Category Archives: Nature

Down Hill To Yorkshire. 8th January

Morton’s Bridge 56 to Ross Bridge 74

At last we woke at a suitable time, and before the alarm clock went off!

Pushing off just before 10am we made our way to the top of Foxton just passing NB Isolnian, The Coffee Boat before they pushed off themselves. Both boats wanted water and the two taps obliged. The lady from NB Isolnian walked down to find the lock keeper to book us both in, there was a 70ft boat on it’s way up so there would be a bit of a wait, so there was no rush to fill our tanks.

A cheeky robin looking for crumbs hopped aboard Oleanna. He sat on the tiller, then the pram hood, then made sure that we’d noticed him by sitting on the rope Mick had just untied to move us up! Sadly by the time we’d found a fat ball he’d been scared off by a big group of walkers. As the top lock filled for the boat coming up a crow decided that he’d have a try for some tasty morsels, he had no luck either.

Once the top lock was clear it was our turn to head down. Another boat was starting to ascend in the bottom staircase, but as we were being followed down they would have to pull over between the staircases for both boats to pass. The sun was shining, what a day to do the flight!

Three volunteers were on duty and glad that there was a busy spell, yesterday there’d only been one boat, the rest of the time was spent drinking tea and re-reading the newspaper. Despite it being a cold January day there were still quite a few gongoozlers. A foreign couple who’d never seen a lock working before never mind a narrowboat, they asked lots of questions, all intelligent. Not once did they ask if it was cold, but they did wonder how we got our shopping.

My favourite gongoozlers were a Grandfather and Granddaughter who stood and watched us for quite sometime. He looked like he was explaining how they worked, all the time with a five year olds glinting look of excitement in his eye . As the water levels equalised I could hear a quiet argument going on between them. He was so obviously chomping at the bit to open a gate and she was saying he couldn’t just do it. She was getting a touch irate with him, ‘You can’t just do it without asking!!!’ So I asked him if he’d like to help, that gate was opened immediately, just a shame that he didn’t stay to close it again!

We reached the bottom chamber of the top staircase before the one coming up had got into the top chamber of their staircase. So I had to wait for them before I could lift my paddle. At Foxton and Watford staircases you always lift the red paddle before the white one, this fills the bottom chamber to the same level as the side pound. When the white paddle is lifted this empties the top chamber into the side pound. When both chambers and the side pound are all level then the gates will open between the chambers. So when you reach the pound between the two staircases (where it is possible to pass another boat) the red paddle is situated at the top of the bottom staircase and the white one at the bottom of the top staircase. If you are doing the flight on your own you have to walk round to do one before walking back to do the other, but as a boat was coming up I just had to wait for them to start filling their lock before emptying mine.

Once everything was level they came out from their lock and pulled into the side. Here they would sit whilst we went past followed by NB Isolnian, then they would be free to carry on up.

At the bottom lock a chap with a windlass in his hand said to leave the gates open as a boat was waiting to come up. I suspect he was with another boat, second in line and was just being helpful. However I insisted that we closed the gates as otherwise someone would have to do some reversing to let Isolnian out of the flight.

At Bridge 61 many people were enjoying the sunshine as we turned left under Rainbow Bridge and towards Leicester.

Today we started our descent to Yorkshire. It’s almost downhill all the way, Keadby Lock being the exception as we’ll be going up there from the Tidal Trent onto the Stainforth and Keadby Canal. This level fluctuates with the tide, but from the top of Foxton we’ll have descended 125m to be at sea level. From Keadby the border into South Yorkshire is between Maud’s Swing Bridge and Medge Hall Swing Bridge which is just over 6 miles west, almost 128 miles away from the top of the staircase locks. At least today we managed to tick off 10 of the 65 locks of the journey.

The countryside looked beautiful today, the greens so lush and the sky bright bright blue. The Riverknits boat was moored with a great view across rolling hills, but Becci wasn’t in to say hello to, just as well as I’d have been tempted to buy some of her yarn. We pootled on meandering our way around the SSSI. It’s the first time we’ve been this way in winter and the views that the hedges normally hide are wonderful.

Saddington Tunnel was clear all the way through a lot of cutting back has happened here, we only just managed to squeeze through when we headed south the year before last. Despite having worked up a sweat doing the locks in all my layers we were now getting cold, the thought of the warmth indoors was appealing so we pulled up and had a late lunch, letting Tilly enjoy the sunny afternoon outside for a couple of hours.

10 locks, 2 staircases of 5, 6.08 miles, 1 left, 1 topped up water tank, 1 cheeky robin, 1 bold crow, 3 volunteers, 1 eyed 1 legged lock keeper, 0 chilled medication available today, 1 tunnel, 0 bats, 123 miles 55 locks and 125m to Yorkshire.

https://goo.gl/maps/R9n4EGFo93D2

Bugs, Bees and Bones. 21st November

Aristotle Bridge

The weather wasn’t conducive for a return visit to Blenheim today, we’d only be allowed into the park anyway as Christmas displays were being installed. So instead we decided to head back to the Natural History Museum we’d only glanced at yesterday. The walk there was bloomin’ chilly and we were glad of the small amount of heat once inside.

We suspect the museum has been updated from it’s original Victorian self. Here is where in 1860 representatives of both the church and science debated the subject of evolution. Stone carved scientists look down on the exhibits and those viewing them, making sure all is in order.

There are still display cases of insects, birds etc, but the contents have been modernised. The large displays, dinosaur skeletons and other bones sit in the main aisles on the ground floor with stuffed birds and fossils on display around them.

On the first floor there are displays of insects and bugs.

Here a Bacteria exhibition gets you to match the good with the bad and see which ones would win in your gut. An artist took everyday objects and pressed them onto petri dishes to see what bacteria would grow. From these she has then crocheted in minute detail the results. It took a while for me to realise that they were made up of the tiniest of stitches, it’s amazing what a pretty result a plastic unicorn gave.

Also on the first floor is a bee hive. Not your normal type, but one built for display. A large glazed area means that you can see straight into the hive. Today those bees near the top, seemed (we hope) to be asleep. But those nearer the bottom and the outside world were more active, a constant movement from these could be seen, enough to make you back squirm. The display case sits on top of a perspex tunnel that leads to the outside world where they plan to add a roof top garden for the bees. Through the tube you can (on a normal warm day) watch the bees heading off and returning with pollen on their hind legs.

Other living displays sit in glass cases around the gallery. Stick insects and spiders, although one spider did seem very absent. Tilly would have liked this floor, but I suspect these spiders would have fought harder than the normal eight legged friends she finds!

Several things stood out from the collection.

An Argonauta nodosa shell collected in 1786 was stunning. It is the shell of a pelagic octopus and must have been about 10 cm long. Isn’t nature amazing when it produces something so beautiful.

Butterflies with their incredible markings.

Dragonflies that have lost their colouring through the centuries and one for Tilly, Mayflies Yo-yo flies!

We’d maybe seen the more interesting bits yesterday, but the building kept giving more angles to view itself.

The individual pillars of British stone continue upstairs, these originally cost £5 to have made. It was hard to choose which was our favourite and astounding that so many similar stones in name could look so different.

We had arrived later in the day, so as the sun started to set the lights inside brought out new details and emphasised the soaring arches above our heads. The building was upstaging all of the exhibits.

0 locks, 0 miles, 0 bridges, 2nd visit, 1 guided tour of Pitt Rivers, 2 many words, 45367 bees, 128 rocks, 192 capitals, £5 each in 1850, 0 Pink Zebra Beauty Tarantula, 1 freezing day, 3% of Antarctic glacier ice is made from Penguin urine!

A Rare Pleasure. 6th September

Welton Hythe to Flecknoe Field Farms Bridge 103, Oxford Canal

Few people like two way tunnels, even fewer like those that have dog legs in them. Braunston Tunnel has quite a big kink between 400 and 300m from the south portal, we know where it is and try our best to avoid meeting anybody there. Today we decided to see if we could get through the tunnel before the masses started to move. So the alarm clock was set, cuppas made to drink on the way, rather than in bed. The sun was low in the sky and we definitely needed our extra layers on. Such a lovely start to the day with that autumnal feel in the air.

We were at Norton Junction by 7:40am. Here the hire boat we’d followed yesterday were filling with water, had they known what laid ahead they would have waited to fill their tank! We rounded the bend to see a boat tagged onto the end of the new armco that is being installed. So long as the depth is suitable this is likely to become a new favourite mooring for many as the view is great. All the hedges are fighting to hold the mass of red berries now. A red glow lines the canal at times.

A sudden flash of blue, then another. Two Kingfishers having a bit of argee bargee wove around each other in front of us for a short while, of course no where near long enough to turn my camera on let alone take a photo! In the morning sunlight their backs were more a turquoise than the usual electric blue.

As we approached the tunnel we could see a blue t-shirt and life jacket start to walk towards us. We were arriving at just gone 8am.

Braunston Tunnel is a broad tunnel, so two narrowboats can pass each other (except when they biff into one another at the dog leg). However if you are in a widebeam you need to book passage so that traffic can be held back at the other end of the tunnel. Passage for widebeams is at 8am and ahead of us there were two of the big brutes. The C&RT chap came to chat, it turned out that we had arrived at just the right moment. The widebeams would take their time to go through, so as we would be much faster we’d be allowed to go through ahead of them. We just had to wait for two coming the other way. As we moved to the front of the queue to wait our turn we could see the lights coming towards us, not far away.

First a Calcutt hire boat popped out, they had also arrived at a good time. The second boat was a cruiser who hadn’t wanted to meet a narrowboat in the tunnel as if there had been a biff, the cruiser with it’s grp sides would have come off a lot worse for wear.

We were then given the thumbs up by the man in blue. Life jackets on, tunnel light on, cabin lights on and big torch at the stern. We were off, happy in the knowledge that there was no chance of anyone coming towards us. On entering the south portal we hit a wall of fumes and then very warm air that steamed our glasses up for quite a while. About a third of the way through the noises changed in the tunnel, we could tell we’d been joined by another boat behind. Two big lights on the bow, no need for them to be focused up at the roof as the likely hood of a widebeam meeting anyone coming the other way is very slim. As we got further north the temperature dropped and by the time we were coming out the other end it was cold to say the least. We pulled in at the end of the moorings and settled down to have breakfast having enjoyed our tunnel trip, knowing that someone knew we were in there is quite reassuring.

Knowing that the two widebeams were likely to be followed by the hire boat we waited for them to arrive so that we could share Braunston locks. This took quite some time. First the blue widebeam came past and carried on down the flight. We waited, and waited, and waited. How long was the other boat going to take to come through? At least an hour and twenty minutes had passed from us mooring up before the very wide widebeam pulled up, using his thrusters so much it made us wonder if the boat had a tiller at all. A few minutes later the hire boat appeared, waved on by the C&RT chap at this end of the tunnel. We made ready and pulled into the lock to await our lock buddies. However after an hour of sitting behind the widebeam they needed a break and some fresh air, so pulled in themselves. The lock was in our favour and boats coming up, so we set off on our own. As the Lockie said you can’t make someone do the flight just because it’s ready and waiting for them, certainly not after lungs full of someone else’s fumes.

Working our way down we passed several boats coming up, all very well timed. On reaching the lock by the Admiral Nelson it was half full. One of the bottom gate paddles hadn’t been shut properly so it was gradually draining. No one was heading our way so I topped it up and down we went. We were now following another boat, the lock ahead was empty and had been left open for one coming up. Perfect timing again as I’d spotted wool hanging from the grab rail of Riverknits boat moored just above the lock. Becci came out to check her wool and spotted us, so time for a chat and catch up in person rather than just virtually on Instagram.

No reason to stop in Braunston, we still have some bangers (anyway they are not gluten free!) we carried on to Braunston Turn. The Midland Chandlers mooring was so full, one boat had tied up their stern and left the bow to drift, ‘Won’t be a minute mate!’ to pick up some new ropes. He wasn’t blocking our route, so we didn’t mind as we veered to the left under one arch of the double bridge. Now we just needed to find a suitable mooring. There are plenty to choose from if you don’t want to be by a road. We carried on hoping to find one with a gap in the hedge for a view.This being the Oxford Canal, gaps are few and far between, so in the end we opted for a good view on the off side and pulled up in time for lunch.

6 hours! Brilliant, then it started to rain, even more Brilliant! We closed up the covers leaving Tilly access at the back. The afternoon was spent stewing apples, jointing a chicken for the freezer and then the drawing board came back out, time to do proper working drawings for Panto. Boats came past the crews getting very wet, it wasn’t until after 4 when the hire boat came past, good job we’d not waited for them. The stove was lit and we enjoyed our first Blackberry and Apple crumble of the year. We just need to top up on berries tomorrow so that there can be a couple more waiting in the freezer.

Our friend Frank has been trying to send me a photo for the last week by text. With the signal around Crick I kept getting messages informing of the message, just not the picture. Frank kept trying and we kept waiting wondering what was so important to persevere. Had he found a stash of ancient coins and jewellery whilst digging his garden? Had he won the Lottery? Had he died his hair red? Was he wanting to show us a wonderful bit of marquetry he’d just done? Had someone we’d not seen for years been to visit? Had the tide in Scarborough gone out so far that it had revealed the location of Atlantis? Well at last we got to see it. Scroll to the end of this post to see what was so important.

6 locks, 7.62 miles, 1 right, 1 left, 1 way tunnel, 2 fat boats, 2 sheets of drawings, 4 soggy paws, 1 box full of interesting things, 1 cat about to loose her nose! 1st crumble, 1 stove lit, 23 apples plopping from the tree behind.

https://goo.gl/maps/vyGmosn2tDH2

A plastic jug full of Blackberries!

Free Range. 19th March

Wheaton Aston

By this morning most of the snow had melted, the birds were busy at the fat balls, when Tilly wasn’t near! The local Sparrows had her sussed and sat high above her in the sideways trees watching until she moved elsewhere then they would take it in turns to peck away until she returned. We ended up with quite a crowd, Robin, Mr and Mrs Blackbird and getting on for 14 Sparrows.

The sun was out, but the wind was still quite biting. We’d already made the decision to stay put today long before we had a notice about a tree being down ahead of us. Being beside a road leading to the service block we’ve also taken the opportunity to place an online food order. Originally it was due to arrive today, however the website had got confused about a couple of vouchers it said were out of date and we had to remove them from our order. All fine, except they were nowhere to be seen to be able to remove them! We tried and tried but had no luck in finding them, so Mick raised it with their online help desk. Sunday afternoon we received a call from them, they would process our order for us which they did straight away, shame they didn’t pay for it. But by now all the delivery slots for today had gone off the website, so it was arranged for Tuesday instead.

Sitting about we decided to open up our wallet and pay for Oleanna’s new C&RT license. Making use of the 10% early payment discount (this will be reduced in the next few years to 5%) we handed over almost £1000. Next will be her insurance and hopefully new batteries (fingers crossed), the next few weeks are going to be expensive ones.

With Tilly back indoors we headed out to buy some broccoli for our dinner. A walk into the village isn’t far, but we decided to go the long way round.

Along the towpath heading south, passing the lock and through the first bridge. A boat was just pulling away, we hoped that the fallen tree had been cleared ahead of them. At the second bridge we crossed over the canal and walked along a track which then took us into a narrow wooded area between fields. The sun low in the sky cast shadows and gave an ethereal feel to the spinney.

At the other end we joined a path that led right across a field busy growing green shoots. We started to be glad that we’d bothered to pull out our walking boots as under foot was somewhat sticky, but nothing compared to Stockings Lane which was to lead us back to the village. Here we could have used waders to get through the thick sticky mud. Walking through the puddles in the end proved to be the safest route.

As we came into the village up ahead was what at first looked like a very trendy barn conversion. The old frame seemed to have different coloured smoked glazing in it’s wonky gaps which caught the light in different ways, all melding with the darkened oak frame. But as we got closer I wondered how good the prescription in my new glasses was. There was no glazing, just holes in a very old barn that stored various bits of farm machinery!

The village has two shops, our route brought us out by the Spar shop opposite the church. Here a good selection of fruit and veg greets you as you enter. They also seem to stock quite an array of non standard things. Local meat in various marinades, asparagus (not popular with the locals), brioche of every shape you could think of. They sold us our broccoli and we were on our way.

Passing Bridge Farm we decided to purchase some of their free range eggs from the farm house. We’ve been moored opposite these cluckers for a few days, so had to sample their produce. Considering there are a lot of chickens on the other side of the winding hole, they are all very quiet.

Due to the breach NB Halsall has had to change their normal route. This is usually the Four Counties ring with added bits once a month, down onto the Weaver and up to Chester. Now their route will be the Four Counties U which they will cover once a month. They had been part way up Heartbreak Hill when the breach happened and our bows were set to cross early this week. With their new schedule they have turned back to cover the north east side of the U first, so won’t be with us for another week, by which time we need to be further south. So having seen that Turners Garage had just had a delivery of Calor Gas, he also sells coal, we will stock up here tomorrow before moving off.

0 locks, 0 miles, 2.6 mile walk, 12 birdies taunting me! 12 month licence, 1 head of broccoli, 6 free range eggs, 4 boxes on order.

Narrowboat Oleanna

Travels of Narrowboat Oleanna

Category Archives: Nature

Down Hill To Yorkshire. 8th January

Bugs, Bees and Bones. 21st November

A Rare Pleasure. 6th September

Free Range. 19th March