On our Way.

Friday 20th August 2010
Little Venice to Limehouse Basin
8.5 Miles 12 Locks

We left our moorings in Little Venice at 7 o'clock as planned and went up to the Services where we filled the water tank, that took till about 8.10, then we were off through the Maida Hill tunnel and were soon passing Regents Zoo, the only thing you can see from the Canal is the Snowdon Aviary .

Part of the Snowdon Aviary

The houses we passed in the Regents Park area of London look a bit on the expensive side and there is definitely no mooring outside.

We arrived at Cumberland Basin where the Canal makes a sharp 90 degree turn to the left, I nearly missed it and had to reverse to get round, it was then Primrose Hill, Camden Market

I think these boxes are Apartment's, but it's only a guess.

 and the first of the today's Locks, we caught up with another boat here, Charlie on Narrowboat Woodruff, he was on his own and we stayed with him until St Pancras Lock where he stopped for water, we dropped down the Lock on our own as there was a boat waiting to come up, we carried on through Islington Tunnel and waited in the next Lock for him,  at Mile end Lock we had our first view of one of London's most famous skylines.

Seen through the Trees from Mile End Lock, can we have our money back please?.

The last 3 Locks were quite close together, we emerged into Limehouse Basin at 2 o'clock.

Limehouse, the last manually operated Lock for a few weeks.

Our first view of Limehouse Basin

We knew that mooring space in Limehouse was going to be tight,so we were happy to see Narrowboat Poppy moored up against the wall, Poppy had breasted up next to us in Little Venice last Saturday night so we Breasted up next to them this time, in the next 2 hours 14 more boats arrived so now there are 7 boats abreast at 4 places along the wall.

Tonight most people attended a safety briefing at the Cruising Association where we were given a talk by Andrew Phasey who will be leading the trip, and the Lock Keeper who explained the procedure for Locking out onto the River, we were also warned not to be surprised if a Police boat came along side to check us out as we go past the Houses of Parliament.

View upstream from Limehouse Lock.

No chance of a lie in tomorrow as there are a party from the Stort Boat Club moored here who will be leaving to go up to Teddington at 8.30 so we will have to shuffle the boats around to get them out. 

The Coal and Fuel boat Baron has arrived tonight and tied up, they filled us up with Diesel in Paddington 2 weeks ago, we will have a top up on Saturday from them.

Coal, Diesel  and other Boatie things are available from Narrowboat Baron.