JON SIMS explores a “perfect microcosm of the English canals” - in a weekend

Taken from Waterways World October 2001, used with permission of the author and Waterways World.

"Jon,” said Phil Thiel in his Seattle drawl , “I gotta confess that I had my doubts about ten guys for four days in a sixty-five foot toob”. So that settles the old argument about barges and narrowboats. They are henceforth to be known as ‘toobs’. Phil should know. Besides being Professor of Architecture emeritus at the University of Washington he is also a naval architect, best known in this country as designer of the pedal powered cabin cruiser Escargot. For many years, Phil has spent his Septembers cruising the French waterways but, having failed to find a team to build a French Escargot, he placed an appeal in Waterways World (October 1991). Needless to say, we eccentric English decided that a wooden boat with limited headroom and no engine looked like fun. How much fun, we soon found out, although, being of a forgiving nature, we became firm friends with Phil and eventually persuaded him that French ditches are all well and good but not half as good as the real thing. Last September he agreed to test this theory and I finally got my chance to get a fresh view of our canals through his eyes.

As a second opinion never hurts, I asked Phil if he would like to bring some other colonials on the trip. Yes he would and we added Temple Jordan, an American lawyer domiciled in Tokyo, to the crew along with his teenage son Sei. So having booked a twelve-berth from Willow Wren to provide maximum cat swinging room at minimum cost, I entered the date in my diary and casually mentioned the idea of a midweek break to various chums. Life then intervened and the next time I consulted my diary was mid August. The hire balance was overdue and our skeleton crew insufficient even to pay for the deposit. With little hope of interesting anybody at this late stage, I sent forlorn invitations to all and sundry. Sundry was busy but all the others, against expectation, said, “Yes please” and suddenly the cat had to be left at home to swing itself. The only possible explanation for this unprecedented enthusiasm must be the average forty-something age of the invitees. The boat was in danger of being swamped by flood of male menopause as old boating cronies and those who had always intended but never got round to it decided to get round to it. Barry, for instance, a canal enthusiast for years but mainly from the towpath, and Dave who is more used to canoeing around the Isle of Wight. “Ah well, Jon,” said Phil in his usual philosophical style, “I guess we’ll be close enough to the bank so that I can always get off it all becomes too much.”

My curiosity about Willow Wren was immediately gratified by a really friendly welcome and an inspection of the boat which confirmed their reputation for no frills at a sane price. Little touches like a hinged engine hatch on a hydraulic strut, giving effortless access to the cleanest engine compartment in Christendom, and a weed hatch (not needed in the event) which had no bolts and yet was, as far as I could see, sink proof. Colour TV? Pah! Being a conscientious skipper, I sat the crew in the front well of the boat and gave a brief talk on safety which seemed to get less brief as old hands, Chris and Graham, embellished my recollections of Murphy’s Law. Fortunately the freshers seemed more intrigued than concerned and it was with a certain curious anticipation that we turned Grebe out of the old meander of the Oxford Canal and headed west along one of the ‘new’ cuttings. In spite of a pessimistic forecast the afternoon was bright and balmy and, with a late arriving crew member due at Rugby in the morning and the two pubs offering a pleasant evening at Newbold, I considered a nice cruise up to Stretton Stop and back to be in order. That five miles there and four back was all it took to convince our first timers that English canals were. . . well, Temple summed it up neatly: “You wanna keep this a secret,” he said as we winded by Rose Narrowboats. I’m not sure Rose Narrowboats would agree but I got his meaning.

We moored in that exquisitely other-world cutting at the Rugby end of Newbold tunnel and I led the curious past the two pubs and through the churchyard to look at the portal of the old tunnel with its loop of canal which was abandoned during the 1820s straightening. Curiosity sated, our thoughts turned to our stomachs. Sadly, the Boat Inn seems to be a shadow of its glory days in the richer world before Davenports were mugged by the big boys. We retired instead to the Barley Mow and were fed and slaked wonderfully at Midlands prices. And people say canal holidays are expensive. Rubbish! In this pub alone, you could burst for under a tenner.

The cruise began in earnest on the Tuesday morning. Our final crew member, Colin Jones, was waiting on the towpath and, having shoehorned him into one of the remaining berths, we set off Braunstonwards via our first taste of locks at Hillmorton. Double locks at that and intermediate paddles between the chambers to boot. What a shame that these paddles are redundant, supposedly to avoid confusing the uninitiated. Perhaps we could have an advanced driving licence for canal boaters with holders permitted to use all the fun little bits and pieces of lockware.

Lunch was at Braunston although with the deep disappointment of finding the baker’s shop defunct. The village supermarket was most accommodating but it wasn’t any particular loaf with which I had hoped to impress our visitors but with the smell of the baking. We ate well regardless, a simple fare of Farmhouse Cheddar, ‘Braunston’ Pickle, pork pies and such delicacies as must have wiped the joys of the average French patisserie clean out of Phil’s mind. Business may not have been so good at the bakers but it was obviously booming canalside. The shop at the bottom lock has been joined by one at the top with British Waterways weighing in at the Stop House. Where passing boats used to be laden to the gunwales with coal, they are now apparently weighed down with painted nick nacks and guide books. Perhaps canal holidays can prove expensive but only if you are a sucker for souvenirs.

The last time I entered Braunston Tunnel, blinded by sunlight and entranced by the beauty of it all, I ran smack into an emerging boat. The steerer gave me one of those withering looks which haunt your waking dreams for years to come. I needed to re establish some cut cred with myself and hogged the tiller for the entire length, touching nothing despite the famous misalignment of the bore and half a dozen oncoming boats. Honour was restored. The new boys were suitably impressed by the endless blackness, punctuated by the occasional airshaft up which they made the usual mistake of looking with mouths wide open. A good job that Braunston drips less than Blisworth. Back in the daylight, an astonishingly dilapidated butty evinced disbelief that anything could still float with so much daylight between the planking. Possibly it was sitting on the bottom, although it did show signs of habitation. It was obviously old enough to cock an historic snook at the Boat Safety Scheme and curiously picturesque in its degeneration. It also provided our visitors with a glimpse into the original function of the canals and of the rigours of their way of life.

Our first attempt at mooring, along the concrete banks above Buckby Locks and the noise of the A5, led us to investigate the Leicester Arm where we found grassy peace and a pleasant stroll to the New Inn. Once again we were greeted with warmth and food fit to kill a trencherman. September days on the canal were proving eminently amenable to the crew, in spite of the indifferent weather, but I also wanted to demonstrate the sheer English glory of steak and kidney pie washed down with a pint of bitter. The pubs along our route fulfilled every expectation with ample puddings to clog the final artery.
 

The hitherto incessant drizzle finally ceased as we returned through Braunston Tunnel while Mike deployed his accordion to pleasant, rustic effect. As we emerged from the far end, sunshine was threatening and out came the cameras to capture a wealth of boats passing in the pounds amidst the brilliance of black and white balance beams and blazing brick work. This was the real picture I wanted the crew to take home, not on film but in their memories.

Mooring early by the marina, we went for a walk through the deserted hummocks of old Braunstonbury and Wolfhampcote with its deserted church: an eerie remnant of abandoned medieval humanity set in the triangle of Industrial Revolution formed by the railways and canals. The remains of the LNWR Weedon and Leamington line hacks across the original Oxford Canal where it once looped up to the top of the valley while, further along, the bridge over the Great Central was an excellent vantage point from which to tell the story of this last and finest mainline railway in England, complete with its continental loading gauge and its ridiculously early, pre-Beeching, demise. If foresight was as accurate as hindsight this would be the perfect link to the Channel Tunnel. Ho hum. Both railways at Braunston are long gone but the older canals survive. Smug doesn’t come into it really.

We cruised across the Puddle Banks in the morning just for the view and were roundly abused when we had the temerity to wind at the winding hole, thus disturbing a boat owner who had chosen it as his personal mooring. Shortly after, Temple was negotiating a bend when another private boat, with no obvious attempt at helm or reverse, ploughed merrily across the inside and shoved us into a hedge. Perhaps that advanced boating licence should precede the ownership of a boat. It has to be said that all of our novices took to steering like the old cliché of ducks to water, with Sei exhibiting the natural glee of a teenager given a very large toy. I assured Temple that collisions were not uncommon and that we English tend to smile our apologies even as we curse the miscreant (always the other chap). Something to do with that other cliché about oil and water. Phil, it has to be said, provided my most enjoyable hour as he demonstrated his supernatural mastery of boat handling, achieving a smooth rate of progress which, in less skilful hands, would produce a wash of tsunami proportions.

Return journeys are always times of reflection rather than excitement. Apart from the X-Files incident of a submerged Toyota in isolated countryside, with no conceivable means of getting where it had got, we returned to Newbold without much further ado. More food and more beer in The Barley Mow was followed by local colour of Ealing Comedy standard in The Boat. Conversation throughout the trip thrived on the diversity of the crew but for final opinions I had to wait until perceptions had been taken away and fermented in the after-math. Phil expressed his pleasure in a few well chosen photographs which epitomised the aesthetic joy of water, wood and masonry. Once again, it was Temple who summed it up, this time by e-mail. Following a few kind words (which modesty forbids) he concluded:

“As you said, time spent on the canals tends to narrow your horizons but in a good sense. Sei and I will always remember the experience. We have confidence that, even as beginners, it is possible to handle a boat without doing excessive damage. We will be back and will also be spreading the word to friends in the States and Japan that the English canal system is one of the wonders of the world and an amazingly accessible one at that.”

I tried to coax an equal degree of eloquence from the home grown crew members. All I got was a broad grin. Enough said!