Boating on the canals

 A recent programme on TV about the canals reminded me of two very pleasant holidays we spent on the canals in the UK, when the kids were much younger. We were leafing through a Hoseasons catalogue, and decided to hire a barge, or narrow boat as they are properly called on the Southern Oxford canal. We chose one of the smaller boats but when I rang to book, it was not available and the same for our other choices. I put the question another way, what DID they have, and it boiled down to a few of the largest size boats that can fit on the canals! All boats have to be a max of seven feet wide, this is why they are called narrow boats, and can be up to seventy-two feet long. We must have left it a bit late to book... We decided to take what was on offer and shared the cost with my sister, Cath.
  Eventually, Kim,I, Cath and our two youngest, Kerry and Debra drove up to Braunston to board our floating home for the next week. The boat was grandly called the Sir Mark Isambard Brunel, and looked HUGE alongside the dock at Braunston Boats. Although only seven feet wide, it was longer than a single decker bus.. The boatman came aboard when we had stowed our gear in its three bedrooms to give me a course in handling it.
  The behemoth is steered from the rear cockpit with a tiller, rather than a wheel, perfectly simple once you realise you push it left to go right and vice versa..the engine is also controlled from here, by a simple quadrant. Central position is neutral, with the engine idling. Push forward to engage ahead gear, push further to increase revs til you are travelling at its maximum speed of four to five mph. To reverse, pull the lever back, increase revs by pulling it further, simple, no? He untied the warps and we were off. He quickly handed over the tiller to me, and it was not too difficult,once you had got used to the five second delay between putting over the tiller and the boat starting to respond... We went about half a mile up the canal, where we passed under a bridge, the towpath kinking under the bridge so that towing horses didn't have to be untethered. He said,'ok, you seem to have got the hang of it, see you in a week' and hopped nimbly on to the towpath to walk back to the boatyard, leaving a terrified novice in charge.
  An abrupt bend loomed up and the boat drifted towards the bank, despite maximum helm. You have to realise that it steers largely by the rudder redirecting the flow of water from the propeller. I quelled my natural reaction to slow down, and increased revs, pleased to see that this enabled the boat to go round the corner happily. The next crisis was at the first lock...locks are only about two feet wider than the boat and the cabin blocks the view of the helmsman seventy two feet further back...by guess and by Goodness I passed between the gate pillars and we entered the lock chamber. If you are going up, someone has to climb up a slippery vertical ladder to carry the warp up to tie up. He, or she, then has to open the sluices with a tool like a starting handle to let water into the basin, AFTER closing the gate by heaving on the beam. When the lock is full, the top gate is opened, the warps are cast off, the crew hops back on, and we motor grandly away. A minor miracle of eighteenth century technology, to lift umpteen tons of steel boat twenty feet, using no motorised force!
  the boat was quite luxuriously equipped inside, once you got used to living in a sort of long corridor.. you have everything you need right with you, in the same way as a caravan, and we passed a very pleasant week on the canal. I had our old Alsation, Flicka to keep me company in the rear cockpit. Each time we came into the bank, she leapt off for a walk, only fell in twice... Cath was helping to push out the bow of the boat when we were setting off once. You have to push long and hard to budge a heavy steel narrow boat and Cath continued beyond the point where she could regain the bank or pull herself onto the boat, she found herself suspended like a human gang-plank. She gave a despairing howl and fell in. I put the engine in neutral to stop the prop and Kim hauled her aboard by the collar, a highpoint of the trip