Visitors

Diane and Ray came as arranged to collect the self-pump-out kit to transport to NB Waiouru

A very pleasant couple of hours was spent getting to know each other and talking about the usual boaty things - toilets, secondary glazing, toilets, 2013’s cruising and other plans, etc., oh and did I mention … toilets!

Great to meet both of you and we look forward to our next meeting somewhere on the cut in the not too distant future.

After Ray and Diane had left we went for a walk along the Middlewich Branch of the Shropshire Union.  The wind was rather fierce again today and the return walk against it was a bit difficult at times! 

Not sure what they were doing - perhaps repairing a breach waiting to happen ...

… or just adding an extra stretch of piling?

No, this is not the sea, just the wind on the canal!!

Working boats Elements and Telford moored near the junction

A good day today!

Cheerio Nantwich

Yesterday (Tuesday) - 

Lucky to catch a glimpse of this flying narrowboat!

It’s time to go, new batteries fitted, ice gone and the forecast for Wednesday is 

gale-force winds of up to 40 mph

After popping into town to get last minute groceries and having some lunch we moved off to the water point; we needed fuel too but there was a boat already on that pontoon so we reversed back once the tank was full

Crusader shared ownership Venus with Colin on board moved forward for us to pull in behind to top up the diesel tanks and we were away.

We moved just 3 miles to Barbridge and were hoping to have a meal at the pub but the towpath was far too muddy to negotiate in the dark.

Sunshine today but the forecast was correct, the winds are ferocious - glad we hadn’t planned to move on again!

George had arranged to meet Colin in the Barbridge Inn this afternoon so we decided that we would have a meal out at lunch time. Instead of walking on the towpath over bridge 100 we walked towards the Middlewich branch, then over the next bridge, turned back on ourselves onto the pavement and arrived at the pub with clean shoes!

What a complete waste of time!  We’ve called in at the Barbridge for about 35 years both when passing by boat and by car whilst living near Chester and we’ve never been refused entry because we had a dog with us.  I was gutted!

Their loss ... and they must lose a lot too, from passing boaters and towpath walkers.   George walked me and Molly back to RnR and then returned for his pint - while I had a root round in the freezer for something for dinner tonight! Not a happy bunny!

A snow day that didn’t happen!

Yesterday the forecast was heavy snow starting around 1pm.  We were due to collect a hire car at 3 to enable us to get to Rose Narrowboats to pick up the new batteries so we contacted Enterprise Cars to get the car at about 11 to avoid the bad weather.

Taken at 9:30 yesterday morning - and that sky certainly heralds bad weather of some kind!

(I’ve even managed to get 2 buzzards in the picture - top let - click photo to enlarge)

The canal did freeze overnight but only very lightly and soon melted away with the shower water and the snow came eventually but in the late evening.  When we awoke this morning there was a fresh 3” on top of yesterday’s ice, but the air soon warmed up and we were good to go and set off down the M6.

We are now the proud owners of 4 brand new sealed unit batteries which George will fit on Monday after returning the hire car to Crewe.  Tomorrow is a visit to family whilst we still have the transport.

C&RT need boaters comments ...

Email received yesterday - if you are concerned regarding the overstaying on visitor moorings in the south of the area please read and comment.

Talk to us! I’m sending you this email because our records show that you are a regular or occasional user of the canals in our south east region.  It’s to invite your comments on proposals for changes to the maximum stay times at 22 of the most popular visitor mooring sites.  Jeff Whyatt, the waterway manager discussed these at his local user group meetings over the past couple of years and Julia Moore helped him with local discussions with representatives of boating organisations.  This resulted in a detailed schedule of proposed changes which we would like to start putting in place for April of this year.  More recently, our new board of Trustees and the Trust Council considered national policy relating to casual mooring along the towpath and confirmed, amongst other things, the importance of measures to improve compliance with visitor mooring rules. I hope you will take a few minutes to go to www.canalrivertrust.org.uk/consultations, read the South East Visitor Mooring proposals and send us your feedback using the special form.  You have until 1st March to do this. We cannot easily reach boaters without internet access so would be really grateful if you could help us communicate this message to others you meet over the coming days.  We can post out paper copies of the document and feedback form to anyone on request to 03030 404040. Many thanks and best wishes Damian Kemp Boating Communications & Consultations Manager Canal & River Trust

What fun!

We could here a motor on the towpath yesterday morning but it was a while before we raised from our cosy bed to see what was going on …

Looking towards the happy chappy we saw the above scene … has the machine fallen down the bank?

The ‘operative' returned - I wonder if this remote controlled ‘toy’ came in his Christmas stocking?

There it is - no driver - no driver’s seat either - and it’s mower!

Here he is (from Balfour Beatty) cutting on the offside bank, he looks very serious but I bet it’s quite good fun although I wouldn’t like to be ‘in control’ of such an expensive piece of machinery on the steep bank sides here at Nantwich.

The sun stayed with us for most of the day - you can see that it’s almost summer outside - a balmy 5.7 degrees - we’d no heating on in Rock n Roll at that time (we’d been out walking) but the sun’s rays through the window directly onto the weather station caused it to read 23 degrees!

Since converting from Windows to Apple Mac I’ve been trying unsucessfully to put a copyright type of watermark on the blog pictures.  I purchased Aperture which was supposed to do the job but it would only allow me to place a mark onto the photo, not to actually create one.  So we looked for something a bit more specific and came up with ‘Impression’ (£10) - very simple, does just what it says on the tin and voila it worked!  Good eh?

Wassat?

A really difficult one …

It’s sometimes on the boat and sometimes in your eyes!

But we’ve not seen much of it lately! 

Until today that is  - fan-bloody-tastic!

('Wassat' with the kind permission (I hope) from Sue)

Sorry, no prizes for guessing correctly!

On the towpath

 Molly and me looking back over Nantwich aqueduct ...

 … and continue on our walk

Thin layers of ice are starting to form in some places

A lonely snowman with toilet-brush hair ...

… and a very jolly one too!

Beautiful! 

48’ Narrowboat for Sale

James and Amy have officially put their boat

Lucky Duck up for sale

for more information

Click HERE

NB Waterlily for sale

Info from Nev today …

Due to unforeseen circumstances narrowboat Waterlily is up for sale once more

for details click on the link below ...

http://narrowboats.apolloduck.co.uk/feature.phtml?id=284510

Molly’s Snowday

Click on photo to enlarge!

Flying!

Both having fun!

Cream Crackered!

Coldy, coldy!

Life at Nantwich is very quiet and outside it’s been very, very cold from early evening until late morning although most of the day times have been sunny and around +6 degrees. 

We’ve still not been able to replace the batteries as the Chandlery here cannot get the correct ones to fit in the allocated space.  George has disconnected the two with a cell down and the power is holding up well on the two good ones.  We have been in touch with the guy who fitted our engine/battery system and ordered a new set and when they’re available we’ll hire a car for the day and collect them from Rose Narrowboats at Stretton Stop.

We’ve been in touch with the C&RT enforcement officer for these mooring and are ok here until tomorrow so we’ll need to contact her again to extend our stay.

We expected to have been frozen in this morning as there was a very thin layer late last night but no, amazingly the water is ice-free this morning!

A few pictures today ...

20 past 4 on Saturday from the galley window

Molly doing her meercat impression, she can walk/stand like this for quite a while and although you can’t see it she’s watching tigers on the telly ...

… and has now settled down to watch in a bit more comfort!

Sorry about the quality of the phone camera pictures even the iPhone 5 takes rubbish indoor ones.

These two were also taken with my iPhone 5 yesterday afternoon just before 4pm when out on our walk - not too shabby even if I do say so myself!