Twists and Turns

Weds/Thursday 8/9th Sept 2010
Oxford to Bablock Hythe
10 Miles 4 Locks.

Wednesday. Jayne called Oxford shopmobility first thing to see if she could have the use of a scooter, yes, and you can use it anywhere within the city limits was the answer,so we arrived at the shopping centre and found shopmobility, while Jayne was sorting a scooter out I put a £1 coin in the guide map dispenser and surprisingly it worked ! out came a tourists map.

Moored above Osney Lock, Oxford

We headed for the area where most of the colleges are and spent the morning there, we enjoyed doing the sights of Oxford much more that London, we found it better maintained with a lot less litter.

Jayne was supposed to remember the name of these buildings, but has forgotten

we will probably go back to Oxford next week so we will revisit them.

Cycle City, this is the cycle parking area at Oxford Train Station

Got back to the boat around 2.30 and as the weather was good I did a bit of paint touching up.

At 5 o,clock the Lock keeper came by to collect the £5 fee for staying on the mooring for an extra night but it was well worth it.

Thursday.   We had planned to move today but had not decided how far, it's the best way, just go as far as you feel like. We past under Osney bridge as we left the mooring, at 7 feet 6 inches between the water and the highest point of the bridge it stops the larger cruisers getting past Oxford.

Osney Bridge Oxford, no Gin Palaces get past here. The fencing on the left is work being carried out on the weir 

 We past Port Meadow on our right, a huge field, the river is wide here but the edges are shallow.

Just right for Cattle, not so good for Boats

The first Lock was Godstow, we arrived with blue Sky's and sunshine but with storm clouds gathering, 30 minutes later at the next lock, Kings Lock I was inside the boat getting the waterproofs as the sky was now very dark and the rain was starting.

Godstow,  another beautifully kept Thames Lock, with the cheerful lockie standing at the controls.

 All the guide books say how tight the bends are from Oxford to Lechlade and they are not wrong, it really gives your tiller arm a real workout, the other thing that gets a workout are the Lock keepers, so far on the Thames all the locks have been powered, Kings Lock was the first of the manual Locks, although the Lockie made it look easy.

Floods are nothing new.

We moored up at 2 o'clock just upstream of the Ferryman pub on some very nice 24 hour moorings.

Moored just upstream from the Ferryman Pub.

Went to the pub  tonight for a meal but we were not overly impressed, firstly they had trouble changing a £20 note for the drinks, secondly they had run out of Chips !!, ( I thought you made chips from Potato's) so Jayne's first choice of battered cod and chips was a none starter, just before we left Jayne popped to the toilet but came back and said "I will wait till I get back to the boat", however, having said all that, the meals we did have were very good so we must have caught them on a bad day. 

Very quite hear, no main roads, the only noise was from Chinook helicopters which we think were from RAF Odiham.
We will move a bit closer to Lechlade tomorrow, how far depends on the weather.

Inspector Morse Territory

Monday/Tuesday 6/7th Sept 2010
Abingdon to Oxford
8.75 Miles 4 Locks.

Monday. We have been closely watching the weather forecast for this week, hoping to try and avoid the rain. We left Abingdon at 10 o'clock and went through Abingdon Lock, this lock has a full set of services so once through it we moored by the water point and waited for the boat in front to fill their water tank, on the Canals boaters use their own hose pipes which they connect to the taps, on the Thames the hoses are permanently fixed to the taps and are a large diameter, even so it still takes ages to fill, whilst we waited I emptied the Cassettes and Jayne got rid of the rubbish into the skip.
An hour after we had arrived we were off again, the weather was still bright but windy, we arrived at the next lock, Sandford, and waited by the lock moorings for the Lock keeper to open the gates, when he did he indicated for us and another Narrowboat behind to wait while a large trip boat from Salters Steamers went into the Lock first, when they were in and secured we were waved in. Sandford Lock at nearly 9 feet is the deepest Lock on the Thames above Teddington, in contrast the next Lock, Iffley is one of the shallowest at 2 feet 9 inches it was also showing the self service sign as it was lunch hour for the Lock keeper, after we had worked ourselves through the Lock dark clouds were overhead so we decided to moor up on the Environment Agency moorings above the lock, the first two attempts were aborted due to it being to shallow but the third time we were successful, the forcasted rain arrived at 5 o'clock and stayed most of the night.

Moored up early on Monday to avoid the rain.

The First Mate checking on me.  The strange object on the roof is a Hedgehog on a Motorcycle, more about him later.

Tuesday. Nice bright start this morning, it was decided over breakfast to move to the moorings above Osney Lock in Oxford so that we could have a look around.

There were a lot of Rower's going past the our moorings on Monday afternoon and Tuesday morning, some on there own, some doubles, fours and eights, we assume they were members of the Oxford University rowing club which we had past.

University Boathouses

We found there was plenty of room on the Moorings so after a cup of tea we set off around Oxford, we didn't have a visitors map so just headed towards some spires we could see through gaps in the shopping area, we ended up at Christ Church meadow with a view of Christ Church Cathedral

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Christ Church Cathedral viewed from the Meadow.

The moorings here are free for the first 24 hours then £5 for the next 24 up to 72 hours, after that they have had enough of you because it then goes to £50 for 24 hours, we have decided that there is a lot more to see here so will stay another day.

Sightseeing and Visitors.

Friday/Saturday/Sunday 3/4/5th September 2010
Moored at Abingdon
No Miles No Locks.

Friday.  Having spent Thursday night moored along side another boat, we were ready to shuffle around on Friday morning when most of the other moorers would be moving, luckily another 70 foot boat moved off from the very end of the free Municipal moorings and we were able to reverse No Direction straight in, the moorings here are by far the best we have found on the Thames.

Moored at the end of the Municipal moorings at Abingdon

We went into Abingdon Town at around 11.30 and just like Wallingford, the last town we moored at, were pleasantly surprised, Jayne needed to visit the Halifax Building Society, after that we had a look at some of the old buildings and the open air Italian market in the Square.

St Nicolas,s in Abingdon

County Hall Museum    it's not really leaning, that ones in Italy.

Picked up a few things from the Waitrose Supermarket on the way back to the boat, another Narrowboat moored along side in the afternoon and stayed till Saturday morning.

Lots of different craft have to share the River, the Narrowboat crews refer to the Glass Fibre Cruisers as Tupperwares and Cruiser people call us Steel Slugs. Another difference is that Narrowboaters are usually happy for other Narrowboats to moor along side for the night if all the mooring spaces are taken, Cruisers don't seem to do it, we have only seen Cruisers breasted up once whilst we have been on the river. 

Steel Slugs and Tupperwares share the moorings

Saturday.  In the morning we had a walk around Abbey gardens and the area where the Abbey once stood. After lunch I changed the Generator engine oil, cleaned the water filter and gave everything a quick check over.

As it was a sunny Saturday afternoon there were plenty of boats on the river from Rowing boats and hired Motorboats to the Salters Steamers trip boat, Goring.   A large Dutch Barge moored in front of us tonight.

No Direction in the distance dwarfed by the Dutch Barge, the locals drop the litter, not the boater

We have an unusual duck swimming around, it's very tame as it takes bread out of our hands, Beige colour with a bright red beak, Jayne has scanned the Internet without finding a positive I.D.

The Duck with the red beak, any ideas ?

Sunday.  Our Friends Pete and Val decided to visit today, so Jayne was on the Internet and found a 2 meals for £10 voucher (max 6 people) for the ASK chain of restaurant's, there happened to be one in Abingdon so she printed it off, when Pete and Val arrived we walked to the Restaurant and had a nice leisurely meal. When we got back to the moorings there was a scruffy wooded cabin cruiser and the Environment Agency River inspectors boat, the Inspector was filling out a form as the boat was un-licensed, as we have paid £130 for a 31day Thames license we were glad to see the Inspector doing his job, the £130 was a discounted price for boats visiting the I.W.A. Festival, normally it would be £171 for 31 days with a 70ft Narrrowboat.

The River Inspector on the left taking details of the Cabin Cruiser

True to form the bloke off the scruffy un-licensed boat relieves himself against the fence,the public loo,s are 50 yards away.

We are thoroughly enjoying our time on the Thames and intend to carry on to the limit of navigation at Lechlade before returning to the Canal system at Oxford, the weather forecast for tomorrow (Monday) is heavy rain and showers the rest of the week so we may stay here for another day.

We have had a trouble free trip so far, not so for everyone, read fellow blogger Halfie tale of woe.

It Doesn't Get Much Better

Thursday 2nd Sept 2010
Wallingford to Abingdon
13 Miles 4 Locks.

As I said in a previous blog it all depends on the weather and today it has been beautiful.
I was up early as we knew that the 2 boats moored on the inside of us wanted to be off by 8 o,clock, they got away about 8.15 and we moved over next to the wall, 10 minutes later the mooring Warden came by for the £5 mooring fee, we asked him what time he started work, 8.15 he replied, what a coincidence, exactly the time the other boats left.

Early morning view from No Direction.

The wall that the Moorings are against is about 3 feet above the back of a Narrowboat so Jayne had difficulty getting off the boat, but we managed it and walked into Wallingford, we found that the £5 mooring fee was well worth it, Wallingford is a really nice little town with some interesting old buildings, at least 7 pubs, a Fish & Chip shop and a very modern Waitrose Store, we did a food shop and were away from our Moorings at about 11 o'clock, very little wind and wall to wall sunshine which stayed with us all day.

The River here is still very wide, twisty and mostly lined by trees, we have noticed a lot of military helicopters flying around and discovered that we are close to R.A.F. Benson which was home to the Photographic Reconnaissance Unit during WW2 and now a base for Merlin and Puma Helicopters. The WW2 Pill boxes are still in place, put there to defend the Airfield against the expected German invasion.

We arrived at Clifton Lock while the Lock keeper was at lunch, so the sign was set to "Self Service" although there were 2 boats in front of us I was keen to have a go at pressing the buttons on the control panel, unlike Canal locks the gates and sluices (paddles to canal folk) are operated by Hydraulic rams which are controlled by pressing small buttons, I closed the upper gates and lowered the sluices after the previous boats have left, the Lock keeper came back on duty and took over so I had to stop playing and get back on the boat.

We are now moored on free council mooring just upstream from the A415 road bridge at Abingdon , and will probably stay here over the weekend as the mooring have a maximum stay of 5 days, it's nice to find a Town that makes boaters welcome and provides plenty of moorings.
All I know about Abingdon is that it was once famous for making M.G. Sports Cars, but not anymore.  Tomorrow we will have tour round the town and discover a bit more.

Filled up and on the Move

Tuesday/Wednesday, 31 Aug/1 Sept 2010
Beale Park to Wallingford
8.25 Miles  2 Locks.

Tuesday.  I was up at 7 o'clock this morning and gave Tom Hill, the owner of fuel boats Archemedes and Ara a call, " High Tom what time are you starting today, we need fuel, we are the 5th boat up stream when you come out of the Lake"  he replied " OK will see you in about 30 mins", problem was they came out of the Lake and turned down stream, 3 hours later they came past going up stream as they had more customers up there, it was a good job we had decided to leave on Wednesday because every time he stopped to fill a boat all the other boats around wanted filling as well, by the time they got to us they had virtually sold out, their fuel tank holds 4000 litres so they had been busy, they also sold 3 tons of coal. While all this was going on the Festival dismantling carried on, the boarding gantry's that had been built to aid access to boats were taken down as well so we had to resort to using our gangplank.

The Festival site being dismantled

Wednesday.  The fuel boat had arranged to be re-filled at Pangbourne on Wednesday morning so at midday we got our Diesel tanks filled, the boat moored on the outside of us had a fill up as well, then moved off upstream, we followed about 45 minutes later.

Coal and Diesel boat Archemedes sits low in the water, it's carrying 25 tons of coal and 4000 ltrs of Diesel

One of the larger Dutch Barges leaves the Festival site on Wednesday.

Today was perfect cruising weather, sunny with virtually no wind and hardly any other boats around. 

The gates of Goring Lock open for  No Direction to enter.

The first Lock was Goring where the Lock keeper was very helpful and used a boat hook (a long wooded shaft with a hook fitted to the end) to take the front rope from Jayne which saved her throwing it around the mooring bollard he then came to the rear of the boat and took the stern rope from me, Goring was closely followed by Cleeve Lock which has a very small rise of 2 feet 3 inches, after exiting the Lock we stopped at the water hose to fill our water tank, the boat that we shared the Lock with came along side and took on water too, fortunately there were 2 hoses, during the 30 or so minutes it took to fill the water tank only 3 other boats used the Lock.

The veiw up stream from Cleeve Lock, perfect conditions

All the Thames Locks that we have been through have Lock keepers Cottages or Houses by them, in 2008 the Enviorment Agency proposed selling off or renting out the properties and getting rid of the Lock keepers to save money but they did a U turn after protests 

No problems when it was It controlled by the Thames Conservancy

We are now moored at Wallingford on the Town Wharf moorings, the town council charge £5 for overnight moorings which is OK, this will be the first time we will have paid to moor on the Thames which is good going as most moorings are charged for, even the bank of a farmers field. We are breasted up (moored along side) next to 2 other boats, they are moving off at 8 in the morning and we will then move over to moor by the wall so we will probably end up paying the fiver. I walked into the town after we had moored to check if there was a Fish and Chip shop, but the pub by the River about 100 yards along the bank were doing 2 meals for £10, which was cheaper than Fish and Chips anyway so I didn't go any further, it is the first Pub meal we have had since July 18th as the pubs around London didn't appeal to us.

There is also a Waitrose store in the town so that is a job for Tomorrow.

Moored at Wallingford

Wallingford Bridge

The I.W.A. Festival.

Sat/Sun/Monday 28/29/30th August 2010
Moored at Beale Park.
No Miles No Locks.

Saturday.  The show opened at 10am and the first stand I headed for was the suppliers of our Batteries, Multicell, now and again we have a strange reading on our Battery monitor panel which measures the voltage in the Batteries, charging/discharge and the amount power in them which is shown as a percentage figure, the first 2 are OK but the percentage figure sometimes does not make sense, we decided that the Batteries were fine and that it was was down to a problem with the Victron monitor panel so we will be following that one up.

We used quite a bit more Diesel coming up the River than we would normally use on the Canals, mainly due to me trying to go to fast, after a while you realise that with the shape and weight of a 70ft Canal boat the extra throttle opening gives very little increase in speed, so now we will be cruising at Canal speed again, Jayne spoke to Tom Hill who runs a Coal/Diesel boat which is on display at the Festival and arranged for us to have a fill up before he leaves on Tuesday, his prices are a bit more realistic that some of the Yacht/Cruiser type Marina's we have past.

At 12 o,clock we started our 2 hours on the .R.B.O.A. stand, the first hour was very quiet, the second very busy, the rest of the day was spent Looking around the show, the organisers had built a mock up of an old wharf where working boats would have loaded/unloaded.

Crane loading at the Wharf

Sunday. We were on the R.B.O.A. stand between 10 and 12 o'clock today, someone (forgot his name) from One Chem brought  some samples of there toilet fluid which were gratefully received. We also bought 6 side fenders from rope specialists outdoor escape, we have been using Go-Kart tyres but being rubber they squeaked when the boat rocked.

There were a few classic cars on display.

1951 Triumph Renown

1970 Morris 1000 Van

Jayne and I bought one of these Vans in April 1971 only by then they were called Austin 6 cwt Vans, XOG 796J, it cost £501.00, £12.50 for a heater and £7.50 for the passenger seat. (Jayne says she could still find the receipt but I think she's winding me up).

Aveling & Porter Roller. 

Last night there was an open air get together of  R.B.O.A. members on the grass area outside our boat, about 35 members turned up, it went on till dark when the illuminated boat parade came out of the lake and up the river turned and back down.

Monday.   Today I had booked a 2 hour rope splicing course in the craft centre which started at 10.30, I can splice an eye on the end of a rope but it never looks very good although we have never had one come undone, we were shown how to splice an eye, how to splice 2 rope ends together and finally a back splice, now I just need to practice for a couple of years.

Whilst I was splicing Jayne had borrowed a small electric mobility scooter from a company who had them on display, we have been planning to get a small foldable scooter for events just like this Festival where there is a lot of walking to see everything, so it was an ideal opportunity to try one on grass, she had it for 2 hours, all the company wanted for it's use was a donation, I asked her later how much she had donated expecting it to have been £5 or a bit more, she had given them £2, mean or what, I'm glad I never worked for her. Comment from Jayne, I asked if the donation was for a charity, they said 'No for us', that is why I only gave £2!!!!

I did another hour manning the swing bridge this afternoon ( see Fridays blog), after that we had a final wander round the festival and watched the model boats on the Lake, not little models but ones large enough for the owner to sit inside and control it.

This is a Model, it's about 24 feet long, 3 feet wide and the owner is lying inside, it even fires it's guns

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This is another of his models, a Nuclear Submarine.

This is called Water Zorbing, the child gets in, it is then pumped up with a leaf blower and the aperture zipped up. then it's pushed out onto the water, there is a rope attached, there was a long queue even at £4 for 5 minutes

It was then back to the boat, we were going to the entertainment tent tonight as it was "Sixties" night but Jayne was to tired.

We have planned to move off on Wednesday probably up to Abington .

Getting Sorted

Thursday/Friday 26/27th August 2010
Moored at Beale Park
No Miles No Locks.

Thursday.  Drizzle this morning as we shuffled our boat with the one next to the River bank, we were allocated mooring position  A,  which is against the bank, it was raining when we arrived yesterday so we agreed to do the swap today.

No Direction lined up with the access boards.

In the afternoon 3 more boats arrived, so there are now 5 side by side.
During a break in the rain we put our bunting and flags up. 

The festival site is off limits to us as the exhibitors set up, we are only allowed in during opening hours unless I can get my hands on an exhibitor pass, then I can have a good nose around before the crowds arrive.

Friday.   Some of the floating exhibitions and boat clubs are situated on the Beale Park lake, the lake is accessed from the River Thames via a narrow cut across which, there is a floating swing bridge, so every time a boat arrives that needs to get into the Lake area the bridge needs to be opened so the organiser asked for volunteer's, I volunteered and was operating the bridge today between 10 & 11 o'clock, it takes 2 people to operate it, 1 to pull on the chain to open it and 1 to pull on another chain to close it, I have also volunteered for an hour on Sunday and again on Monday.

A Dutch Barge enters the lake with the Swing Bridge open

At around 5 this afternoon I heard the distinctive sound of a Narrowboat with a Bolinder Hot Bulb Engine these were one of the first Diesel engines available in the early 1900s, (the starting procedure requres a Blowlamp !!!.)  I went down to the lake entrance to have a look, it was 2 Historic boats from Tamworth,  Kangaroo, the one with the engine and Australia the Butty, without an engine.

The 2 Boats pass the open Swing Bridge, our mate Caz is standing on the back of the far one.

Tomorrow we will have a quick look around the show when it opens at 10 am, then we are both on the R.B.O.A.. stand at 12 for our 2 hour stint.