First day boating again

29th April

There's post by Sheila just below this one, giving an account of our break in the Lakes, which was indeed extremely enjoyable. I can heartily recommend the Burn How Hotel in Bowness on Windermere.

Nonetheless, as Simon and Garfunkel said in 1970, "Gee but it's great to be back home" (I'll come back to the question of keeping your customers satisfied later).

After a good night's kip last night on our lovely, memory foam toppered bed, we made an early start to day. With her bottom free of weed, Sanity fairly zoomed along even in tick over, getting up to 2.5 mph at 850 rpm on the long straight stretch of the Cannock Extension.

I managed the turn onto the Wyrley and Essington without too much hassle. Apparently BW have spent £500,000 dredging the Curly Wyrley in the last couple of years, and it certainly shows. It used to be notorious for shallows and problems with strange objects underwater. Now it's nothing like as bad, though there are still the odd heart stopping rending noises from underneath in some of the bridge holes.

By just after nine we'd arrived at the service block and moorings at Brownhills. There were a couple of Anglo Welsh boats in possession of the services, so we tied a bit further on. We walked back to have a natter with a woman living on a boat in the arm alongside the services, and she confirmed that these are reasonably safe moorings, especially if you pull back onto the services (which are behind a BW locked gate) for the night.

We did a mega shop at Tesco, restocking the fridge and the veg drawer. Must say, after we washed the fridge yesterday before restarting it, it made me think that these self defrosting fridges are all very well, but they don't encourage you to keep them clean. With the old ones, you had to switch them off and clean them from time to time, or else you just couldn't get anything else in past the inches thick layer of frost.

It's a 24 hour Tesco here, but not very big. We got all the needful stuff, but I'm glad that we'll be passing the canal side one at Leamington Spa within the week, to pick up some of the more exotic stuff. We also made a couple of trips to the Wilko's that's here – this demonstrated that it's worth walking past the Tesco onto the main street, which has a range of other shops like a butchers and a bakers.

Finally, some thoughts about Canal Transport Services and Matt Cooper. Let me say straight away that he's a nice guy, aiming to be helpful, and seems to have done a good job of the grit blast and two pack blacking. He's used some stuff called Manor Coatings Promastic 600 CT, which from the descriptions on the website sounds like just the job. It can even be over coated with undercoat and gloss, for example around the tunnel bands.

The problem we had with him was the classic one about timing. I mean I know that Arthur Ransome said that the only boat builder ever to finish the job on time was Noah, who had a special incentive, but in fact some builders (Braidbar, especially now, and Stone Canal Cruising) do manage to keep to schedule.

With Matt, we'd said that we needed the job done in a window between mid April and mid May, because of our other commitments, and he'd made a provisional date for the week beginning 14 April. He then phoned at the start of April to confirm that, and we started looking at hotels for that week. The very afternoon when we'd decided on the Burn How, and were about to book and pay, he rang again to say his work had slipped back because of problems with the one he had on the dock at the time, and could he put us back by a week.

That was fine, in fact, as it got us out of the expensive and busy Easter week, so we booked for the week after. We actually arrived at CTS on the Friday before, after deciding not to do two nights at Anglesey Basin, and Matt then told us that Sanity would now be going on the dock on the Wednesday, but that that would still mean that she'd be all done by the beginning of the next week.

Off we went on holiday, and as I said, had a great time. The only thing was, it was a bit like having your car in for its MoT. You know how you spend the day anxiously eyeing the phone, waiting for the call from the garage with those dread words "I'm afraid we've had a bit of a problem, squire"?

Well this was like that, only it went on all week. In the event, we had a call on Thursday evening: could we put off coming back until Wednesday? Well, no. All right then, how about Tuesday, which I said we could probably cope with. Because things were reasonably quiet in the Burn How during the week, they were able to let us stay on another night, at the price we had paid via Lastminute.com (£114 per night).

When we got back, Sanity was indeed ready. Matt didn't seem to sense that he'd risked seriously inconveniencing us, and that it could have been a real problem. We won't be going back there, partly because of that, and partly because, compared to a lot of other yards around the system, it's just too much hassle getting up here.

If you are a leisure boater, and can give him a four week window during which you leave the boat there to be worked on as and when, I'm sure he's fine, but if you are a liveaboard, and have to make arrangements for somewhere to live whilst the work is done, you need to use a more reliable yard, I reckon.

Heigh ho, enough said. Tomorrow we press on to Longwood, probably stopping at Aldridge Marina for a service, then the day after it will be the long slog from there to Catherine de Barnes and away out of the BCN.

Getting ready for a week away

18th & 19th April

We've had a couple of quietish days here at Norton Canes. Compared to the rest of the Northern BCN, it genuinely is quite rural, but the A5 and the M6 Toll are not far away, so there's a fairly constant background of traffic noise.

Yesterday we walked into Norton Canes itself to check out the local bus situation. Examination of timetables at the stops and discussion with some locals waiting there established that our best bet tomorrow will be to walk right into the village to the bus stop outside the library, from where we can get one of four buses an hour into Cannock, whence we can catch a train to Windermere, changing at Birmingham New Street and Preston.

Back in Sanity we ran the engine and did a last washload. After lunch we set out to find some of the geocaches we'd identified. This involved quite a bit of exploration of an area of ex spoil heap covered with birch forest. Two caches were successfully located, despite the presence of various lads on trail bikes zooming up and down the sides of the hills.

Making our way back to the canal, we walked down to its junction with the Wyreley and Essington to find one last cache before coming home.

Nicely tired out, we had a quiet afternoon.

Today has been given over to preparations for leaving the boat for a week. The fridge freezer was turned off, and the freezer side defrosted and cleaned. We're keeping the fridge bit closed up to preserve the coolth in it until tomorrow. I've just about managed to use all the perishables up in good order – there might be an egg and some lettuce going spare tomorrow.

We've moved the plants onto the roof of an unoccupied boat, and sorted clothes, both for taking away, and as the start of the seasonal change round. Greatly daring, we've put the puffa jackets away in their compression sacks for the summer. When we come back, we'll probably get out the tee shirts and shorts in the hopes of a warm May.

And that's about it for the nonce. As I said last time, I'm taking a break while we're in the Lakes, but thanks to Blogger's scheduling facility, little reminders posts should appear every two days.

Joys of the Northern BCN

16th & 17th April

Secure at Longwood, we had a good night's kip the night before last. In the morning, Tom on Vivid III (he who had helped us up the locks the day before) gave me some advice on tying in Anglesey Basin. It seems there can be a problem with drunks wandering past the end of the basin during the evening; the trick is to come back along the canal a little way, to where some power lines cross overhead. There's a good hard edge and depth, presumably where there was a loading staithe originally.

We reversed back to the water point and topped up the tank, then set off onto the Daw End Branch of the Wyreley and Essington. We'd been warned that it would be shallow, and indeed it was. At times we were struggling to make better than 2 mph, with mud and muck swirling up beneath us.

Sanity slogged on – the GPS proved remarkably useful, as you could see what effect different engine revs had on the speed, rather than trying to guess by watching the bank crawl by. It didn't help that the weather deteriorated severely, becoming cold, wet and gusty.

I'd had the impression from enthusiastic accounts that the northern BCN was remarkably rural, not to say bucolic, but was sadly disappointed. From time to time there were some fields, but mostly the scenery was of unremitting suburbia, mixed with light industry.

At Daw End itself we had a little light relief to see one of the pubs, The Boathouse, advertising its "Riverside Patio."

This rather miserable state of affairs carried on all the way to Aldridge, where we pulled in to do a quick shopping trip. Trying to come into the side, I found a reef of silt just off the end of the side weir beyond Aldridge Wharf Bridge, and struggled to extricate Sanity by reversing off. I finally got in further along, guided by Sheila who had hopped off as we came through the bridge.

The light industry was particularly prominent here, not least because of the auto paint shop alongside the plastics moulding firm, so that the nose was assailed by a variety of long chain organic molecules. What with one thing and another, I was strongly reminded of Robert Falcon Scott's reaction when he finally made it to the South Pole:

"Great God! This is an awful place."

On walking up into the centre (about 10 minutes) Aldridge in fact seemed to be quite unexceptional, a typical bit of suburbia going about its business. I'm sure that the weather, the awful state of the cut and a last assault by my head cold, leading to a nose bleed earlier in the day, had biased me just a bit against the whole place.

Shopping done, we slogged on to Catshill Junction, where we turned right for Anglesey Basin. It's an interesting place, and we found Tom's mooring without trouble – indeed, you'd have difficulty tying anywhere else. The other serious option would be to drop a mud weight in the middle of the pool.

After lunch we found a quick cache, and set off to explore the Chasewater Country Park. We'd only made it as far as the reservoir dam when it started to teem down again. The reservoir looks seriously low for this time of year – it can't be the lack of rain, that's for sure.

Back at the boat we huddled down inside. There was a good internet connection, at least, so various bits and pieces could be done. As it got dark it got quite creepy, frankly. There wasn't much to be seen, but odd voices could be heard in the murk, and the absence of other boats made it all a bit edgy.

It's one of those areas which would be transformed by more traffic, and the presence of even a couple of other boats would have made all the difference. Perhaps once the Lichfield and Hatherton Trust has reconnected Huddlesford with Ogley Junction, this basin will see more visitors and become a good deal more welcoming.

As it was, we decided not to risk another night there, and came on to Norton Canes today. By way of recompense, as we left the basin, we spotted an unusual bird flitting about. Checking the guide afterwards showed that it was a Common Sandpiper, suggesting that Chasewater would repay some birding activity.

The water was much deeper for this bit of the trip, and better weather certainly helped. Ironically, we made our first trip down the weed hatch on the way, when I removed a collection of plastic bags and weed from the prop.

Brownhills provides some really good moorings and a Tesco right by the canalside. We're told by Matt Cooper here at NC that they are a safe overnight mooring into the bargain, as is Pelsall Common, just by the junction of the Cannock Extension with the W & E.

We got here just on lunchtime and tied to a trot of boats by the yard. Matt came across during the afternoon and discussed what we are having done. It seems Sanity will go on the dock on Wednesday, and should be all done by Friday. We are leaving her on Monday to go to the Lakes, returning the following Monday, so the timing should be just right.

I'll do a quick post on Sunday, but then take a week off. I've scheduled a reminder post to go out every other day whilst I'm away, with links to what we were doing this time last year, just so folk don't forget we're here.