Gratitude – the gift that gives

Io Saturnalia! Happy Solstice! and almost Merry Christmas! Are you ready – wi

These significant festivals begin this week with the official start of winter. It marks a time of ending and beginning, launches a time of taking stock, counting our blessings if you will, and being grateful – all of which done positively is good for our wellbeing. [Don’t take my word for it but the work of psychologists including Emmons ,McCullough, Kilpatrick, Larson, Wood, Froh, & Geraghty, who have all researched and written on the connection.]

As headlines make for gloomy reading and fear of disease seems pervasive once more we all need to feel good about something – to make time and space to consciously recognise the positives (however small) in any aspect of our lives.

It’s seems easy in this floating life we have made for ourselves to feel gratitude in many ways – grateful for having made the choice – grateful when the winter sun shines, warming us with its soft rays and charging our solar panels! Grateful for the unfolding beauty of nature around us from sunrise to sunsets. I can even be grateful for the mud settling in around us on towpaths – because without it I wouldn’t feel the utter joy when summer comes and it’s all gone! I’m also grateful for the respite from mud created by the old paved sections of towpath worn smooth by the hooves of horses and feet of working boatmen in whose footsteps we travel.

But this week particularly I’ve been grateful for something I have feared and dreaded for decades – the dark. Talking to colleagues and friends, it appears I have a gendered approach to the dark. It’s not the dark per se but what cover it gives to the human dangers that can lurk within it. As Elise Dowling puts it in her searingly honest and funny book Coasting: Running Round the Coast of Britain – Life, Love and (Very) Loose Plans, it’s the fear that a serial rapist lurks behind every bush. Surely more the product of an overactive imagination rather than proven crime statistics?

This winter I am grateful for the dark as we approach the longest night and the shortest day. Without this time living afloat, surrounded by nature and its inhabitants I would have continued my gendered approach to the dark. I would never have seen it as a calm and beautiful time recharging but fearful, alarming, potentially dangerous. I will always remain grateful for this remarkable opportunity to discover the wonder of what seems like a whole new world – utterly fascinating and astonishingly freely available to us all.

We’ve had several moorings here on the Staffordshire and Worceshireshire canal which have been idyllic in terms of silence and seclusion. There’s been no need to sleep with curtains drawn on the waterside of the boat, the bed side as we are currently moored. From the window we can see the stars and moon gleaming above us and just raising up on an elbow doubles them in number as they’re reflected in the water outside.

Once your eyes accustom, it isn’t actually pitch black dark. Light pollution has changed how we view the night, and that’s partly through fear, the desire to banish dark with light which merely casts more shadows. There are places though where it’s possible to experience the stars with dark skies – a fantastic winter treat if you can find some on the map near you.

We think of night as a quiet time, but I’m gratefully discovering that’s far from the case! Eavesdropping on those around us makes that very apparent. From the brown tawny owls breathily asking “Who whoo?” from the trees on the far side of the water to the ever-vocal Canada Geese. Even when on water they remind me of portly parsons with their thick white dog collars.

A Canada Goose

There’s no harsh alarms or strident calls like they make when flying in formation. For most of the night, just the voices of individuals can be heard, chuntering away like children muttering in their sleep as they toss and turn on the water.

It’s a companionable dark, a comforting dark, a normality into which we are lucky to get a glimpse and to share. From the side opposite the water come other occasional sounds, the shrill “kaak kaak kaak” alarm of a startled pheasant, perhaps warning of a prowling fox, and the heavy snuffling of a badger digging up tasty roots and slugs by the towpath.

Then it’s a sunrise awaking us, a new day, a new dawn promising yet another sunset and comforting dark night to come.

This week all is lit by a waxing gibbous moon (isn’t that just a glorious phrase?), leading us up to a Cold Moon which we should be able to see on Sunday night this week before the Solstice on Tuesday.

The moon gives us extra working time outside too. Winter on a boat means more work – inside cleaning the floor of mud more often as paws and boots pad it in – outside collecting twigs for kindling, foraging and sawing wood for the fire. We’ve got our Yule (Juul) log ready to burn on Tuesday night to keep us warm on the longest night. The winter solstice is the seasonal time to honour the light and darkness within ourselves – a tradition in many countries is to write on scraps of paper the things you wish to let go of, to shake of. As they are flung into the fire they create a blaze of light illuminating us as we speak out aloud those things we want to bring into our lives.

We’ve also been hugely grateful this week for the sight of coal boat Bargus beaming through the darkness – festive lights aglow. Jay, Kat and Lulu brought us our order of 200 kg of smokeless fuel which will keep our stove glowing for a month or so. We’ve never let our stocks get as low as they have this year, all empty baskets on the roof and alarmingly down to our last bucket of coal before they chugged into sight!

So we’re grateful for coal boats working at this time of year, delivering to us with a smile and keeping us cosy. On the hot stove as the dark of the Solstice descends we will be grateful for a warming wassail. Wassail or Ves Heill in Old Norse means ‘be in good health’ – a good toast to use this year particularly.

This year I’m going to try the National Trust’s Petworth Wassail recipe. They make it using 3.8 litres of cider which could be a bit much for the two of us so I’m going to reduce that quantity! It’s effectively a mulled cider with orange juice, cloves, nutmeg, and brandy. Over a glass (or two) I shall be happily grateful for time away from work to refresh and relax over Christmas to get ready for 2022. I hope you too manage to relax and reset yourself for the coming year – a process which should be invigorating in its introspection, as well as positive and productive.





Our Plan B to party on

Christmas demands planning, and despite Omicron, Delta and other Covid-associated variants, it looks like bubbles this year will be mainly alcoholic!

Living afloat Christmas demands decision making not just on what presents to make/buy, what shopping to do or who is cooking what. We’ve both had both our jabs and our boosters and our flu jabs. We now need to decide thanks to invitations, where we are spending Christmas, and that means making a decision on where we should moor our home. We’d love to stay on the boat but the pull to be with family is stronger.

Last Christmas the edicts said – stay overnight with family – don’t stay overnight with family – total confusion on the government’s rules if you remember. We were lucky to be invited for a lovely family Christmas by Daughter No. 2 and her partner so we moored up not too far from them and left the boat in the company of other boats on a Winter Mooring site. These are long stay temporary mooring sites allocated by Canal and Rivers Trust to allow people to stay for periods from a month to three months and they exist across the country. We didn’t want to stay for a month but stayed instead for nearly a fortnight as there was space on that particular stretch. There was a water point but no waste disposal, but there was parking nearby and we fetched the car. There were good walks but during the time we were there many of the footpaths flooded and the towpath turned into a quagmire – even the swans thought so but somehow they still stayed pristine (unlike the inside of the boat!).

This year Daughter No. 1 has invited us to spend 5 days of family celebrations. This means leaving our home, our floating home for 5 nights moored somewhere. We can’t moor up nearby as the closest waterway would be the River Soar and it has been subject to flood warnings regularly through the late Autumn/Winter which makes it difficult to navigate. As I write there is another warning that strong flows make navigation difficult and dangerous along the entire length of the canalised River Soar from Kings Lock near Aylestone to Redhill Lock close to the mouth of the Soar where it joins the River Trent near Sawley. In other words – it’s not safe on the Soar. So Plan A – to moor nearby and stay in our own home overnight is not feasible.

The Soar’s no fun when in flood – you’re effectively trapped by rising waters as we know of old

So what are the other options? For boaters leaving their boats for any length of time, there are two main choices:

Marina mooring
  • Plan B – Marina
  • Plan C – Towpath mooring
Towpath mooring Christmas 2020
Marina prosMarina cons
secure in terms of cctv, locked accessadditional cost of mooring – usually pay by length of boat and duration of stay or a fixed fee
power hook up enables a low watt heater to be left on board in case of freezing weatheradditional cost of electricity
water, electric, showers, car parking and sometimes a laundrette may be available. Electricity means batteries don’t get drained if you leave the fridge on and you don’t need to run the engine every day. Also means you can use power tools to get maintenance done.static living
usually on a pontoon away from potentially wobbly trees that may fall in a stormmay have to navigate onto a mooring spot amid other boats and pontoons
neighboursneighbours
pontoons which are mud free and sometimes de icedpontoons are often slippery in ice, snow and rain
Towpath mooring prosTowpath mooring cons
no additional cost – it’s covered by the licence security – need to try and moor near other boats but can’t expect strangers to keep an eye on your boat to prevent break in etc., equally there may be other boats when you moor but they may move on before you return leaving your home alone (see what I did there?!)
you can moor wherever is easiest for your needs and stay for up to 14 days in many places no electricity risking batteries running down as solar is limited at this time of year, and you’re not there to run the engine to top them up
need to moor on piling where you can attach mooring ropes to chains for security.cold snaps can lead to frozen/burst pipes as no heating whist you’re off the boat
neighboursneighbours
2020 Moored on a pontoon in a marina during Lockdown 2

Does this make us sound very untrusting or just paranoid about our home? We’ve never (fingers crossed) had a problem in the three and a half years we’ve had the boat. Some people have security cameras on board linked to their phones etc. That always seems to say to us as we pass (probably wrongly) “Look – there’s things worth stealing on here!”We don’t have security cameras and we don’t have anything on board worth stealing like a TV. The laptop will come with us as I shall need to do a little bit of work sometime during the festivities.

We accept that the chance of someone breaking in and trashing the boat which is really the concern is slight – whether they would be doing that from boredom or need to find food or somewhere to stay, we’d still like to go away feeling we’ve taken the necessary steps to keep our home safe.

We’ve weighed it up, spoken to many people and developed our own Plan B. The week of Christmas Preaux will be tucked up safe and secure in a marina so we can go and party with the family without worrying about will the boat still be there when we get back, will she have flooded because of burst pipes or been flattered by a falling tree.

Our chosen Plan B means we can enjoy Christmas with our fabulous family and return to a warm secure home that’s ready for us to move. It means all we have to think about is where shall we moor to celebrate the end of another year afloat together and the start of another somewhere new.

Glad that’s sorted so now we can concentrate on a rather more pressing need – sourcing more fuel for the fire which is running 24/7 and will do right up to the time we tuck up the boat for her Christmas break. We’re lower on supplies than we’ve ever been…eek!

We need a coal boat!

Iced up and frozen solid

What a week – snow, ice, frozen ropes, rain, fieldfares, owls, kingfishers and fantastic community spirit.

Living afloat on England’s inland waterways makes us much more aware of that archetypal English conversation staple – the weather. We live in it much more than we did amid bricks and mortar. Winds buffet the boat, sometimes gently, sometimes violently; the clatter of rain on our metal roof has us racing to close the hatch and cratch; and sunshine brings us out like flowers to bask in warm rays. This week though we have encountered little of the sun amid much other weather!

Saturday morning I awoke to Steve suggesting I might like to look outside. The forecast had been for rain and possibly some ice. We were planning to join friends at a local parkrun and my enthusiasm for the run bit was already running low when I went to bed the night before. To see a carpet of white laid out always makes me feel like a small child. I rushed into clothes and boots and with the dog as eager as I, headed out with glee. It was sadly slushy under the pristine top layer, but within minutes it was snowing again.

It continued on and off through the day – we made it to within a mile of parkrun before it was cancelled but we did a bit of shopping and exploring areas unknown to us before picking up a small crew member from a no-snow zone and bringing him back for the night. Delight was written large when we got back to the boat and found enough snow for a (very small) snowball or two. Next morning saw less snow but a crisp covering of ice. Puddles begged to be slid on, and the usual dog walk was a great adventure with ‘skating’ and snowballs. The woods were crisp but far from white.

By Monday morning when we were back to normal crew numbers and aware we needed to head off from our two day mooring at Fradley Junction. There had been more snow overnight, with no sign of thawing. Emptying bins and loo cassettes was a chilly business – the water to wash out the latter had frozen by the Elsan point but we with the help of CRT staff we managed to find running water nearby.

They told us the snow was much heavier where we were heading, and that a tree down on the most southerly point of the Trent and Mersey Canal at Wood End had been cleared the day before. So forewarned, we prepared to set off.

Getting the boat from its mooring took numerous kettles from the stove to thaw the ropes enough to untie them! The fenders too needed thawing from the metal piling before we could leave.

The thin ice on the canal cracked and scrunched as the metal hull of the boat broke it up. Metal on bridges and locks stuck to my gloves, pulling the lining from one through existing rips, and the anti slip surfaces to cross the locks were covered in crunchy snow.

Travelling from Fradley Junction was magical at first. We seemed to be the only ones moving and we slowly made our way from the Coventry Canal through a swingbridge, onto the Trent and Mersey and through the first two locks. Thanks to CRT staff for thoughtfully setting the second lock for us before we got there.

We then encountered others on the move, and were reminded of the advantages of safety in numbers. Woodend Lock comes just after the most southerly point on the Trent and Mersey Canal. It used to sit, as you might expect in wooded isolation but now sits overshadowed by swathes of desolate land cleared for HS2 emblazoned with red and white trespassers keep out signs.

This used to be woodland – now it is cleared and fenced off for HS2

Last week the canal was shut above the lock after a tree came down and blocked the navigation. It was rapidly cleared (along with many others Storm Arwen brought down) but whilst the trunk and major branches were piled on the side, leaves, twigs, and the general detritus that falls from a large tree creates a floating ‘soup’ within the canal which takes time to dissipate and disintegrate.

It creates problems for navigation – it clogs the prop so the boat isn’t being moved through the water. Steering becomes a nightmare, and locks compound it. Locks allow boats to travel up and down hill by a series of gates. Open one, let the boat in, adjust the water level inside and then let the boat out. As you open the gates if this soup is around you let it in, it clogs the boat and there’s difficulty getting the boat to move out. Our net comes in handy for trying to fish some of it out.

At Woodend Lock we ended up moving 4 boats (including ours) in and out of the locks by hand using frozen ropes. It was much easier with more of us – had it just been the two of us we would only have had one boat to move, but it would have been hard. More hands made light work and also provided a chance for a chat. When you’re all in the same situation (can’t say same boat!) people rally round, united in a common understanding and goal.

Once through the lock judicious use of reverse gear at times gradually dissipated the clogging soup, and we were able to move on. It was though a problem we encountered at our next four locks, although not as difficult to deal with as the Woodend one.

Steadily we made our way past the eyecatching Armitage Shanks/ Ideal Standard factory at Armitage, reflected in the glassy canal, through the narrow former Armitage Tunnel with me walking ahead of the boat to check no one was coming the other way, to moor at Rugeley conveniently between Morrisons and Tesco! Not the most beautiful mooring but undeniably useful.

By the next morning there wasn’t a flake of snow or a frozen rope in sight as we made our way out to Great Haywood to moor alongside the neo-classical mansion of Shugborough Hall. From our mooring we can walk just across the famous Essex Bridge, across the River Trent which is joined by the River Sow just upstream. This is the longest remaining packhorse bridge in England with fourteen of its original forty round span arches left. It takes us straight into Shugborough Park much to the dog’s delight.

We did a very short early morning move before work to get improved internet signal and it proved a delight – kingfishers darting like vivid turquoise arrows above the dark waters, and posing in the trees but still I haven’t managed a decent shot of one despite their generosity in posing! There seem to be many around us but perhaps it is just that they are so vividly apparent against a wintery, often monotonal backdrop.

Between work the view from the side hatch is uplifting. I look up from the computer to trees and birds. As we walk or cruise it’s not only kingfishers that are so apparent but fieldfares, like large colourful spotty thrushes, rise in clouds from among the red berries of the hawthorn bushes alongside the canal.

We’ve moved on again now, turning under the Haywood Bridge past the moored boats of the Anglo Welsh hire fleet, and out into Tixall Wide which lives up to its name. The Elizabethan gatehouse of the former Hall overlooks the Wide which was orginally created to provide a better view for the Hall owners. Now it creates a paradise for wildlife, even if it does feel as a boater that you’ve suddenly gone to sea!

Living afloat allows us to discover and explore these remarkable places, to be closer to nature and the seasons, and to have a heightened awareness of their importance as a rich and vibrant backdrop to our lives and work. I work from my computer with ever changing views and alongside the comforting heat of the 24/7 working stove. This really is work-life-balanced.

Hope your week has been as memorable and beautiful as this one’s been for us.

Taking nothing for granted; blood, sweat and an end to washing our dirty linen in public

This time last year we were in the midst of Lockdown 2, wondering whether Christmas would be a time we could share the presence of loved ones which was the greatest present we wished for.

This week last year – colder and lonlier for most

Since then the world has moved on, and in some ways we have learned to live with a pandemic. Vaccinations, boosters, masks, handwashing, sanitiser, personal space and less crowded socialising have all become familiar to many of us.

Personally we are conscious of where we go and how, where we meet people and we think of their safety as well as ours. We have relaxed but we are still aware of the risks, perhaps because we live in such a self-contained environment.

I honestly fear as a society we are in danger of taking too much for granted, in what we do, how we live and how we consume. Consciously thinking of how and what we consume is life changing. For many of us Covid brought us up short and made us re-evaluate what we value, even temporarily . For us, moving to live on a 50ft narrowboat has conclusively forced us to re-evaluate what we value in terms of lifestyle, and a good example, not to put too fine a point on it, is our dirty washing.

We have no washing machine on board. In the past year or so we have tried all sorts of solutions to live cleanly. Handwashing, standing by water taps on the towpath wielding a homemade dolly created from a boat hook (literally washing our dirty linen in public) to showering with the washing and trampling it underfoot like a French grape harvest – definitely not as delicious an outcome! These got the washing done one way or another but in the main it’s been months of standing in car parks at all hours operating washing machines, trailing heavy bags to family and friends, having our underwear pawed over as part of a service wash, none of which prove economical options.

Car park washers – this one in Skipton, North Yorkshire

But now – that’s it. End of tether reached. Decision made. We are going independent on the washing front. We have drying capacity outdoor if the sun shines (although handwrung things take an age to dry, even when I used rolling pins!) and indoor on a folding ceiling rack above the stove in the winter or rain, all we need is a good spin speed and a better way of washing clothes than by hand. A machine that will cope with underwear and jeans, duvet covers and towels. A machine that will spin out as much water as possible. A machine that takes the strain… ah bliss!

So shall we go for a mini washer of the type you see advertised all over the place? We’ve canvassed opinion – some people swear by them, others swear at them. They aren’t cheap, particularly if you’re buying one or more a year…

There’s so much choice… Top loader, front loader, it’s hard to know where to start. We began by making the big decisions. A full sized machine so parts are easier to come by, replacements available and it will have the highest spin speed possible to reduce drying time, So where to put the machine when space is at a premium?

Inset in a kitchen cupboard is just not practical – it would take up more than one cupboard and that’s our vital food, equipment and cleaning storage.

In the bathroom was something we toyed with – taking out the basin, trying to squeeze a washing machine between the gunwhales and the loo with the plumbing encroaching into the kitchen cupboard behind it so it wouldn’t sit too far out. Not ideal though and where to put the basin? If we could find a countertop basin maybe it could sit on top of the washer but the plumbing for basins needs to drain so the basin would end up rather high!

We dismissed the front cratch as that doubles as a bootroom and fuel store in the winter; a conservatory and extra living space in summer. Putting a washing machine in there would completely remove the space from use for anything else.

Steve has spent weeks stalking the boat with a tape measure and thinking. The decision is to accommodate a washing machine in the wardrobe at the end of the fixed main bed. Last year we converted the hanging space to shelving to give us more storage space. Top shelf is linen, second shelf is mine, third shelf is Steve’s and beneath rest shopping bags, rucksacks etc. Bags and rucksacks will be moved to the cratch for now, and Steve has reordered his clothing shelf contents to under the sofa and under the bed.

Just as there would be in a conventional landbased home that’s old and previously loved, reorganising electrics and water pipes to service the machine is necessary. It’s now underway but we have a uniquely floating home requirement – to remove sufficient ballast from below the floor to accommodate the weight of the machine and preventing the boat tipping violently over. That meant getting up the floor, and discovering what ballast was in use. In other parts of the boat we have found kerb stones in use and they are incredibly difficult to remove when you have little wiggle room to get anything round them to lever them out. Fortunately under the wardrobe proved to be paving slabs – easier to remove in pieces.

Levering out paving slabs from the wardrobe floor

Having got sufficient paving slabs out to cope with the weight of the machine there’s another rather more extreme requirement. The base of the wardrobe has to be extended by 2cms to fit the machine. This means moving a partition wall which is housing shelving, and not damaging existing pipes from the hot water tank in the process. It is painstaking work conducted in tiny cramped spaces.

Once the space is ready, which probably will take some considerable amount of time yet how the machine is to be powered will require new power cables, purchase of an inverter so it can run as we don’t have mains electricity. All of this has been part of Steve’s intensive pre-planning, involving visits to Victron suppliers and discussions with washing machine manufacturers.

When we are ready for the machine to finally arrive it will have to come in the stern doors and down the twisting steps through a doorway which will have to be removed to enable it to get into its new location. We will need to rely on strong friends and reliable straps to help lower it down and manoeuvre it into place.

I recognise the effort, the sheer hard work going in by Steve to make us independent on the washing front is something which underlines that it’s not just about buying a machine and slotting it in. He’s suffered spasms of cramp from being wedged in a tiny space sawing away, smashed his head on overhanging shelves and literally sweated blood over getting the boat ready for this machine.

Seeing this extreme effort behind the scenes makes me realise that getting a washing machine is not something to take for granted.

I fear we are in danger of taking many things for granted because they become automatic, things we don’t really think about. Our incredible education provision from pre-school to university is remarkable, but how often do we stop to recognise just what a priviledge it is to have this provision available. This week’s I’ve had hospital tests, flu and Covid booster jabs. They have been timely reminders that the National Health Service and all who work within it are in danger of being taken for granted, and not sufficiently appreciated.

In lockdown we came to value our local shops and I hope we won’t desert them amid the marketing clamour of Black Friday or Cyber Monday, funded by the multinationals.

Most of all though as we come to Christmas 2021, let’s not take family and friends for granted. Their presence, not commercialised hype is what matters. It’s a lesson we learned the hard way through the early stages of the pandemic – let us not forget it, and let our gratitude for them light our Christmas.


Tuning in

Living afloat brings so many dimensions to life. Some are expected – like being able to move on when you don’t fancy the location (or the neighbours), or you feel you’ve explored everything you can in that place, but some are totally unexpected.

The sensory scope of each place is remarkable, and unless you are consciously listening or seeing you could miss out on a hugely rich part of life. It is most apparent at this time of the year when dusk falls early and the night is long.

On Sunday (after successfully completing the Seagrave Wolds Challenge of 17.2miles and thoroughly enjoying it as usual) we were still moored on the Ashby Canal, in a rural location amid fields of cows and ponies. No streetlights created a velvety blackness at night; a deadening carpet of yellow and brown fallen leaves muffling dog walkers’ footsteps as they passed the boat at dusk; night brought us the occasional car horn anxiously approaching the nearest canal bridge, but apart from that, the sounds were totally the sounds of nature – shrill moorhen squawks, the gentle hooting of a tawny owl, scuffling of small creatures moving through the towpath leaves.

In the early morning the bullocks in the adjoining field bellowed, and a distant donkey joined in the chorus with an asthmatic hee-hee-heee which just occassionally ended in a haw. The sparrows and robins, blackbirds and blue tits created a constant background symphony in the hedge alongside us, apparently unaffected by our presence.

Monday took us onto the Coventry Canal, moored on the outskirts of Nuneaton.

It was a very different place to stay. There were houses on the far side of the canal. Close to each other but detached, modern homes with gardens coming down to the water, each with its own character telling you something of their inhabitants. Some clearly housed children of differing ages, with brightly coloured plastic play houses, sandpits with lids and trampolines; others are homes of obvious plant enthusiasts with specimen trees and carefully tended herbaceous beds; others point to hedonist inhabitants with hot tubs, swinging chairs and hammocks. Garden buildings doubled as offices, or “Dad’s bar” and lots of plastic rattan furniture in shades of gray and black, some with covers, some without. At night solar fairy lights appeared along many fences. For all the apparent human presence it was silent on that side of the canal.

On our side of the water, walkers passed soundlessly on newish, well made paths. Ducks chattered alongside a solitary swan. The birds kept up a steady flow of conversation and made their presence heard (and felt too as they tapped their beaks against our steel hull to see if there’s interesting edible weed attached to us that they can enjoy). The occasional train rumbled past but there are few regular services on this branch line. Sudden shrill sirens on distant roads reminded us of how close we are to the hustle and bustle of a town.

After eleven delightfully easy and well maintained narrow locks down the canal, through the market town of Atherstone in Warwickshire, we came to our third mooring of the week.

There are boats on both sides of the canal here – long term moorings opposite us, with a huge variety of boats, narrowboats, cruisers, converted tugs. Some permanent homes, some used on high days and holidays, others in the throes of being made habitable. A service point beside them – provides a necessary opportunity to remove the waste from the boat and fill up with water.

A railway rumbled intermittently and regularly in the distance; a little-used lane over a canal bridge ahead brought the sound of vehicles, and beyond the long term moorings a large property was guarded by occasionally vocal dogs that sounded fittingly large too. It was at times though remarkably quiet here, and that included birdsong. I saw no birds on the water and the hedge alongside our mooring seemed bereft of inhabitants. Walking the dog just 50 yards beyond the bustle by the moorings and the wildbirds appeared. They’ve chosen a quieter, more peaceful location.

Human accents have changed too – at 5.30am in the morning we clearly heard two men heading from boats to work, or perhaps going out to fish. The monotonal Brummie twang was very apparent.

Then we moved on two locks to our third and final mooring of the week, and possibly a home for the next two weeks – Hopwas in Staffordshire, a short hop from Tamworth, a market town famed for its Titian-tinted pigs.

We moored on the outskirts of the village. Last time we were here we strayed too early into the beautiful woods for our morning walk. Inadvertently we then found ourselves trapped as it became a live military firing range! This time we’ve downloaded the firing times from the MOD website and have yet to hear evidence of anyone firing, in anger or anything else!

Sounds here are muffled and amplified by layer upon layer of fallen leaves – footsteps crackling through the dry top tier, activities of wildlife amplified by the scuffling sounds their paws and beaks make in the fallen foliage.

The woods, despite their military use, are full of birds and creatures scurrying to and fro, the world being their own until borrowed by walkers and soldiers for a time. There are ducks on the water and the occasional moorhen too.

This life afloat surrounded by nature is teaching me to hear – to listen better. It’s a lesson I wish I had appreciated sooner, particularly in business and in education. I hear the crackle of dry leaves on the woodland paths but miss the scamper of a squirrel or the frenzied digging of of Jay seeking acorns. Sometimes snap decisions are based on the initial or apparent information easily offered, but that doesn’t always lead to the ideal solution, because other information which could lead to a full response goes unheard, unrecognised. It’s something I know from experience that sometimes speedy solutions or responses receive more recognition than those that take longer to craft. Speed is sadly in our fast-paced world, often synonymous with efficiency and professionalism when actually it may lead to a shallow response that doesn’t really resolve all of the issue.

Taking time to make a decision and a judgment is not a waste of time but an investment. Taking time to really hear what’s really going on around me informs a competence that prevents negligence or wastefulness.

It’s tough really listening, really hearing but it repays the effort I put in to it, in so many ways. It uses my senses better- by listening fully I can see so much more, saving time and money, effort and error. I am sure I , and those around me, can benefit from me being more aware and more alert.

Taking time to hear what’s going on around me, to appreciate the complexity, the multi layered environment that envelops me isn’t easy, but it richly repays the effort of listening and seeking to understand my changing world. I am not only aware of more around me, but aware I get so much more out of the world by doing so.

Life’s far from being on auto-pilot now.

Silver linings and a reminder of what really matters

I know that many people working from home have found themselves viewing their home differently – some despairingly but many positively, learning about their home and community in a different way.

I’ve had a new experience of our home this week too. I don’t do ill very often – I think the last time was several years ago so I had only fleetingly wondered, and worried a bit what it would be like to be ill on the boat. This week I had the chance to find out! Not Covid fortunately but a gastric attack probably brought on by too much rich food over four indulgent birthdays in quick succession.

The result has been that in just a couple of days I have discovered even more advantages to living afloat (is there no end to the delights of floating life?). Here are my latest findings:

1. The walk (or dash) from the bedroom to the bathroom is 4 steps – nearer than most en suites!

2. Lying in bed with the curtains open allows me to watch the tops of the trees on the other side of the canal gently swaying in the breeze which is so relaxing, and something I shall consciously make a point of doing now I am recovered. I watched fluffed up grey squirrels making their way time and time again to the highest leaves that still clung on, surely just for fun because there seems no food to be had up there, and the branches are so slender they bend wildly sending the squirrels swinging and scurrying back down only to repeat the game again.

3. Watching the same trees and the same part of trees for a few days allows me to appreciate the speed of change as autumn moves apace. Colours turn from dark to light green, to yellow, before being patterned yellow with mottled brown before being blown from their living home or turning brown and falling gently down when they are ready.

4. I’ve never been in bed on the boat during daylight hours when boats are moving past before. If I found myself awake when they travelled by at tickover speed, the resulting movement of the canal gently rocked me back to sleep – so thank you to all of them – you have no idea how soothing and calming your passage along the canal was to an ailing soul! To those who passed at higher than tickover speeds, I hope you never lie abed in a boat feeling ill when others pass by at speed…

5. I’ve stepped away from any work and given myself the time to recover. Had I been working on the ubiquitous hamster wheel I would have soldiered on, and undoubtably taken longer to recover. It makes me realise that we need to look after ourselves – however and wherever we work. Our health is the most important thing.

6. Lousy internet connection and screens making me feel ill has meant even more book reading than usual and it has been a blissful change.

7. Towpaths here in the Midlands are perfect for short flat strolls through breathtaking autumn colours. Easy walks clear the head and make you feel normal again.

The latter is a really good thing as we have the 16ish mile Seagrave Wolds Challenge to complete this weekend in return for soup and crumble. It’s an amazing community event which sees around 200 people run, walk and plod a course across Leicestershire paths, fields and mud every November. The funds it raises supports a variety of charities including the Village Hall, the local church and the Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal. The event has been going since 2005, and our triumphant trio has completed it in all sorts of weather!



The event starts from the village hall with a 2 minute silence, a piper sending us off and is a remarkable achievement supported by villagers, runners and walkers alike. Food stops en route usually mean you can put on weight on this event despite putting in the miles! We missed those last year when it was a virtual event and we ended up calling into the boat which was moored nearby for sustenance!

I’d like to think that our collective experiences during lockdown have suited in many community events across the country, examples of how local people are supporting their communities and making a difference. They are events we can all delight in supporting. I’ve not heard of any celebratory community events being launched as people have gone back to working back in their normal workplaces, perhaps that lack itself is a mark of an unappreciated environment?

We need to appreciate what we have – this week of all weeks. This is a week in which we remember those who gave so much so that we could all be free.

Some gave their lives, others suffered life-changing mental and physical injuries in their battle for the freedom of future generations in conflicts from history to the present day; their families paid and pay a high price too for their service to their country. We owe it to all of them, to those we love, and to ourselves to look after our own health (mental and physical); to look after each other – our families and communities; to look after the precious life we have; and to look after the world in which we live.

One of the most inspiring projects on the waterways at the moment is currently taking shape here in the Midlands. It seeks to turn unwanted or abandoned narrowboats into restored floating homes for homeless service veterans. The first boat has been donated and members of the canal and river community are contributing to its renovation in many ways. Some helped move it to the yard that offered space for it to be worked on, others are working on it when they can sharing particular skills, some are donating money – and in that way, this is an invaluable life-changing project which anyone can support, wherever or however they live. Forces Vets Afloat is a remarkable project seeking to give back dignity, thanks, and a new way of life to service veterans by providing as many sound, floating homes as possible. If you or your company are looking for a worthwhile project to support this November, or this Christmas – perhaps this is one you would enjoy getting involved in. Not only is it seeking to provide homes and a new lifestyle for homeless veterans, in the process it also prevents boats being abandoned, reducing pollution, waste and has to be one of the most ambitious but inspiring recycling projects ever.

Winter’s coming so we’re planning and ham-ming it up!

The first frost arrived this week hard on the heels of the clock change, and a need to have the fire lit more often now to keep us cosy. The frost caught me by surprise meaning the early exit the dog and I make through the stern hatch turned into farce. The hatch was frozen shut so we ended up crawling through the rear half doors emerging floundering on the narrow rear deck in the crisp morning dark.

And we’ve had Bonfire Night, which heralds the tail of autumn.

Tommy tells me these are his “ear fenders” – essentials on fireworks night!

November for us, as for many creatures, means conscious preparation time for HAM (Hibernate, Adapt, Migrate).

In conventional homes we tend to prepare for winter by checking fuel supplies and heating systems. We do that on the boat as well – checking where and when fuel boats are passing to make sure we have bottled gas for cooking and fuel for the stove. The stove is our sole drying and heating source as well as a winter cooking source for soups and stews. Just as many animals change their diets in winter, so do we – more soups, stews, slow cooking using the stove. We also start spending more time foraging for winter fuel – for sticks to light the fire, and Steve keeps warm by chopping the wood we collected and stored earlier in the year.

This year we aren’t corralled by a lockdown (currently). Last year that prevented us moving. Covid resulted in us seeking out a place close to services to reduce the amount we needed to travel for water and waste disposal. From December to April, Willington in South Derbyshire became our mooring home for the duration of lockdown 3.

So as continuous cruisers we have a choice in terms of location. We could hibernate – choosing to pay for moorings in marinas or online along towpaths on allocated winter moorings operated by Canal and River Trust (CRT) across the country. From 1 November until 28 February 2022 CRT sell permits for allocated mooring areas. Winter moorers pay by the metre of their boat and by the month. Each mooring site has a different price depending on location, proximity to facilities and demand. The costs this year range from £7.10 to £22.90 per metre per month.

We don’t think we are going to go for the marina, single or even multiple location winter moorings but stay as continuous cruisers although we will look for longer mooring spots – those allowing us to stay for 14 rather than 2 or 5 days.

Animals stock up on food for winter hibernation…and I’m starting to do that with tinned, dried and longlife foods so we have enough if we get iced in on a part of a canal somewhere away from shops. If there’s ice then it’s not good to move the boat – the potential for damaging the protective blacking or other boats is real.

Some animals add body fat to get them through the winter…I think I’ve done that despite the fact that I don’t actually have any intention of living off it during the cold months! Time for extra exercise to burn it off I feel or as you can see – I shall roll off the boat in the Spring!

We will adapt our movement for the winter – muddy towpaths make for slithery walks, ice makes crossing over locks to operate them difficult and dangerous, it also makes lock spindles slippery, and the whole lock environment becomes riskier. To stay safe you need to take more time, move more slowly and with more care. In cruising terms, we want to reduce the number of locks we have to travel in the winter time – reducing the potential for accidents or incidents.

So we will adapt the way we cruise, looking for less locked routes (the latter is the reason so many people seek the Ashby Canal where we are now in winter as it has no locks for 22 miles), and seeking longer mooring stops.

We also need to adapt our travels to take into account the winter closure programme of canals which is created by CRT. As winter is a time when fewer boats use the waterways, CRT and others like Network Rail or gas companies plan a programme of essential repairs and maintenance during these months. There are 166 scheduled repairs to locks, bridges, and other elements of the network this year. Some last a few days, some months.

So wherever we move we need to take into account these works as they can completely shut canals for navigation, meaning we could find ourselves trapped a long way from vital services. That has changed our selection of routes. We originally thought of heading for the Shroppie (Shropshire Union) for the winter but having seen six scheduled works along its length stretching from 8 November to March 2022, we’ll enjoy it with all its improvements, in the Springtime. It’s good to see that some of the locks we’ve struggled with on canals in the past are down for some tlc this winter which will make boaters’ life easier. The Rochdale and the Llangollen, both on our travel wish lists will also be improved by the winter works which is good to hear.

We are also adapting the way we live on the boat – the windows are now encased in their secondary double glazing. Last year I said we needed to replace the old scratched and cloudy Perspex panels so we could see out better…but the pandemic put paid to that! Perspex became a high demand and high price item thanks to Covid demanding screens everywhere we turn. So replacing our double glazing can wait. We are going to snuggle down in a faintly fuzzy world for the winter. It will allow us once again to emerge blinking into a brilliant clear Springtime once we take them down. Perhaps next year we will take them to a Perspex company to use as templates for replacements.

We won’t migrate south to warmer climes but head north from where we now are on the Ashby Canal, which actually means we need to head south first as the Ashby is in effect a long cul-de-sac! We want to be midway between Leicestershire and Lancashire so we can reach either fairly easily should we be needed/wanted.

That gives us a variety of locations to explore – the Caldon, the Peak Forest, the Ashton, the Macclesfield (we travelled the Macc at a rush last year coming back at speed from Yorkshire so didn’t have a chance to discover its true character).

The Ashton Canal is a tiny waterway – just over seven miles linking the Rochdale, Peak Forest and Huddersfield Narrow canals. It may be short but work is scheduled for 5 projects there this winter on locks, from ladder replacement and grouting to replacement of gates and also the realignment of a towpath section for a new cycleway. Those works range in time from 8 November to the middle of March, so we’ll give the Ashton a wide winter berth!

Ashton (plus my finger) in the summer!

The Caldon extends 18 miles with 17 locks from Stoke-on-Trent to the Staffordshire Moorlands and Churnet Valley. It is a canal that came about to support two major industries – bringing limestone needed for iron making and flints essential for pottery. It has two arms, one leading through a low tunnel to the Wharf at Froghall, the other Leek branch ends at the River Churnet Aqueduct. These two branches will be benefitting from 5 projects over the winter, one a major canal bed replacement over an embankment at an early part of the canal will take from November to March. So the Caldon will be one for another season.

The Peak Forest is a canal we have enjoyed touching on in the past, but we haven’t really got to know it in detail. It runs 14.8 miles from Ashton-under-Lyne east of Manchester connecting to Whaley Bridge in Derbyshire. Four of the Peak’s 16 locks are being repaired during this winter, and to get to it we would need to travel the length of the Macclesfield Canal from where we are now. So it looks like the 27.5 miles of the Macc will be our winter destination – somewhere to explore with amazing winter walks along its length. The Macclesfield will take us from just near Kidsgrove near Stoke to Marle Junction with the Peak Forest in the foothills of the Pennines.

The Macclesfield is renowned for its beautiful countryside, fantastic walks and also includes some delightful towns – the silk town of Macclesfield obviously but also Bollington and Congleton. There are services along the length, and we didn’t encounter issues with wifi when we travelled through in the summer so we feel confident we can work there.

The Macc isn’t scheduled for work this winter. It was the subject of major work earlier this year when it suffered a breach when a culvert wall collapsed. A section of the canal had to be closed and drained completely for repairs. Hopefully there won’t be more breaches this winter…but if there are, well it’s a pleasant canal to be stuck on, with good fuel supplies and services.

First though we need to get there. We can’t set off until after 15 November when we will travel along the Ashby to the Coventry, up to the Trent and Mersey and onto the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal as we’re due at Action Trussell in Staffordshire the first week in December.

From there we will then head back to the Trent and Mersey Canal, before turing onto the Macclesfield Canal. That part of the journey will be delayed by stoppage work on the Trent and Mersey which we will need to wait to be completed. At the moment those works are scheduled from 8 November to 17 December. If the works are able to completed on time (depending on weather and the complexity of the work), then we might get onto the Macc in time for Christmas – but who knows? Time will tell – the only think we know for sure is that we will winter somewhere…!

Effective communication

Just as in business, education and let’s be honest any relationship – it’s not all plain sailing on the canals, and communication, or rather miscommunication, is at the heart of most issues.

This working week has been a sorting week for us – getting on with jobs that have been outstanding, prepping the boat for winter and preparing for exciting new projects (more in due course on this!). We’ve not cruised much apart from an early Sunday morning short move from one mooring point to another which turned out to be a slightly longer move than anticipated due to a fishing match. The fishermen were taking up the mooring spaces we were heading to so we continued until we found somewhere suitable and unoccupied!

It’s given me time for thought this week, and I’ve found myself going back to a thought-provoking TED-x talk by round-the-world yachtswoman Dee Caffari. If you haven’t heard it – do take time to do so. It seems so relevant if you are a boss, a leader, a team member, a parent, grandparent, wife, husband, partner, friend, colleague, teacher, lecturer, or let’s be honest – any human being who has any interaction with another.

On a narrowboat we don’t face the big seas and waves but we do have winds and we have bridges, blind bends, in some cases areas where one of the crew has to walk ahead to makes sure the navigation is clear unless you’re singlehanded when you can either push on and hope for the best, or walk ahead and run back to get the boat once you’ve established it’s clear!

On our travels round the network, north and south, we’ve seen everyone deals with these challenges in different ways. It doesn’t matter if they are holiday boaters, long-married couples, families or singlehanders travelling with others…communication is a key to problem-free navigation. Communication though is not without it’s difficulties…

Some blindly hope, others use sheer vocal volume (shrieking and shouting generally), some turn to modern technology bellowing into walkie-talkies or mobile phones if they have signal, and some resort to historic methods such as semaphore. For us the latter works well if there’s a line of sight. It overcomes the risks that you can’t be heard over the noise of the engine, wind or rushing water and in situations where there’s no line of sight we go for cautious slow approach until visibility is reached.

It’s been interesting travelling with others this year because you see how differently crews communicate, not only among themselves but with you too. If both of you are in a wide lock are you leaving one at a time or both together? I’ve had people say you go first and then they head off first, leaving me wondering who misunderstood! We’ve learned it’s best to communicate clearly by gestures with boaters – a clear after-you arm indication works for all nationalities, all hearing abilities and boating abilities too.

It’s not exaggeration to say that communication failure at locks can be a matter of life or death. Someone working the locks who doesn’t constantly look at the skipper on the boat to see whether they are ready can cause chaos or worse. Opening lock paddles creates powerful waterflows. They could knock an unprepared skipper off balance and into the water with fatal consequences, or sink a boat that’s on the cill or too close to the top gates. If a problem arises engine noise in a confined space, forcefully rushing water and rising panic can make it can hard for those operating the lock or on the boat to communicate with each other.

Sad reminders of the dangers of locks in particular are a regular sight along the canals

What and how we say it can have lasting impacts on individuals. In education I know the essential importance of feedback to students and colleagues – but how you say something is as important as what you say. That’s why audio, and sometimes video feedback can add so much to the words. It adds emphasis so the right things are taken from the words whatever type of day the recipient is having.

We all want to be understood and yet we take too little time to check understanding. Sometimes we don’t have long – a split second to know that what you meant has been understood. Sometimes you need simple, clear and pre-discussed signals and actions to make things instantly clear. Sometimes you don’t have that luxury. A hand raised palm forward as stop seems universally understood and is clear – unambiguous. It can be quite calming to communicate so clearly and quietly – amid often noisy settings yelling and shouting just seems to inflame situations, creating uproar where there’s no need for it.

If there is a breakdown in communication then it’s important for the future to understand what went wrong – without attributing blame (that’s the hard bit). Sometimes this is where gestures Dee talks of, can mean so much. A smile, a hug, a hot meal ready and waiting, a cuppa, and CAKE. All these communicate so much which goes beyond words. They are understood across generations and nationalities – as part of a universal language of understanding, caring and love.

A gesture speaks a thousand words – but also remember the power of a shake of the head, a frown, a shrug, a dismissive look, a judgmentally raised eyebrow – and think how those might be interpreted by others, even if meant as a joke! (It’s usually those closest to us that we fail in this way as I know too well).

In our communications next week afloat or on dry land, let’s show people we care about them and demonstrate that by taking time to check they have understood what we meant. Let’s think of others and be positive in what we communicate, and supportive in how we choose to communicate. That should be as good for us as much as it will be for those with whom we communicate.





After a year of trying – we can’t go on

A year ago as the second lockdown loomed in England in the face of the Covid pandemic, we were on the idyllic 22 lock-free miles of the Ashby Canal for the first time.

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Our intention was to sit out the lockdown in a Marina, namely the Bosworth Marina, and then make our way to the current end of the still being-restored canal to at least let us say we had ‘completed’ the distance of a whole canal.

Just days before that lockdown was due to lift on 2 December disaster struck. On Sunday 27 November the Ashby was the subject of a breach.

Hundreds of thousands of gallons of water and the fish who lived in them poured out of a collapsed culvert flooding fields. A rescue mission was launched and stop-planks were installed rapidly, shutting off the canal and stemming the flow by lunchtime. In the marina stop-planks were installed shutting us all in to stop water being sucked out which would have led to the many narrowboats inside being marooned in the same way as those up near the breach.

Once the canal was stabilised and lockdown lifted we could move, but we headed out of the Ashby with alacrity rather than approaching the breach, feeling it safer to flee to the Trent and Mersey (where we then got locked in during lockdown 3 for three and a half months!). So we never did make it from one end of the Ashby Canal to the other, and it took until May this year for that stretch of the canal to be rewatered.

Almost a year later, after hundreds of miles and hundreds of locks taking us north into Yorkshire and south to London, we have returned to finish what we started.

We turned onto the Ashby from the Coventry Canal early last misty Sunday morning. Steadily, with a stop for lunch en route, we found our way like homing birds back to a mooring spot near Stoke Golding which we had found blissfully quiet last year before the lockdown started on 5 November. Last year of course, the world had shrunk. People were staying home, travel was local or non existent. Dogs enjoyed being home with their owners, and holidays were on hold.

We found the mooring peaceful and idyllic in its tranquility. This year we moored up within a few hundred feet of our original location, behind a couple of boats, one of which we had seen here last year. Across the canal the same ponies grazed in the same field, and the same Canada geese took off in their V formations at dusk to fly to their nighttime nests, and return at dawn. But that was where the similarities ended. The peace and quiet was as distant a memory as a lockdown. People are now taking holidays, and not all with their pets.

Over the bushes from our mooring it appeared the farm buildings we could see were dog kennels, and we can attest that several of their canine guests may well be returning to their owners a little hoarse! Just one example of how the world has changed in this past year!

We moved first thing Monday morning to another mooring – designated visitor mooring at Sutton Cheney Wharf which had been out of commission last year. The intervening space has been well used by someone – whether the Ashby Canal Association or CRT I know not.

The moorings now enjoy a smart recycled pontoon with mooring rings, located just a couple of hundred yards from all services including hot, spotless showers (spa day time) and a fantastic cafe/restaurant plus car parking – £2.50 for 24 hours. What more could one ask? Well, possibly more than 2 days permitted mooring if I’m being selfish!

From there after our allocated time, we moved on, accompanied by a borrowed 4 year-old and his grandparents – thanks Lucas! We made it to Market Bosworth and moored up temporarily for them to disembark just before the marina where we’d experienced our first and only marina life. With just the two of us and dog aboard once more we carried on, to find a delightful mooring spot near Shackerstone a stone’s throw from the Battlefield Railway Line and its delightful cafe (spot the theme…!)

After a couple of nights we collected our own 3 year-old deputy tillerman, and we made it through the Snarestone Tunnel (where Tommy valiantly tested the acoustics at full volume – they’re amazing – check them out on our pickingupducks Instagram!) before arriving at long last at the finale of the Ashby Canal.

For the first time in all our travels we found ourselves faced with a canal closed sign and a canal-level bridge backed by stop-planks. We turned in the available winding hole, our mission complete. We can go no further on the Ashby for now.

A quick visit to the volunteer-run shop, 5 tombola tickets later we emerged the delighted owners of Ted the teddy (another one, won on the very last ticket, the only one ending in a 0!), and for a modest contribution as part of his birthday present, Steve became a member of the Ashby Canal Association. A fitting conclusion to what should have been a short journey but which has taken nearly a year to complete.

A year is nothing, compared to the efforts of those who laboured to built this canal to transport limestone and coal from the Ashby Woulds (interesting spelling isn’t it?) from 1804, or those who fought and indeed continue to fight to reopen the Ashby for boaters to enjoy in their droves today.

It is a beautiful canal, winding through beautiful countryside, much in the National Forest and it deserves the support of all who enjoy it – boaters, walkers, fishermen, canoeists, kayakers, paddleboarders, and runners of all generations. Let’s hope it can be enjoyed for generations to come, and that one way we can return again, this time to travel the full length from the Marston Junction, past the current terminus and winding hole, past the Moira Furnace to Conkers at the heart of the National Forest. If we can do that, then we can get in another excellent parkrun, just a little stroll from a mooring – if we aren’t too decrepit by that time to complete 5k!

Blisworth Tunnel Blues

Music has been a constant across generations globally to communicate and express our emotions, to lift our spirits, to soothe, calm and console. Whether we create it ourselves or benefit from the works of others, music is immensely powerful in provoking a human response.

Whether spontaneous or planned, music is also complex. Just a few notes have the capacity to teleport us back in time to a place, a person, a situation. A chord can change our mood, a rhythm can force us to move or keep us moving when we are flagging, and a voice in song can express much we would struggle to say.

Music is the accompaniment to our lives – big events, special moments, break ups, parties, farewells – each of us has, and will create a personal musical record of memories and meanings. We’ve collected a few new ones over the past weeks connected to the London Marathon.

What has this to do with canals? Well, I’ve always found music a supporting force, and was looking for something to get me through the next tunnel (never my favourite places). We’ve heard people singing in tunnels, we’ve heard blasts of music from passing boats, and regularly hear calls and shrieks from small children exploring the acoustics. We have though, tended to go through accompanied only by the rhythmic reverberation of the engine and sporadic, percussive water splashes landing on and around us from the tunnel roof.

Our next tunnel was going to be Blisworth – the ninth longest canal tunnel in the world that snakes for 1.74 miles under Northamptonshire’s Blisworth Hill at a depth of around 43 metres. This mighty feat of engineering took many lives in its making, and has cost several since in the days men had to leg boats through, lying precariously balanced on boards and pushing the boat along with their legs against the sides of the tunnel. Completed in 1805, this longest tunnel on the Grand Union Canal is a monument to all those who painstakingly built it by hand with picks and shovels and barrows. The one that’s open is actually the second tunnel to be built under this hill – the first attempt in the late 1700s collapsed because of a failure to identify and factor in the quicksand all around.

On our London sojourn and return I knew we would pass through this cavernous blackness twice. It is a tunnel I find both daunting and oppressive, more so than many others we have passed through. I think this is because you once you enter you see no light at the end of the tunnel because of an S-bend in the construction.

I knew I needed something to get me through Blisworth, and in searching came across the Blisworth Tunnel Blues by George Nicholson. Naively thinking jazz, southern folk style music, I searched for a copy… finding only sheet music which appeared for a soprano and orchestra. Vaguely wondering if I could do something with voice and a penny whistle which is all I have on board right now, I sought the score. When it appeared I realised I was labouring under two illusions – it was way beyond my musical abilities AND it was not the blues as I had expected, but the epitomy of the blues Blisworth creates for me in terms of mood. It seemed particularly appropriate that it had been commissioned for the Orpheus Ensemble.

George Nicholson it appeared, was a fellow Blisworth sufferer! I tracked him down at the University of Sheffield where he’s the august Emeritus Professor of Music, and discovered that he last encountered the tunnel in 1978. He remembers it vividly and it hasn’t changed at all.

“What impressed me most about Blisworth was the darkness, the fact that you were cut off from the outside world for about half an hour at a time. Once the tunnel bends round you can neither see light behind you not in front of you. I also remember the periodic showers of water from the air vents that fell on me as I steered us through.

I found it a very compelling experience, not exactly a comfortable one, but certainly memorable and thought provoking.”

George Nicholson

George told me he composed this extended orchestral song cycle “to play for the same length as the canal boat journey through the tunnel, give or take a few moments in the open air at either end of the trip.” That’s a challenge if I ever heard one! (The piece as written and played totals 37 minutes and 41 seconds).

He kindly sent me a link to a recording of Blisworth Tunnel Blues in which the soprano is his wife, Jane Ginsborg. Obviously there’s no connectivity so far underground so another musical friend of mine, the accomplished and versatile vocalist and trumpeter Avelia Moisey and her technically savvy husband Andy converted it for me to an MP3 so I could play it in the tunnel on our return.

So this week, for what I believe to be the first time ever,a recording of Blisworth Tunnel Blues was played in its namesake location.

I first heard the piece one evening in stationery, late autumn sunlight. This time could not have been more different. We climbed the 7 locks of the Stoke Bruerne flight in crisp sunshine that made the autumnal reds, yellows and oranges blaze.

It was early afternoon and the sun was filtering weakly through the beech trees surrounding the cutting by the former leggers’ hut as I started the recording playing from the open cratch of the boat – as far from the engine as possible. It was the accompaniment to our journey into the inky blackness of the tunnel.

I had warned the boat ahead of us of my intentions just in case we scared the living daylights out of them but they were well ahead and actually couldn’t hear a thing over the noise of their engine.

In situ, the constant bass rumble of the engine and intermittent percussive splashes as drips fell into the water around us, or hit the metal shell of the boat added significantly to the atmospheric nature of the piece for me. I was conscious that my anxiety levels began to rise as I listened to the music reverberating around me, as we moved deeper into the darkness. Suddenly at 23.19 minutes into the music, as Jane Ginsborg’s beautiful voice clearly articulated “I had a dream…” the pitch black around me was lit by a ghostly white presence alongside the boat – a calcified side to the tunnel which looked eerily human in form.

Suddenly the music was overshadowed by an abrupt drop in engine revs and a hammering on the roof – Steve’s signal as tillerman of an issue so to the accompaniment of what sounded like chimes at that point, I dashed to the tiller to discover that the boat ahead had veered into the right-hand wall and appeared side on across the tunnel in our headlight. Steve was concerned its sudden collision might have been the result of a loss of steering or power.

Adrenalin pumps at times of stress, and the spoken voice rises in pitch. As I returned to the bow of the boat to see if I could identify the issue ahead, the rising soprano line piercing the darkness matched my increasing tension. Fortunately the boat ahead recovered and moved on before we reached it.

The words of Blisworth Tunnel Blues are based on texts exploring darkness, blindness and alienation, starting with Emily Dickinson’s We grow accustomed to the dark (personally, I don’t think I ever shall) and ending with a section from Byron’s Darkness prompted by the volcanic ash cloud of Mount Tambora’s eruption that blacked out the summer of 1816. Both in their way appear black and bleak but have much to offer in terms of hope and resilience. Dickinson’s poem is about how we humans stumble about until our sight adjusts in darkness. Byron issues a warning of an apocalypse, a call to care for our planet and the threat that hangs over us if we don’t – a message as timely today as in 1816.

This particular journey through the Blisworth Tunnel was the most memorable I have ever taken thanks to George Nicholson’s composition. The music didn’t comfort or console in any way but reinforced the dark, dank, underground experience in the most remarkable way. It was with immense relief that I approached the light at the end of the tunnel.

I emerged into the dappled autumn light of the Blisworth end of the tunnel both shaken and stirred by this remarkable experience. I felt like I had been holding my breath the whole way through, and was also acutely conscious of the sweet, musty smell of autumn which greeted me as I emerged into the light. To hear some very short (fair use) clips of our experience then visit pickingupducks on Instagram on 16 October 2021.

I wondered how it would have sounded without the throbbing, percussive bass of the engine and the chiming of the water splashes – perhaps one day someone will take an electric boat through the tunnel to the accompaniment of George’s music. What I would love to experience would be a trip through the Blisworth Tunnel (did I really just say that) on an electric boat hosting a live performance of the piece.

And the timing? It was pretty close to perfect – we emerged at 34.18!