Fradley Junction to Shardlow - Last Leg

The final leg of the journey was from Fradley to Shardlow - a leisurely two and a half day journey. We got back on the boat on Sunday afternoon, and thought it would be nice to go and investigate Alrewas for the evening. The journey was an hour or so, through three locks. Fradley Junction was busy, with queues for the locks, and as Rivendell is a long boat, when we came to queue for the first lock, there wasn't a large enough space for us to fit near the lock. I therefore pulled into an empty long-term residential mooring on the right, quite a bit back from the lock. As boats passed up and down through the lock, our turn was coming, and with two other boats ahead of us in the canal, but behind us in the queue, I got the wave to get in the lock... This is exactly the sort of time when you want to smoothly pull out from the bank and cruise neatly into the lock.... Needless to say, the boat had some different ideas! I pushed the front end out, and ran down the bank to jump on the back before it got too far into the canal. I put her into forward, and tiller to the right to push the front end left into the middle of the canal. Now, this also pushes the rear end towards the bank. Not usually a problem, as the back end will just rub along the bank for a bit before you can use heavy left tiller to bring the rear inline with the front. However, as this was a long-term mooring, there had not been much movement on this bit of bank, and sediment had built up. The rear end beached.. Damn!! Only way off is to reverse (the back of the boat is the lowest in the water, at around 2ft 4 draft, so reversing is the best way off a shelf). This brought the front end back into the bank. Deja vu.... Get off, push front end out, drive forwards, get stuck. Repeat several times.. Now the other boats, who had been very courteous in allowing me through looked annoyed! What the hell is he doing?

Eventually, I reversed a good 50 ft down the cut, into nice clear water, and a large bust of power got the boat nicely in the middle of the canal, and I could cruise into the lock... What a start to a gentle afternoon's boating! The rest of the journey was simple, and we moored up in Alrewas, looking forward to a nice pub meal. Time for cock-up number two... In Alrewas, as in many parts of the country, on Sundays pubs do Sunday lunch, but no food in the evening. Damn again!! Back to the boat, and I made a surprisingly good and quick veggie chilli. Went down a treat, and saved us a few quid to boot... We went back to the George and Dragon for a few pints later. Nice pub - had a band on, but we were tired, so headed back for an early night.

Moored in Alrewas on the first night.

 The next morning, it was cold, but looked like the rain of the past week might have abated. The forecast was for 8-10 degrees and light winds, with occasional heavy showers. The stretch to Burton Upon Trent was fairly uneventful, apart from some rather tight spots going through bridges. I was getting to know the boat much better now I had driven it for 180 miles over 13 days or so. These would once have made my heart race and made me very nervous, but not anymore - I managed to get through without the slightest scrape. Probably because there was none around to notice!!

Lazy bridge builders! Loads of room, so lets make the boats go through the little channel on the left!!

Tight squeeze! an inch either side of this bridge!

As we came into Burton, the industrial history of this hallowed town was obvious. The heart of the Brewing industry for centuries, we found Burton to be surprisingly pleasant by boat. In contrast, it is grim to say the least going through on the A38. There are brewery tours for both Marstons and Bass breweries, but we had to push on. Inde Coope is my favourite Burton brewer.

Welcome to Burton

Burton is very pretty by canal..

After what seemed like an age going through Burton, we quickly came to our overnight stop, Willington. We chugged through the village and all the mooring spots were full, so we had to head out the other side before we found any space, on a non-piling bank. It had been raining for the past 30 minutes or so, and we pulled up and put in some mooring pins (look like a 2 ft massive nail). As a boat came past at rather too quick a speed, our boat moved and ripped the 3 mooring pins out of the very soft bank.. Time to move further down the canal onto more secure moorings!! Another quarter of a mile down the canal, and we were just coming into a nice size gap, and the heavens absolutely opened! It rained so hard, it was difficult to see the front of the boat, let alone the bank! I've not seen rain like it in Britain before - as bad as I saw in the storms in Texas when I lived there. Drenched, we finally moored up, changed clothes, and wandered off to town in the hope that pubs served food on Mondays here! Luckily, they do. We had a good meal in the "Green Man" pub, and then went over the road to the Rising Sun for a couple of pints. This pub lets in Dogs and has scrabble, connect 4 and various other games, and a great Rock/Metal jukebox. We spent quite some time here!

Moored in Willington.

One of the three pubs within 2 minutes walk from the canal in Willington

The next morning, we made the walk to Mercia Marina, where we went to the cafe for what must be the best breakfast you are ever likely to find for a fiver. It is amazing!!! Bellies full, we headed off, and quickly came to the first of the wide locks since we left the Grand Union. This first one is a monster.. about a 12 ft drop. As was to be the case for most of the day, as we came to the lock, it started to rain... First we had to wait for a couple of boats to come up. This was not made easy, as both of the bottom lock gates wouldn't open fully, and the second boat to come in struggles to push past the first. The driver of this second yellow boat then climbed out to help with filling the lock, tying his middle rope to a bollard at the top. As the lock filled, it was quickly clear that it was going to be difficult for him to control his boat using a tied rope. As the boat rose, the rope got slack, and the boat went forward, jamming its nose into the serrated cill. The bow got jemmied in the cill, and within a few tens of seconds, the boat was in danger of being sunk - the water level was rising quickly, and the bow was jammed, water rising all the time, threatening to pour over the front at any minute. Panic ensued, and people shouted to close the paddles letting water into the lock, and open those to let the water back out. The people on the paddles didn't quite get the urgency of the request, so I shouted "the boats about to sink, let the water out!!!" and that seemed to leave no room for confusion. Within another 10 seconds or so, paddles were shut and opened, and the level started to recede. Another 30 seconds, and the boat was free... These locks can be dangerous!! A few minutes later, and the two boats left the lock, and we entered, along with a 45 ft boat, ready to go down. This was uneventful, but when it came to exit, those non-opening doors caused serious problems. First I tried to exit, while the 45 after reversed as far back in the lock as he could. It didn't work - I came to a halt. Wo we tried the other way - and juuuuuuusssssstttt he managed to push past on full throttle, metal scraping metal and timber as he went. BW really need to fix these gates - if two 50ft+ boats went in, there would be no way either would get out, and you would have to waste a lot of water and time re-filling the lock for one boat to leave whilst the other went back down again to get out.

Large Stenson Lock

The boat and the cill..

Non-opening doors make it very difficult to leave the lock if two boats are in.

 We were now getting close to what will become "home" for the boat for the next 6-9 months. The countryside around here, just south of Derby is really stunning.

Lovely countryside around here

Getting close to Shardlow!

Lovely bridges along this stretch

Before we knew it, we were at Sharlow. Once again, this village, which looks pretty grim when you drive through by road, is transformed when you go through in a boat. Really lovely. Lots of pubs, a wharf, boatyard, and many pubs litter the towpath. This was obviously an important place in the history of the canals, being the end of the Trent and Mersey canal.

Shardlow Lock

Working boats 

Great pub - the Clock Warehouse. Another dog friendly pub.

Moored below Shardlow lock - Sun at last too!

After 200+ miles, and about 15 days of boating, we finally arrived at Chapel Farm Marina - our mooring for the next 6-9 months or so, whilst Andy (who's mooring it is) has his new boat built. All we have to do now is go and park! This, it turned out, would not be that easy.... And of course, there were lots of spectators... In 200 miles, I had not hit another boat. As we finally came to our our marina, I managed to hit three as I tried to get into the mooring! Ah, the shame.. The "problem" was that the wind had picked up, so when I came to come in the entrance, and tried to manoeuvre the boat to go into the mooring, the front end was being pushed closer and closer to the line of boats. I quickly realised that this could only result in one thing - you can't control the front end of the boat at slow speed. I slammed it in reverse to try and get back out of the marina entrance. When reversing, if the front is could in any direction other than straight, reversing seems to speed up the lateral movement, and I bashed into two boats (fenders luckily) before the middle of the boat was far enough through the entrance of the marina to push the front end badk into safe water. One of the owners came quickly out to assess the damage (none, luckily as I hit his fender, and at a low speed). After a few more attempts, and one of the other boaters helping my front end in with a rope, we were finally in! What in introduction to my neighbours to be! Hopefully I'll get a bit better at this tricky bit of manoeuvring over the next few months!

Finally at our new home marina!

Finally moored up.