Survey app had tracked my route and said it was 5.42 miles. So which do I believe? Have I got my step counter calibrated correctly to my stride? Have I actually been walking further than recorded all year?

Walsall Schnitzel tonight, turkey that needed finishing off from the freezer. We discussed where we should go now and when. There’s a storm coming, so we don’t want to stay at Stoke Lock with all the trees. Would we have enough time to go that way or should we just stay pottering about for a while longer?

0 locks, 0 miles, 1 new drive plate, 3 hours, 1 new gate drawing, 2 logos, 1 rose email, how many? 1 last day of good shore leave for Tilly, 4.95 miles, 0r 5.42 miles, 82 brisk minutes, 1 huge gaggle, 1 mended boat ready to push off.

Ten Going On Fifty Six. 1st October

2 Replies

Stoke Lock

My favourite, Webbox for breakfast!!! It’s rare She gives me Webbox, but today She gave me some whilst She and Tom were still in bed! Result! Apparently it’s because today I am ten. I’ve been warned not to expect Webbox every morning just because I’m ten now. Did I mention that I’m ten, She thinks it’s important, I think I am still a cat.

Have to say the bag She had smelt very good, it smelt very very good indeed, in fact it smelt so good I tried to get into it the wrong way. Inside was a furry, feathery, yummy smelling thing that just had to be licked to death. She said she now regretted getting me something that would be covered in lickingness. But I’m ten today so that doesn’t matter.

After some biscuits I headed out to check on the outside. Yes it was all still there, plenty to climb and scratch around in. She says my nails are filthy, but I don’t care, that’s because I’m ten today.

An email to the Production Manager for panto was needed for a catch up, things were feeling a little bit too quiet in panto world. She didn’t reply but within an hour Jamie, the set builder, got in touch saying they were about to start. He has concerns about one piece of the build and would I consider some adjustments to it. He made a suggestion, hmm. Not ideal. I thought some, asked a question with a suggestion back. This then morphed into a hybrid solution which would require some redrawing.

**1st of the month, time to annoy the spiders**

After lunch with Tilly back on board I’m ten today! it was time to head to the water point. This morning RCR had called saying an engineer would be with us tomorrow morning. If we end up without a working engine at the end of tomorrow we want to be prepared, batteries topped up and a full water tank. However this would mean having to move with part of the engine soon to fail, add into the mix that we are on a river and fairly close to a weir!

I insisted that the anchor was laid out ready for deployment, not on it’s prongs, but there on the locker lid ready should it be needed. Things were moved out of the way. We discussed the plan of action. We untied. Mick pulled us backwards away from the trees at the bow, then gently nudged us away from the mooring, winding to head down stream. All went well and we were soon alongside the high wall of the lock cut. The stern needed aligning with a ladder, which Mick climbed, bow and centre line were tied. Hose passed up, a small adapter required for the tap, then we could fill the water tank. The pressure wasn’t too great so we were there for a while.

Next was the slightly more risky manoeuvre of returning to the mooring. The lock cut wasn’t wide enough for us to wind in, so we needed to reverse out of it. The grinding noise was worse in reverse, but Mick took it gently, then with help from the bow thruster we turned to head up stream and pushed on back to the mooring. No need for the anchor thankfully. Just as well as all day we’d only seen a couple of boats come past who’d have been able to give us a tow back to land.

Sock pair 104 were packed up and then walked to the post box I’d spotted the other day in the village. I’d considered walking further today, but I needed to try to get the adjustment to panto sorted.

The other day I invested in the program I’d used to clean up the print for panto. A one off payment rather than a monthly subscription. I scanned in my drawing and was able quite quickly to adjust the width of the gate curly bits. This printed out at the correct size so I could amend my drawing quickly. Brilliant. I’ll still need the drawing board out to finish things off, but far quicker than doing it all by hand. I just need to keep finding reasons to use the package and learn new uses for it.

Kedgeree this evening, well we had to have something fishy to celebrate Tilly’s 10th birthday, she’s nearly caught me up now as in cat years she’s most probably about 56. Tilly had salmon in gravy! I had requested, frogs legs, clams, tuna steak with a bit of cod’s roe on the side and a fricassee of shrew. She said that with our current engine problems they’d not been able to get to specialist fishy froggy shops and maybe I was better off self catering.

0 locks, 0.1 miles, 0.05 there, 0.05 back, 2 winds, 1 full water tank, 10th Birthday, 56! 1 catnip kicker, 3 shrews, 1 mouse, 1 attempt at a squirrel, 1 boat back on it’s mooring, 1 engineer in the morning, 1 more thing to okay for printers, 200mm lost from gates, 2nd day of waiting.

Up For Bargus. 27th September

If Anyone Is Interested! 15th September

Near Massey’s Bridge 12

Hello!!! If anyone is interested …. I’m fine, thank you.

My left arm was a touch sore but it has recovered nicely now with a bit of bed rest and gentle exercising, the occasional pounce has got it back in full working order. I get daily strokes and have no idea what all the fuss has been over Tom’s one. No need to visit the green Toms and Shes for me. Thank you Dave for your concern.

Today, however is a touch too blowy for my liking, even too blowy to sit on my throne under the pram hood, so it’s the window view for me today.

A touch too blowy! Understatement. I managed to sit it out for a few hours, the small willow trees opposite bending right over, the Hawthorne hedge giving us some shelter from the gusts. Mick tightened our ropes, not that there was much slack in them to start with. By midday I’d worked my way through panto references pulling out good images for Min the props maker, but I’d also had enough of the lumpy water. I was starting to feel a touch seasick.

Apparently the worst of the wind had passed over, so I headed out for a walk on solid ground. Up to the viaduct. I crossed the canal and then followed the old Midland Railway, Derby and Melbourne Line until it met with the Sawley and Western Line at Chellaston East Junction. Here I could hear the woofers barking away that we’d heard on our way west a few weeks ago, they were tucked away behind trees and a big fence. The Derby and Melbourne Line used to turn into the Derby and Ashby Line heading through Tonge which is 10 miles from Derby. The mile posts sponsored by East Midlands Electricity seem to cover both railway and canal.

I’d done my best to rush through the trees, but they’d offered me some shelter from the wind. I intentionally zigzagged my way along the open road, being in view of on coming traffic as well as avoiding trees and being blown into the road by possible gusts. It was a hood up day, even that needed hanging onto! Thankfully soon a footpath dipped away from the road to Massey’s Bridge on the canal.

Now on through the fields on the other side, low growing crops and some fields left after the harvest. A stile, an electric fence, a pile of beer bottles and cans! Someone had managed to get them all here full, why couldn’t they take them away empty!

An intentional line of trees, then a slightly ornate stone wall surrounded the destination of my walk today. Swarkstone Pavilion. I’ve seen it from the canal many times, looked at the details on the Landmark Trust website, but never managed to get this close before.

Thankfully the weathered oak gate isn’t filled in, so I respectfully had a nosy through it.

This was the location for an album cover photo shoot for Beggars Banquet by the Rolling Stones in 1968. The images weren’t seen by the band to be edgy enough at the time, they preferred graffiti on a toilet seat, however the record company didn’t like this either, so it ended up being just copperplate writing on a white invitation. One image from the photoshoot ended up being used as a promotional poster for the album. More info can be found here

**No chance of playing bowls today on that lawn**

The pavilion was built to give a grandstand view over what ever took pace in front of it, inside it’s stone enclosure, be it jousting, bear-baiting or bowls. It is Tudor/Jacobean and was built in 1630 by mason Richard Sheppard, designed by John Smythson. It belonged to Swarkstone Hall a great house which was demolished in 1750. It came into the hands of the Landmark Trust in 1985, they re-roofed it and put in floors so you can now stay there. Have to say I’m glad I wasn’t staying there today as to reach the bathroom you have to cross the roof terrace!

It is a wonderful building even though it is only just a bit deeper than it’s two towers are wide, so quite a skinny building.

I headed onwards to see what I could see, an old Tithe Barn which has been converted into a house. then across another field to St James’s Church. The church dates from the 12th and 16th Centuries and was rebuilt in the 1870s. Sadly today the doors were locked, I only just managed a peek through a door but couldn’t see much.

An angel in the graveyard warned me to look up. They were right as a chunk of the roof had recently come crashing to the ground. I kept my distance as I walked round and apologised to the residents below my feet.

I crossed back over the fields. The turn around staff at the Pavilion were just packing up their car to leave, the property ready for the next guests arriving later today. Sheep grazed in the fields. I returned to the boat along the towpath, discovering the possible culprits of us being kept a wake a few nights ago. Two chaps were busy sawing up big logs with a chainsaw. Along the towpath the wind had brought down a few more branches for them to claim. Maybe the sawing we’d heard around 1:30 in the morning had been them collecting suitable wood, hoping no-one would notice in the dead of night!

Back on board I managed to eat some lunch, my stomach having calmed down. Mick took a walk to the viaduct turning right to have a look at the River Trent. The wind hung around for much of the remainder of the day. Tilly didn’t venture far, in fact she gave up with outside and ended up having to use the still clean facilities onboard.

0 locks, 0 miles, 40+mph winds, 565642387686534 berries on the towpath, 1 pavilion, 1 church, 1 angel, 47 brisk blowy minutes, 2 chainsawers, 1 paint list, 1 props folder, 4 homemade chicken spring rolls.

Knock Loudly. 25th August

High Bridge Aqueduct to opposite Willington Services

Puzzles on a Monday morning again. I’m obviously out of practice as the first one got the better of me. Maybe next week I’ll do better. No rush to go anywhere today, other than to top up with water.

Boats were moving before us, some that had gone that way in the last couple of days were returning, maybe boaters out for the Bank Holiday weekend. Others still had a sense of purpose trying to beat the drought stoppages, although we are quite a distance away from the locks to be closed later today.

We pushed off, our main aim for the day to fill with water and hope to get a suitable mooring for a supermarket delivery in Willington. As I walked ahead I noted that the next slightly better mooring, further away from the road and railway was empty this morning. Ten years ago we sat here waiting for Dallow Lock to be mended, maybe we’ll return to it in the next few days.

The boat ahead of us winded and reversed back onto the service mooring, we breasted up, holding our place in the possible queue. A load of washing went on, enough water for that job and sufficient to give Tilly’s pooh box a refresh. A do-ci-do was performed once the other boat had finished and we could fill our water tank.

The bin enclosure was overflowing. Three Biffa bins, their lids unable to close and bags of stuff piled all around them. Years ago up on the Macc we heard from a CRT chap that when this happens the Biffa employees will not empty the bins, because they can’t get to them to empty them, their job is to empty bins and not lift bags of rubbish out of the way to get to them. As we filled with water, more people arrived and just added to the mountain, we wondered how long it had been since the bins were last emptied and how long before they were due to be emptied again? Every extra bag of rubbish left on the floor becoming a greater problem and expense for CRT who have to send someone with a van to move the rubbish and take it to a tip. This person could be doing far more important things than moving rubbish!

We kept our general rubbish, but made use of the food waste bin. Tilly’s litter could wait for another day or two and not be added to the mountain.

A boat moved off just opposite, the perfect place for a delivery, we were quick enough to grab the mooring and then placed an order with Sainsburys. Oleanna sat in the shade for a few hours before the bright hot sun moved to heat up the cabin sides. Sadly Tilly would have to remain disappointed as being right next to a car park meant shore leave would be cancelled for the remainder of the day.

**So near and yet so much piled up rubbish!**

During the afternoon a Biffa bin waggon arrived. Single handing, the driver looked at the compound, took some photos then left without touching anything. We then watched as more rubbish arrived and was left surrounding the bins, we also saw someone empty two cassettes, then leave them. They and the bags of cushions are not domestic waste.

Late afternoon when the temperature had started to drop I headed off to add more minutes to my walking today. I had a destination in mind.

Willington Power Station was actually two power stations, built between Willington and Twyford in the 1950’s. Power Station A had four 104MW generating units, each burning 1,000 tons of coal a day when on full load, creating 200 tons of ash. Willington B opened in 1962 with two 200MW generating units which burnt 2,000 tons of coal a day and 400 tons of ash. So when on full load the power station required 8,000 tons of coal a day the majority of which was delivered by rail. Power was delivered to the surrounding area as well as London and Bristol.

Willington A was closed in 1995 and B in 1999. The vast majority of the site was demolished, leaving the five cooling towers still standing boldly close to the road. There were plans to build 1000 houses, which were refused planning permission, but a new gas power station was granted permission. I can’t find anything about them being listed, they have survived for 25 years, maybe they’ll continue to be a landmark in Willington.

I obviously took many photos. Just what was the doorway used for all the way up there, only one handle to hold onto! You’d have to knock loudly. Eek!!!

Closer photos can be found on the 28 days later website, there are some great drone photos.

**Such pleasing shapes when the sky is blue.**

It was far too hot to do any cooking this evening so I boiled the kettle, made up some GF couscous, added the left over roast veg from yesterdays roast and a few other bits and bobs from the fridge, creating a very nice salad.

0 locks, 1.9 miles, 1 full water tank, 3 overflowing bins, 1 biffa visit, 1 clean pooh box, 1 empty yellow water tank, 5 sturdy cooling towers, 76 brisk minutes, £2.55 for blueberries, 1 shopping delivery, 1 hot day, how many more paddlocks and chains around lock gates from this afternoon?

https://what3words.com/interviewer.cones.bounding

Smoking Chimney. 24th August

Marston Visitor Moorings to High Bridge Aqueduct

A cuppa in bed with the newspaper, followed by the Geraghty zoom. Acorn coffee and flour, Jelly bags, underwater feeders, trench foot and not going out on a Bank Holiday Monday were topics this morning.

We were just about to push off to when a boat was heading towards us, we were wanting to return to the winding hole behind so waited for them to come past. However they were also turning, but then pulled in just beyond the narrow opening to Shobnall Marina as a boat was already tucked away in there getting topped up and emptied. As Mick brought Oleanna to the winding hole he soon aborted his manoeuvre as the boat that had seemingly seemed to be busy had now finished and was about to turn back out onto the canal. I went to chat with the other boat, yes they were heading in through the bridge for a pump out but we could wind first. I waved Mick on, he winded apologising to the anglers right by the mouth of the marina, he didn’t get a reply just a grimmace. What did they think setting up where boats are guaranteed to be turning!

Dallow Lock was neither full nor empty, I waited for Oleanna to be in sight before topping it up, it’s a quick lock to work so we were soon on our way hoping for a mooring around Bridge 29. We were in luck a space with armco a little way on, we pulled in and had an early lunch.

Whilst on the train the other day, I’d looked up what there was to do around Burton. High up on the list was a visit to Claymills Victorian Pumping Station. On further investigation we discovered that this weekend it was going to be steam! We are finally in the right place at the right time for somewhere to be open and with engines working away as they once did day in day out! Hooray!! We weren’t going to miss this.

At Bridge 29 there is a sign with directions to follow, it also says that if you can see black smoke coming from the chimney then it’s a steaming day. Sure enough there was a little plume of black smoke curling up to the sky. We crossed the busy road and headed on, the aroma from the sewage works drawing us onwards.

Back in the day, 1859, when Burton was making pints and pints of beer the River Trent was one flowing stinking river. For every pint of beer made the brewers put eight pints of used water back into the river. It stank and the river was dying. The first solution was to send all the waste water downhill to where Claymills was built. Here the sewage was left in beds so the solids would sink to the bottom, the cleaner water was then put back into the river. This however didn’t work, the river still stank.

The next idea was to pump the sewage to a farm 3 miles away at Egginton, fields in turn had a layer of sewage poured onto them, this was then ploughed in. It still stank! The next move was to add lime into the mix, this was mixed into the sewage, then the mix pumped out to the farm. The 27inch diameter pipes suffered, unsurprisingly with lime scale which had to be chipped out. Today nobody told us whether this process actually worked to stem the stench, but it must have gone someway to helping with the 20 million litres of sewage a day!

The pumping station operated with four beam engines, steam being provided by five Lancashire-type boilers. These were run on coal, but today they were trying out Bio Mass as an alternative. The pumping station is classed as a Traction Engine so it is allowed to burn coal, but should the day come when they have to stop, bio mass may well be the fuel they have to use. Today you could hear the numerous volunteers mumbling and some quite audibly complaining about the lack of psi the eco mass was giving, sadly not enough to get all four beam engines up and running, however B and D were busy pumping away.

Today you can walk into both engine houses, climb the spiral staircases and walk on the metal mesh floor looking down on those three floors below. I’m not keen on heights and after about five minutes up the top I’d had enough, the beam engines were amazing but their constant movement shuddered the floor.

Down to the rear of the engine houses between them is the Boiler House. Here several chaps sat about chatting. One fella was deep in conversation with another in overalls, should they add coal into the mix to get the pressure up? Another chap poked and prodded the boilers, topped the hoppers at the top up with more of the lumps of greenish bio mass, a hot place to work.

The pumping continued until 1971 when a new pumping treatment plant was installed next door, the Victorian buildings were left to decay. In1986 the buildings were listed and the owners Severn Trent appealed for volunteers to look after the engines, as a result the current trust was formed. During the years of decay anything brass had been stolen, various parts removed to other museums. Restoration work commenced in 1993.

By 2023, after 30 years of work all four beam engines had been restored to operational condition along with two boilers. They worked hard to bring back to the site other original steam engines, these have all now been restored and are back working on days like today.

The steam powered workshop has been restored, belts criss cross around the building providing power to all the machines. Next door is the dynamo house with its 1889 Crompton Dynamo, the oldest in-situ working dynamo set in the UK. If the bio mass had been giving them a higher psi then this building would have been shut to the public, only being able to peer in from behind a gate. But there was no danger of falling on live things today. Alongside the Crompton Dynamo with all its posh brass is a self built dynamo which was made from whatever the engineers could get their hands on. If you worked at the pumping Station and lived in site, you got free electricity.

Outside people had brought other items of interest. Numerous Austin cars, a Renault, a fire engine from Aldermaston, vintage varieties of apples, a cuddly woofer. Numerous people walked the site in overalls, from the age of nine to eighty something. Pulling levers, oil and grease ingrained everything except the apples and the polish on the cars. No fancy paintwork on the engines, just hard sweaty oily red, pumping pumping away, well apart from Engine A that needed more psi. What an interesting place and well worth visiting on a steam day if you can catch one of the seven weekends a year.

Back at Oleanna we wanted to move on away from the busy road, some shore leave required by Tilly today. Only a mile got us away, only just, from the A38 and the railway tracks, an hour and a quarter was awarded to the second mate. I set about sussing out how much less time we’d need the oven on to cook a spatchcocked chicken. The temperature outside had been creeping up most of the day, but our tummies were requesting roast chicken. I cut the backbone from the chicken, leant on the breast bone and flattened it. Pulled out the roasting tin that normally only gets used for roasting duck with it’s lift out rack, hopefully this would reduce the oven time by at least half an hour.

The chicken turned out very juicy, took an hour to cook, just a slight adjustment to get the other veg browned and job done, a Sunday roast without us getting too roasted ourselves. What a good Sunday.

1 lock, 3.7 miles, 1 wind, 1 smoking chimney, £10, £9 OAP, 4 beam engines, numerous other engines,1 Renault, 1 woofer, 361 volunteers, 8 varieties apple, 20 not 60, A not wanting anything of it, 1 flattened chicken, 2 beers, 1 good Sunday.

https://what3words.com/strut.scavenger.blissful

The Only Paper In Town. 23rd August

Shobnall Fields to Marston Visitor Moorings

I could hear an engine, Could this be him? I stopped eating my cereal and stuck my head out of the hatch. It was Brian on NB That’s It and he was going to pull in for a cuppa. We first came across NB That’s It at Sykehouse Lock a few years ago, then shared Johnson’s Hillock Locks and the Wigan flight with them a few years ago. They moor at Strawberry Island in Doncaster and were one of the leading boats of the Strawberry Fools flotilla that set off the Fund Britain’s Waterways Campaign Cruises this year, which we joined to go through Gainsborough on 1st April. Since then Brian and Jo have cruised down to London, honked their horns outside the Houses of Parliament, reached Lechlade, up to Torksey on to Boston, crossed the Wash, cruised to Bedford, waited for locks on the River Nene to be mended and now Brian is heading back to Doncaster single handing. Until yesterday he’d single handed his way from Peterborough to the bottom of Glascote Locks in 7 days to beat the stoppages, several flights of locks will be locked shut at the end of Monday, remaining that way until we have seen some significant rainfall over several weeks.

We’d spotted that our paths would cross, so had he, messages had been exchanged yesterday about returning our Middle Level windlass and key. This morning he’d already pulled into Shobnall Marina to top up with diesel, 200 litres (85p)! There was time for a catch up over a coffee, he can slow down now that he’s out of the danger zone. After an hour of catching up he set off again, todays mission would be to battle with striking trains!

***I’ve been up all these big trees now!***

Yesterday when I returned from Dawlish I’d spotted a boat we were looking out for, NB Jemima-D, Marc and Fabienne had spotted Oleanna and said hello to Mick, he’d just assumed they read the blog so hadn’t twigged that they were also new members of Cutweb an internet based Cruising Club that we have joined this year. I could see someone was outside, an ideal opportunity to go and say hello to them.

NB Jemima-D is a shareboat, or co-operative boat, currently with ten owners, but hoping to be back up to twelve owners soon. Marc volunteers at Harecastle Tunnel and they are watching the water levels dropping at that end of the Trent and Mersey. Boats are starting to sit on the bottom in Stoke. They were glad to still be able to cruise, but their boat won’t be returning to base for sometime. Maybe they’d get chance to do some of the Tidal Trent. It was very good to meet you and maybe our bows will cross again in the coming weeks.

Our two days on the mooring were up. What to do now? We opted to move up to just past Shobnall Marina onto another 2 day mooring. From here we can explore Burton, Tilly hopefully would have some friendly cover to explore too rather than having to climb the giant trees on the playing fields, I’ve got quite good at that! Great views from up there.

The moorings were empty, so we pulled up at the far end. A quick scout round, a busyish road through the trees and friendly cover, hopefully there’d be enough to keep Tilly occupied and away from the road. After lunch we walked in to town to go shopping for the next few days.

The Bass Pumping Station was used to pump water up from a well to be used in various ways in the brewing of Bass beer. Apparently there are another six such buildings around the town. Alongside the building is a now rusted away holding tank, it doesn’t look like it’s used anymore, but the water in Burton gave the beer a distinctive flavour.

We walked down to the Town Hall. Originally the Town Hall had been in the market square but by 1883 the building was deemed as unserviceable and demolished, the council taking to having meetings in a back room of the nearby Angel public house. In 1891 Lord Burton offered the use of St Paul’s Institute and Liberal Club for the council offices. 1894 saw an extension built, paid for by Lord Burton, providing more office spaces and a new council chamber. As the town grew the town hall needed to follow suit, so in 1939 a new four story Art Deco building was added again to the east, opening shortly before WW2 started. More info can be found here Link

Outside is a square, a statue of Lord Burton, now slightly hidden in amongst the trees. Next door is St Paul’s church which opened it’s doors in 1874 and was designed by James M Teale and Edmund Beckett Denison. It was paid for by Michael Thomas Bass, the church and vicarage costing £50,000 at the time.

We managed to find a light switch to have a look around. The organ in the south transept is now mostly empty, but it doesn’t half show off its looks, designed by GF Bodley in 1894.

Large tiles sit on pews in the north transept, these depict the life of St Paul and used to be part of the floor of the chancel. Deep stone carvings in the lady chapel mention Alexander Michael Bass who died aged 6. One window stands out from the others as it’s in memory of Phillip Lloyd Stockley, who was in a machine gun corps and died at Ypres, his father was vicar of the church.

This was to be the first weekend we’d be able to purchase a Saturday newspaper, sadly Lidl didn’t have a copy. We tried the Post Office which had a sign outside suggesting it sold papers, but it didn’t. I opted to cross the railway lines and head into the town centre to see if I had more luck there. Nothing in Sainsburys, so a longer walk was needed. This did mean I got to see quite a few breweries, the offices of Waterways World, the old and new fire stations and some yarn bombed bollards.

There is a trail of Burton Yarn Trent bollards that you can follow, I only found two of them but there are fourteen in all and their website has a pattern you can follow to knit your own cover should you want to.

I tried two newsagents and finally I found possibly the only copy of our chosen newspaper in Burton. When I got it back to the boat it turned out to have August’s edition of Harpers tucked inside, an American magazine priced at £8.99! Had someone hidden this there to pick up later for free?! Neither of us have found anything that interesting in it, but we are very pleased to have our first Saturday newspaper for what feels like months, there’ll be something to read in bed over the next couple of mornings, plus puzzles!

0 locks, 0.5 miles, 1 Fool on his way home, 2 Cutwebs, 2 BIG trees climbed, 2 outsides, 1 cat a bit too close to the road, 1 cat grounded, 1 newspaper hunt, 49 brisk minutes walking, 1 USA magazine, 10 chicken sausages in a tray bake, 1 town hall, 1 church, 1 plan for the next few days.

https://what3words.com/raced.duke.honey

Narrowboat Oleanna

Travels of Narrowboat Oleanna