On the Road Again: June 11 and 12

11 June

We had breakfast at 6AM and then moved off to a nearby water point to top up the water tank. It's recommended that you do that every two days. The sewage tank has an alarm on it and the diesel should last two weeks.

Then it was three locks before hitting the Harecastle tunnel. We had to wait for a couple of northbound boats to exit the tunnel and were given a briefing by Derrick, the tunnel keeper. While waiting our turn Derrick pointed out to Lynette the original tunnel on the right of the current tunnel and also that there was another tunnel around and above the old tunnel.

The tunnel is just under 3000 metres long and is supposed to take 45 minutes, based on a 3 – 4 mph speed. When we took off Derrick told Jim to accelerate a bit and we zoomed through in 30 minutes, which is right in the speed range. We wore raincoats and life jackets as recommended. There were a few drips etc along the way that Jim encountered. Sue and Lynette were sitting in the bow and were quite often sprinkled with drips. They could see growths and wet areas on the tunnel roof and sides and were able to see wet areas as they came up, something Jim couldn't see as he had to concentrate steering. There's a drawing of a skeleton about 475 metres inside the tunnel, but we were going too fast for Lynette to photograph it. The tunnel is 14 feet wide, twice the boat width, but being round you don't have all that much room to play with. It's been built in several stages and it looks like the diameter, or at least the height, changes by up to two feet. Jim had to bend down in several places.

The narrow boat has a forward facing lamp and with all the interior lights on and curtains open, there was a reasonable amount of light, but it required continual movement of the tiller from one end to the other. The exit, in the south, was visible most of the time. Sometimes there was an additional noise as the exhaust ventilation fans came on.

Someone asked how the locks work. Yesterday we put a few lock photos on this blog, so here's something to make sense of them. The boat yards always give good instructions before letting people take off in their boats and you are always worried about how you will actually cope but once you get out and start operating the paddles and the gates it all makes sense and if you are at all unsure there are always experienced people in other narrow boats and almost always they are very helpful.

Canal sections are flat, level collections of water, normally wider than 15 feet, that run over distances from 100 yards to several miles. Water doesn't flow in either direction, it just sits there. To make the canals into a useable waterway, they use locks to change the water levels, between A and B. If you are going from A to B and B is lower than A, here's how things work out.

Somewhere there will be a level change between the canal section that ends at A and the next section going to B. That's there there will be a lock. A lock is a concrete box, about nine feet wide (just two more wider than the narrow boat), which has moveable ends on, and which you fill with water. When you come to a lock that is empty of water and the output level is lower than where you are, you have to fill it with water, so that you can sail into it. First you check that the output gate is shut, otherwise the lock won't hold anything. Then on the input gate, or where you are, you open the “paddles” which are valves that let the water from the canal into the lock. (They are probably called paddles, because they are flat like the paddles that were used in butter making.)

Provided everything is OK, the lock will fill up with water until the lock level is the same as the canal from A. Then you can open the gate and sail into the lock. You must now close the input gate and the paddles. Your boat is now in a small 70' length of the canal called a lock.

Now you go to the output end of the lock and open the paddles to slowly let the water out of the lock. When the lock water level reaches the same level as the next section of the canal, the gate(s) can be opened on that side. There's still enough water in the lock for the boat to float and you sail out and moor up while the crew close the gates and lower the paddles. Locks can range in lift or drop from five to twenty feet. It's a very smart system. You do get a little movement of water down the canal, a lock full every time a lock is emptied, so the water is not stagnant, but a bit murky. A canal makes the Wanganui river look clean. To ensure the canals never run out of water or overflow into the nearby land, there are reservoirs and spillways at various locations.

While there were fewer locks today for Sue and Lynette to operate they were very, very stiff and hard to operate. Some of them needed greasing. One experienced canal operator told Lynette & Sue that the reason why they were so hard was because a renter earlier had got grease on his clothes and complained so the order went out to stop greasing the paddles!!!

It was another beautiful fine day, after a cooler start. We noticed a temperature sign at Longport which read 20.7C. Certainly warmer than Hikuai.

Lynette and Sue walked around Middleport, (which adjoins Longport), and had an interesting time. Near where we moored on the canal there were a number of abandoned shops and buildings. The quest was on for a dairy or supermarket where they could get bread, butter and gardening gloves (these are necessary to help their hands when they were operating the paddles. It took them 1 ½ hrs of walking. No signs for town centre so had to ask a man in a mobility scooter. His instructions were okay but the estimate of distance was way out. Then after getting their purchases they were faced with trying to find a reasonably short way back to the canal and towpath. People here often only know their immediate areas, eg where they live and how they get to work. Anything else is unknown to them. They called into the Middleport Pottery and got further directions. Once they were on the towpath they could sort out their directions and get back to the boat.

After lunch, we headed towards Stoke on Trent and places further South. We came across a couple of moaning Poms, with no patience for newbies at all. We bore the brunt of their mutterings for other people. At one lock, another novice and his lady were waiting for the lock. They let one boat go through and were taking their time over getting into the lock, because the guy thought MP1 was going to get in there before him. MP1's wife did a fair amount of muttering, telling us how it should be done and we were pretty quick. We let them go in front of us.

Further along, a lady in pink was helping us with a lock so that she could get their boat through quicker. We dropped down the lock and she closed the gates. Suddenly there was a pathetic old time cow horn, the sort you might get on a Model T car, from a boat that was about 400 yards away. This was MP2. They complained that we should have held the lock open for them and stated that they had been on the canals for 36 years. Well, if they had a decent horn and a bit of patience, they might have enjoyed it more.

We stopped then night at Ham Heath, which is handy to the Wedgewood factory for tomorrow. Dinner was at the Toby Carvery and we had an excellent meal for three for just over NZ$50. A very pleasant part of the canal with shady trees on both sides and very expensive properties on the port side. There was even a notice saying “Private Fishing”. Perhaps some of the property owners consider us waterborne gypsies!

Tunnel entrance with another boat coming ouy

Lynette ready for the tunnel

Daylight again

Sue concentrating on the tiller

A family of Canada geese

Lynette in charge

One of many derelict buildings on the side of the canal

A bottle kiln used in the pottery industry

The Dolphin Marina

A boat marina for Jim, complete with shooting supplies, a 10 metre air gun range and Country AND Western

A beautiful evening sky

Fishing on the side of the lock is still possible if you have an electric cart or tricycle

June 12

We had planned a short day so were a bit late departing, leaving after 8AM. This was the first morning that we were not first on the canal in our area.

We went down the canal to the Wedgewood factory, planning to have a look at their museum. The fickle finger of fate got to us and the factory was closed. The whole area was shut off with steel fences, so we can only presume that this is a summer maintenance activity. The rail lines pass alongside the Wedgewood factory and the tracks are used very frequently with very fast commuter and long haul trains. Gates cut off the vehicle and pedestrian access well before the trains arrive so it is impossible for idiots to kill themselves. There is a narrow one way bridge with a height restriction for access to the Wedgewood property. As we left our mooring we noticed that a panel van driver did not know the height of his vehicle and caused a significant traffic jam.

On we headed to Stone, as that had a couple of pubs handy to the canal, and wasn't too far away. Only seven or eight locks. Luckily we had plenty of time as we, together with five other narrowboats, were held up for 30 minutes at the lock before the Canal Cruising Company area. Lynette went down to find out what was happening and discovered that that company was instructing two new rental groups. As the lock had been emptied the first rental group had right of way before the boat in front of us could enter the lock and go down. The people in that rental boat had had some experience some years ago and therefore were given less tuition. We heard shortly afterwards that they had managed to collide at the next lock with a moored boat where the owner was carefully painting part of his superstructure. Bet he was shocked. The canal grapevine is pretty swift at spreading messages. When they went through the lock Jim had noticed their struggles and said “They are going to have trouble soon” so he was spot on. The boat had a bunch of retirees on it with one of the women having had some experience many years ago. They were on a 70' boat which was 25' longer than ours and such a large boat is a challenge to handle.

The next lot of beginners were absolutely clueless and the instructor had to accompany them through the lock instructing both the skipper on the boat and the rest of his party who were to handle the paddles and gates. Sue & Lynette could not help them with the paddles and gates as the instructor had to show them and it took twice as long as normal. Sue & Lynette were considered “experienced” by the tutor.

The benefit of the wait for us was that the following skipper gave us useful information about mooring in the Chester area.

When we got to Stone, we raced into the pub for a late lunch. An excellent meal again. The weather had been fine and clear, but darkened and we had a few heavy spots of rain.

We then wandered into the village of Stone. Stone was a pottery village and Dunoon still manufactures here, as Lynette and Sue found out when they walked into the factory outlet shop. The village High St is about 400 yards long and has at least a dozen charity type shops and four shops with To Let on them. We had a pleasant afternoon tea looking down the High St. Jim found a few books while Lynette and Sue grabbed a couple of fishing nets so that we can scoop up the rubbish in the canal as we go along.

We really enjoyed Stone. It's a very pleasant spot. People are friendly and happy to chat with you.