Long lining with the Fullers

Having moved out of my University digs for summer on Sunday I drove stright over to the Fullers house in Stone  after being at home for about 12 hours (10 of which i was asleep) in order to go boating.

Roger had Ilford (A 1912 ex FMC Braithwaites Butty owned by Roger for the last 5 years) at Great Hayward with Southen Cross and Aquarious loaded the three boats with logs from a logging contract with the National Trust to removed around 100tonnes of logs from the Shugborourgh Estate by water.

After turning Southen X at the jucntion and having BBQ on the boats on the Monday night we left Hayward on Tuesday morning motored through to Alvecote with the three boats and Sweden heading towards Braunston for the Historic Working Boat Rally. The first day went well and saw us moor for the night in the basin at the Samual Barlow pub at Alvevote for Tea with Clover& Fazley (amungst others) alongside.

We left early Wednesday from Alvecote and had a clear run through the locks and another good day making Hawkesbury Jn the following evening where we Moored against the warlf alongside the pub and again took full advantage of the pub for food and beer. Two good days boating had seen us ahead of schdual and we spent the thursday morning moored against the Greyhound to watch the sport, with many boats passing through the junction, including Clover & Fazley as well as Hare and Cactus, who i pleased to say all made the turn as well as we did.

We then left Hawkesbury after lunch and boated down to the moorings at Brinklow where we ate onboard cooking a meal of Potatoes, Carrots and FrayBentos pies cooked on the range using reclaimed coal from the hedgerow and where joined by Hadley. Leaving Brinklow Matt walked up the arm to collect Sickle as we passed by and the boats made Braunston at around 2.30 to take up our mooring by the marina entrance.

Southen X and Ilford made the three locks at Hilmorton in 21 minutes start to finish.

Trent adventures

Got a phone call last night at about 7.

"Emilyanne is currently stuck on the mud 5 miles from Crowell on a falling tide can you think of anything clever to do"

Urrrm, not really! Fortunatly another canalworld forum member had do the same, in a simular of of the trent, just a few days earlier. So i got the low down of how it went for him and how quickly the tide came up and the like. He was luck enough to stuck at around midday so refloated around 5 in the evening on a sunday day. Where emilyanne has gone around on a rainy evening as was due to refloat at around one in the morning.

Anyway, they got off fine (at one, in the dark) and made a mile or so's progress towards Cromwell before sticking again. So are not waiting till two this afternoon to hopfully refloat for a second time and make it into Cromwell lock and on to Newark at last!

Wet weekend on the Chesterfield.

Well, ok its wasnt that, better than forcast but compaired to the week before it could have been febuary again!

After a week fo exams I (daniel) joined the boat just east of Worksop for two days off before my lasy exam. Progress on Saturday was slow, at times the weed was that bad it was faster to walk the boat through it than try and use the prop. Sunday went well untill around midday, when the heavens opened, and clear lock free sections started to show up our current coal and how little steam it seams to make us!

Still, the boat is now at Clayworth, and will progess further tomorrow while i revise for my last exam which is in friday.

IWA Campaign Rally

Rally was a great success, the boat arrived mid afternoon on the Saturday and a fuss was made all weekend with a great number of people coming to have a look at the boat, which was kept insteam throughout the weekend.

I joined the boat breifly for Sunday including and evening in the Beer tent before returning to Loughborough for another week of work.

Then today i had my first of four end of year exams, which i can report went well.

The boat is now in the Worksop area, and will be leaving the Chesterfield on the Friday or Saturday of this week going South up the Trent.

Chesterfield

Emilyanne is now on the Chesterfield canal approching Retford. 

Trent crossing went withou mishap with Tom at the wheel with a recently recruited crew who seams to show good promiss.

Tom is now boating on the chesterfield alone this morning and is to be joined shortly by katherine who will crew with him upto the rally site at Kiveton where I will join them for the sunday of the rally. During while time i will hopfully collect the last few weeks photos.

Look forward to the rally, which will be our first campaign rally, if your around, pop in and say hi or else maybe we will see you in the beer tent.

Bingley Five

Quick update: Progress towards the rally is going well.

There was tension in the air friday night when it was realised that the boat didnt have enough coal onboard for the weekends boating and nothing had been done anything about it.
- However after hald a days steaming the boat is now at bingley five having got there an hour after it closed (2hours where spent coaling in the morning) and so by the end of tuesday when the boat should be at or close to Keadby ready to go onto the tidal trent, from where its a few hours cruise to the base of the chesterfeild.

Im still not sure exactly how long i can take off over the week but im expecting to make it to the rally for at lease one of the days.



Daniel

Two steam boats meet

The leeds and liverpool is home to the newest steamboat on the canal system, owned by geoff laycock (emilyanne is the second newest) and as she was in the area a meetup seamed in order!

 - Sadly i have still not been able to get to the boat myself, but geoff was kind enough to supply a photo of the event. There is also a short video on youtube.

On another positive note, after four days hard graft and the first proper all nighter i've ever done, today marked the handin date for my 3rd year major project report. A 13th of may i wont forget for a while!

Good progress.

Im still stuck in Loughborough with far to much work and deadlines to be able to consider evern a weekends boating. HOWEVER!

The boat has now passed Burnley and is making good progress toward the river trent on her way to the chesterfeild campaign rally at the end of this month.

Photo to follow once i have had them sent over from her recent crew!

And shes off!

Thursday last fortnight marked emilyannes departure from the marina at anderton on her next summers boating with her heading north onto the leeds and liverpool on her way to the Chesterfeild rally at the end of this month (May 23/24th) and has currently just past fellow steam boat whistle down the wind's mooring at hapton who left in the same direction in the morning. The chase is on!

Few photos from the wigan flight:

Some nice new gates sealing well.

The other end of the spectrum

One low pound.

But otherwise a very good day!

Planning 09

This weekend marks the start of the boating year. We the crew all got together and planned emilyannes movements for the year and began geting her ready for the year ahead.

Tom and Katherine spend friday on the boat cleaning the galley and bathroom and assessing what needs doing on the boat before the off after eater. Joining Me (daniel) at home in the evening to get busy with a sasco wall planner, nicholson canalmap, and nick attys route planner on the laptop!

The two jobs that came out top where to revarnish the upper portion of the engineroom walls to match the recently repainted lower half, and to finally finish the refit of the backcabin start this time last year. Hence Saturday saw Katherine cleaning and rubbing down the engineroom walls and Stephen an Daniel fitting new linning out to the backcabin bulkhead and removing the old sink ready for the replacment.

Katherine cleaned the engineroom wall (can you see where she had go upto?)

Cutting up the wood for the back cabin wall.

Wall, Before (left) and After (right). Its cleaner if nothing else!

The aformentioned 'old sink' ready for removal!

Other activitys at the Marina during the day.

An Update

Not much has happened to be honest, infact ive not personaly been on the boat since the last post although i probeberbly will before the end of the Christmas hol's.

However shes still afloat and well! Prehaps over spring some work will be done on her to finish the refit on the back cabin, give her a good clean up and maybe improve the engines exhaust vacuum leak (joys of finding vac leaks).

No firm plans have been formed for next year, but a trip up the Chesterfeild has been mooted, possibly co-insiding with the IWA campaign rally, possaibly going via the SBA trentlock rally on the way back down, and maybe even the IWA National at redhill after that. And theres always the work at liverpool to visit. Who knows!!

Cheeky photo of me and the Kitcar because boating it so quite!

Home

EA is now home in Cheshire.

Emilyanne on the Rochdale.

Im now back in loughborough at university (term started monday just gone) and so the boat is having a few days rest while i get sorted at loughborough, tom goes to see his brother on anglesea!

Again, im sorry theres no photos yet. I really will get them up, and work through the backlog of rather lacking posts. But for now thats where we're upto.

The westfield is still a non runner atm also.

Highest steamboat.

Last night we belive we where the highest steam boat in the country, certaily the highest steam narrowboat as we traveled trans-pennine through the standedge tunnel. The longest, highest, deepest canal tunnel ever built

More later. Photos to follow...

Back on land for a few days.

Having being boating since Sunday of last week im now back home for two or three days before our passage through the Standedge tunnel.

We had an excellent run up from shackerstone, everything well went well, although on the approach to Stone the cental secontion of the grate broke in two and fell out.
 - Fortunatly however, as we have been expecting this to happen for a month or two we had a spare onboard. The previous one lasted eight years, and the spare was cast at the time time. The two side sections are still very servicable.

Standedge passage booked for Friday. Boat now waiting outside visitors center at DobCross.

We also got HADAR'ed. See NB Hadar's blog on my blogroll.