Drought forces Operation Sanctuary

As waterways are closing around the country through lack of water including England’s inland artery, the Grand Union, we are now on a race to get to somewhere we can live, work, and safely access water and waste disposal.

According to the National Drought Group this has been the driest year bar 1976 since records began in 1890. Drought has been officially declared in 6 areas of England. This is having a major impact on many sectors. We boaters who live on our boats and continually cruise (not having a home mooring or home marina), are being significantly affected. Reservoirs and rivers that feed our canals are struggling because of a lack of rainfall, and in the case of reservoirs, many have been kept deliberately low for maintenance work so they have no capacity to cope with the crisis.

It seems bizarre that at the start of the year we were facing floods and now we are being told the next 9 days will be the last meaningful movement we can make until there is “significant rainfall”. 

That has given us a clear target. To travel as far as we can in the next 9 days.

Since last Saturday, we have gone 42 miles through 69 locks from Wiltshire into Berkshire. An email from Canal and River Trust yesterday set our goal – to get across the Thames (tidal and non-tidal sections) and onto the Grand Union canal. We aim to clear Stoke Bruerne locks in Northamptonshire by 3pm on 25th when they will be locked, until perhaps next year, because of the water shortages. This is not a short time fix.

Stoke Bruerne is going to be a challenge. There are 7 locks in that flight alone, and we need to be through them by 3pm on 25th.  The only way we can reach there, in time, is by travelling long days and hoping that no locks on the way develop problems, no trees fall down to block our route, and our engine (and muscles) keep going.

We are still on the Kennet and Avon canal down in the south of England. It seems to be one of the very few canals in England and Wales without water problems at the moment. So why are we leaving what would seem to be an ideal place to be?


Well, we always aimed to travel its length, which we have done east to west, and now we are heading back west to east. We intended to be nearer to family in the Midlands and Lancashire over the winter. So we are leaving the well-watered Kennet and Avon, but we can’t return the way we came. That would require travelling up the Thames, onto the South Oxford Canal. The latter has been closed since July because of low water levels.


So we need to get onto the Thames at Reading and turn right towards London. That will take us through Henley-on-Thames, Marlow, Maidenhead, past the famed Olympic Eaton Dorney Rowing Lake, through Eton, Windsor, past Magna Carta Island and Runnymede, Staines, Chertsey, Walton on Thames and Sunbury before the delights of Hampton Court and Kingston upon Thames. Just beyond Trowlock Island in the Thames comes Teddington Lock. That’s where the Thames becomes tidal so we have to be there at a specific time, for high water, if we are going to get through the next stretch round Twickenham, Eel Pie Island, Richmond, Isleworth and into Brentford where opposite Kew Royal Botanical Gardens we hang a sharp left and turn onto the River Brent. That leads us to Brentford Gauging Locks. Through them , and we are on the Grand Union Canal. That is a journey of 74 miles, 37 locks and 9 bridges we have to move.

At that point on Wednesday next week if all is going to plan, we will heave a huge sigh of relief and then after that, we need to push on if we are going together anywhere near where would suit us before the closures hit.


From the moment we turn onto the Grand Union, we must travel 72 miles, through 87 locks and move 2 bridges in 5 days – all at a maximum 4mph.


Can we do it? We have no idea. We have hope but we know it is going to be close, very close.

Our Operation Sanctuary is on, but quite where that sanctuary might turn out to be, may not be where we intend. Wherever we end up we are likely to be exhausted by the time we get there and hugely grateful to every voluntary lock keeper, Gongoozler who opens or closes a gate for us, and any boats with whom we can share a lock. Apologies to all friends who we won’t able to stop and see on the way.

It also means our reflection on the Kennet and Avon is somewhat overshadowed right now. Maybe it should wait until we aren’t frantically planning our ‘escape’ into the shallows!

Wish us luck! 🤞