It’s not really a vlog because in this episode I’m just re-tracing my steps from the prior five cruising videos and didn’t really film as usual but I compiled this selection of clips to illustrate Stuff Of Interest – mostly to do with how amazingly busy the canals got after July 4th when lockdown restrictions were eased and people could use their boats again.
An episode in which, despite wind and rain, I boated on like a trooper to get from Otherton to Autherley, including the extremely narrow section that’s barely wide enough for one boat just before you get to Autherley.
Picking up from the previous video, I continue down the Staffs and Worcs canal from Acton Trussell, through Penkridge and moor outside Otherton Boat Haven. En route, I demonstrate how not to open a lock gate.
At the end of a very warm day in June, I set off from Shugborough to Great Haywood, turning there onto the Staffs & Worcester canal because from there down to Autherley is a section of canal I’ve never done before. I moored at Tixall Wide – beautiful – and then headed on around Stafford before being perplexed at what people have at the end of their gardens in Acton Trussell.
After almost drowning in the sea of rain falling onto Fradley, a new menace threatened my journey as the furious weather switched tack, turning instead to attack me with blazing rays of sun at a million degrees. Parched, weak and craving to escape the furnace I hauled myself to the back of the boat and just about had enough energy to propel the boat in search of shade, even as my last drops of water were exhausted. This is that traumatic tale.
This is the vlog version of the trip shown in real-time in the last video; I leave Kings Orchard Marina near Lichfield and head north up the Coventry canal to Fradley Junction where it rains a lot and I moor above the locks.
A “slow TV” (real-time) bow-camera recording of the trip from Kings Orchard Marina at Lichfield to Fradley Junction on June 21st 2020.
In the second of my lockdown Skype interviews with other boaters, we cross the pond to Missouri, USA for a chat with Kay Davis and Jeff Hoesel who own a 1994 Gibson Cabin Yacht and take it for trips along the mighty Mississippi River.
Over recent months I have noticed a number of unsightly rusty spots erupting on the boat’s roof. Some, I assume, are from bits of grit rubbing through the paint as I’ve walked over it; for others I have no idea as to their origins. All needed tidying up and the rust stopped in its tracks though so in this video I show you my initial attempts, which fall short of a full repaint.
On Wednesday 13th May, the lockdown restrictions on the English waterways were relaxed slightly to permit day trips for leisure boaters. So I took the opportunity to fire up the narrowboat and do a five-hour cruise down towards Fazeley Junction and back.
