Xilion Rose

We left Birmingham after a great weekend and made our way south, almost passing the Cadburys Factory at Bournville, well, you can’t pass up an opportunity to scoff free chocolate can you, so we moored up in their secure mooring point and joined the happy throng roaming around Cadburys World. After exploring the Factory (and topping up our chocolate levels) we headed for Stratford, a short trip of only 24 miles, but with 57 locks. As we arrived at the last lock before Stratford, we were joined by a Swan and her 5 signets who were determined to get into the Stratford basin before us, so we agreed to share the lock (see photo below) and save water.
The Stratford Water Festival was planned for the following Saturday / Sunday, and with Selina and India arriving, meeting new friends and even winning the award for the best Semi Trad Narrow Boat, the whole weekend proved to be a great success. All in all, about 50 or so Narrow Boats and around 30 Plastic Cruisers attended and on the Saturday Night, there was a parade of illuminated boats and a massive firework display.
The Stratford Festival wetted our appetite, and as there was a similar event planned for the following weekend in Evesham, we extended our Avon license, and made our way down the Avon to the Festival Site. The Evesham Festival was this year celebrating it’s 25th year and as part of the celebrations, every one was asked to dress up their boats, therefore with bunting and coloured lights purchased, we proceeded to dress up Xilion Rose for the illuminated parade on the Saturday night, this was followed by one of the best firework displays I have ever seen.
After the Festival, together with Gary and Sarah on their N/B Stealth, we slowly made our way back to Stratford and the start of the Stratford Canal where we plan to start our journey down to the Thames via the Grand Union Canal and The South Oxford Canal. Well, we made it into the first lock from the Stratford Basin, and then promptly tripped over one of the new style Mooring Bollards (the type with a sharp square on top), which resulted in a quick trip to the Minor Injuries Clinic to have my shin stitched up. Back in one piece, and with Annie insisting that I stay sat down on the boat and her doing all the lock work, we slowly made or way towards the Grand Union junction at Kingswood.   

Save Water, Share a Lock with a Friend

Xilion Rose in a Festival Mood

Bollards One, Malcolms Leg Nil

After leaving the Llangollen Canal behind, we made our way, via the Middlewich Link to the top end of the Trent and Mersey Canal and the Anderton Boat Lift. After meeting up with a couple of friends (Adrian and Michelle) we entered the Boat Lift and dropped down 50 ft to the River Weaver, we then turned left and headed for Northwich, the following morning we went through Dukes Lock and explored some of the upper section of the River before returning to the Boat Lift, where after saying goodbye to Adrian and Michelle, we decided to return to the River and take our time to further exploring the River Weaver.
After spending a couple more days on the River, we returned, via the Boat Lift to the Canal and headed for Nantwich where we had a dinner date with Paul and Jen, Paul is one of Annie’s ex workmates from Kidde. We then left Nantwich and headed south to Gnosall for a really important appointment with a guy called Terry Robinson, Terry is a qualified Boat Handling Instructor, and we had booked a two day course with him so that Annie could learn drive the boat with confidence and also to enable both of us to gain our European Boat Handling Certificate. During the “Celebration Meal” after the successful completion of the course, Terry’s Partner, Pat invited us to join a planned trip with the I.W.A. through the Dudley Tunnel, passing through the Dudley Limestone Mines and ending in the Canal Basin at the Dudley Living Museum. We were so impressed with the Living Museum that we decided to bring Xilion Rose to the Museum Basin and spend some time exploring the attractions. We actually spent three nights in the Museum Basin as there was so much to see and do, from Chain Link Making in the early 1900’s through to a typical garage from the 1930’s (actually a Sunbeam Garage) where the mechanic took us for a short drive in his very rare, 1934 Sunbeam Light 6, of which only 4 are known to exist, the model is called the Light 6 as it had 6 side windows.
We finally left the Museum Basin and headed for Gas Street Basin in the centre of Birmingham and the annual Dragon Boat Races. We had a great day with loads of thing to see from the actual boat racing through to Dragon Dancing.
Our next target is the Stratford Boat Festival, to be held over the weekend of the 3rd and 4th July.
Cheers for now, Annie and Malcolm

The Anderton Boat Lift

Chain Making by hand in the 1900's

Annies first Solo lock

Dragon Boat racing in Birmingham

After leaving Nantwich, we arrived at the junction where the Llangollen Canal branched off to the left, and were immediately confronted with 4 extremely narrow locks, with signs to instruct us to lift our side fenders as the locks were only 7 ft wide, after threading our way in to the bottom lock, with a certain amount of bumping and scraping, our eventful journey down the “Llangollen” started..
We had heard that visitor mooring was scarce along the canal, but this was a myth as the lock keeper proceeded to present us with various pamphlets and flyers that explained the do’s and don’ts of the canal, among which was a long list of mooring points along the 44.5 miles to Llangollen.  
Our first stop was only 2 miles from the start of the canal, we had arranged with the Swanley Bridge Marina to leave Xilion Rose in their care as we needed to return to High Wycombe so that we could look after India and the three dogs while Chris sprung the surprise of a weekend in New York for Selina as a way of celebrating her 40th birthday.
We returned on the Monday and set of down the canal towards Whitchurch where we moored over night in the short Whitchurch Arm, a really pretty mooring with plenty of room to sit out and relax after cruising the 12 miles from Swanley Marina. One point of interest re Whitchurch is that about 32 years ago we hired a Canal Boat with a couple of friends and at Whitchurch we decided to eat at the only Indian restaurant in the town, on getting the bill we realized that we had not picked up our wallets, and had to go through all our pockets (including those of Steven and Selina) to try and raise the required amount, unfortunately we came up short by about £1.00. The owner went mental as we left amid promises to return the following day with the required cash, needless to say, we never did return to pay the outstanding amount but Selina still remembers the owner and warned us not to eat Indian food while we were in the town.
The following morning we set of again towards Llangollen, passing a group of people on the towpath with various cameras etc. all focused on a bush on the non towpath side of the canal, and when we asked what was going, they explained that there was a Kingfisher’s nest in the bush and the chicks were about to fledge, unfortunately, we did not see any action, but marked the spot on our map with the intention of stopping in the same area on our return trip. Pushing on, we finally reached the Ellesmere moorings where we found that a new Tesco’s had been built and were able to re-stock our provisions.
The following day we reached the famous Pontcysyllte Aqueduct and decided to moor overnight and then cross the Aqueduct in the morning as the only point to moor once we crossed over was about 4 miles away in the Llangollen basin. Morning arrived and over we went, and it was spectacular with a walkway on one side and just a couple of inch’s of steel on the other side so that when you looked over the side of the boat, you looked straight down to the River Dee, 126 ft below.
We finally reached the Llangollen Basin and met up with Brenda (Annie’s sister in law) and her brother Lewis and his partner Linda. We were immediately invited to join them that evening for a meal in the Hand Hotel, where at about 9 15. pm. many of the Llangollen Male Voice Choir came in for a general sing song, and everybody in the hotel was invited to join in, we finally stumbled back to Xilion Rose at about 1.45. am. The following morning we were woken up with a bang when a hire boat, full of young ladies (?) on a Hen weekend hit Xilion Rose head on in their efforts to turn their boat around in the basin.
We left the basin on the Bank Holiday Sunday after Selina arrived with India, who was due to stay with us for a few days, the reason for the early departure was that Llangollen was about to be invaded by loads of Hire Boats, and as the 4 miles to the Aqueduct was mainly only wide enough for one boat, it was thought wise to get out while we could. As we went back crossed the Aqueduct with a full boat load of friends and relatives we were hit by a tremendous side wind which scared the life out of everybody (including me) as Xilion heeled over at an alarming angle.
With the departure of everybody (except India) we set off for our next target, the Montgomery  Canal, which runs for 7 miles down towards Maesbury Marsh, with plans to restore the full canal which will eventually go as far Welshpool. The current 7 miles were beautiful and tranquil and well worth the time spent on this little known canal.
Our next target is the Anderton Boat Lift and the River Weaver, which will be the main subject of the next blog update.        Malcolm and Annie. 

Four Locks invite you to join the Llangollen Canal

Some parts of the Canal are only wide enough for one boat at a time

Xilion Rose on the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct

Don't look down !!!!!!!!!!

After turning left on to the Worcester / Birmingham Canal, Annie (who is still “doing” all the locks) perfected her “Kick Lock” technique, this comprises of standing on one half of the exit gate and “kicking” the other half gate open (see photo below), this saves her one trip around the lock when leaving the lock for the next boat. After two days (and 56 locks) we reached Worcester and decided to have a couple of days off to explore the city.
After the short break, we left the City behind and made our way, via the Diglis Basin Lock, on to the River Severn, and after passing Worcester Cathedral, pressed on towards Stourport on Severn, where we plan to join the Staffs and Worcester Canal. Stourport Basin (where Xilion Rose was built) was very “interesting” as you need to do a 90 degree turn to get in to the first lock, and you can’t see if there is anyone coming out of the lock, and of course the onlookers, called Gongoozlers (loads of them on a hot summers day) just want you to mess up and make a fool of yourself (no problems there then), but luckily, we had a clear run in to the lock.
After winding our way through the basin, we emerged on to the Staffs and Worcester Canal (one of the prettiest canals in the UK), and made our way north towards Wolverhampton, passing on the way, the three locks at Kinver (photo below), these locks look like a staircase but in fact are standard locks with a very small pound between them (each pound about 10 foot long). Pushing on (at 3 mph) we passed a beautiful looking Angus Bull (photo below) munching his way through the lower leaves of a tree. The variety of interesting sights that keep appearing is really amazing, just to illustrate this point, shortly after seeing the Angus bull, we saw a large Rook actually land on the water and then dip down, splash around for a bit, then take off with a small fish in it’s beak. We made steady progress northwards, passing the entry to the infamous Wolverhampton 21 (we are saving these locks for our return journey) and eventually came to the start of the Shropshire Union Canal.
We made good progress towards Gnosall  (passing on the way the unique double bridge with the famous half size telegraph pole in the top arch),  where we had an appointment with Terry Robinson, an experienced RYA Training Instructor who will teach Annie the finer point of boat handling (and therefore free me up to actually “man the locks”). Another interesting episode on the “Shroppy” was the sight of 4 people getting off their boat clutching a variety of musical instruments and on being asked if they were going to have a jam session on the canal bank, extended an invitation for us to join them in the local pub and listen to their interpretation to some old Irish ballads. The following day (with very heavy heads) we carried on towards Nantwich, a really stunning town, and the start of the Llangollen Canal, one of our main targets for this year.   

Annie and her "Kick Lock" technique.

The beautiful Staffs and Worcester Canal

Worcester Catheral from the River Severn

The Kinver Lock Flight (not a Staircase)

Our friend the "Angus Bull"

A strange place for a Telegraph Pole ?

We arrived at Hillmorton boatyard and abandoned Xilion Rose to the “Bottom
 Painters”, our plan was to drive to Tewkesbury in our classic car to attend the Hampden Lodge Ladies Festival where we had a tremendous time, meeting with most of our family and friends. After a great weekend we returned to Hillmorton (with thanks to Dave Porter who acted as our executive taxi driver) to find Xilion Rose with a black and shiny bottom. After loading all of our “goods” back onto to the boat we set of on our indirect route to Llangollen.
Our route took us on to the Warwick section of the Grand Union Canal with first the Stockton Flight (where we came across a duck, still sitting on her nest) and then the dreaded Hatton Flight with it’s 21 double locks, luckily we met up with Sylvia and Mel on their boat “Contentment” who were also heading for the Stratford Canal. On reaching Kingswood Junction we joined the Stratford Canal but unfortunately, Sylvia and Mel turned left towards Stratford, as we turned right towards Birmingham, however, we were joined for a day by some of our family which helped as there were 21 locks to tackle before we reached the Worcester and Birmingham Canal, where, being gluttons for punishment, we turned left, away from Birmingham and headed towards Worcester (with 56 locks in 24 miles). Please see below, some of the sights we came across during this part of the “Adventure”. 

Sylvia at the tiller of Contentment

N/B Contentment at Kingswood Junction

Waiting for things to happen

We make it 14 baby duscks

Another nest at the side of the Canal

British Waterway lead the way

Repaining Xilions Skirt

We turned left knowing that 56 locks were waiting

After our 5 month winter mooring in Aylesbury Basin, and the spring cleaning completed, it was time to set off on our 2010 adventures. Having made friends with Ann and Gerald (and Holly the dog) who were also winter moored in the basin on their boat Hampshire Rose, it was decided that we would leave Aylesbury together, so on Good Friday, with the sun shining and with our Goddaughter Sam and her friend on board (with 16 locks in front of us before we get off the Aylesbury arm, extra hands are always welcome), off we went. Well… the sun lasted about 30 minutes before it clouded over and started to rain, and it was b****y cold rain, so we pushed on but after just 6 locks, we decided to call it a day and moored up, that afternoon was spent playing good old fashioned board games.
The following morning the rain had eased off so we continued towards the Grand Union canal at Marsworth, and with the many hands available, we reached Marsworth without any problems, where we turned left and headed north, past the Whipsnade Lion and after 6 more locks, moored up and relaxed after what we felt was a fair days cruising.
Easter Monday dawned and we set off and after a morning cruising we moored and said goodbye to Sam and her friend, and hello to our granddaughter India, who was joining us for a few days as we cruised towards Weedon with Hampshire Rose in close attendance. On the way to Weedon we passed our first major sign that Spring had sprung, with the first sighting of a duck and her 7 chicks, which looked like their first excursion on to the water.
After saying goodbye to India, we made our way to Braunston, via the Blissworth tunnel, the 7 locks at Whilton, the Braunston tunnel and the 6 locks that finally drop down in to the traffic (boat) jam that was Braunston on the handover day (most hire boats start and finish on Saturdays).
After negotiating the Braunston jams, we made our way to Fenny Compton Marina where we have arranged to have our Hydraulic Bow Thrusters repaired and a new Central Heating Boiler fitted, these jobs complete, we headed for the Hillmorton locks where we intend to have the underside of Xilion Rose cleaned and repainted.

The first baby ducks of Spring

Spring Lambs

Holly tries to walk on water

While we were in Spain for a week in late November we were asked if we would House Sit a beautiful Spanish style house for six weeks, starting early February, so after we spent about 1 second considering the offer, we accepted and have now decamped to our temporary abode in Velez Malaga, about 25 miles West of Malaga town.
On our arrival we were greeted with cloudy skies and rain, however, we were not worried as we expected the sun to break through at any moment “Wrong”. During our first three weeks here we have only had a total of three days where it did not rain, still, at least the rain is warm and we live in hope that the weather will improve during the remaining three weeks.
Selina and India visited us for a few days break and we took the opportunity to visit the Caves at Nerja, what a brilliant day out that proved to be, the actual caves were spectacular and kept us all enthralled during our underground walk. After a bite to eat, we decided to take to the “mountain roads” for our trip home. Well …. We certainly found some of the most difficult and narrow roads in that area, but the views were worth it, we even managed to find a couple of avocado pears for India to pick, and then we found some prickly pears which India insisted on calling “Spiky Plums” and insisted that she wanted two or three to take home. (I am still pulling out the tiny spikes from my hands two days later).
The following day we decided that, as Gibraltar was only 100 miles away, we had to go and see the “Rock” and visit the famous monkeys that live there. Altogether it was a great day out and we even managed to persuade one monkey to sit on Selina’s shoulders, the problem was, we could not persuade it to get off (see picture).
We will update the blog when we get back to Xilion Rose on the 17th March and get her ready for the “off” during the fist week of April.
Malcolm and Annie

The Caves at Nerja

One friendly monkey

Sorry for the lack of blog updates over the last couple of months, but being moored in one place is very boring after the fun of cruising the waterways last year. However, we did manage to get a week away in Spain with some old (an in “known for a long time”) friends, Pete and Dianne. While we were in Spain, the opportunity to “House Sit” a beautiful Villa came up, and as it would be for six weeks (February to Mid March) it seemed rude not to accept. so flight booking made (thanks Star for the Air Miles), we will depart on the 2nd Feb and return on the 17th March.

Just to let you know, with the bitter cold and snow, we are as warm as toast in Xilion Rose, even in – 15 degrees C (Wednesday 6th night tempriture), although it seems strange that the boat does not “rock” from side to side when we move around inside, this is due to the fact that Xilion Rose is frozen in to the ice.

 Annie has taken up Photography as a hobby since we arrived in Aylesbury Basin, and after a one day course with Max Pickering (BBC Sports Photogrepher of the year 2006), is starting to show great promice (hopefully the blog photos will now improve).

Thats all for now, and we will update the blog again as soon as we start cruising, which it targeted to start towards the end on March.

Cheers and a Happy New Year to you all

 Malcolm and Annie 

Just an Interesting tree in the snow

Xilion Rose frozen in to the Ice at Aylesbury Basin

Leaving Xilion Rose safely moored in Crick Marina, we arrived in Thame and picked up our second love, our 1953 Sunbeam Alpine, which had been living in our daughters garage while we cruised the UK canals. After a magic long weekend in the Isle of Wight with the Thame Classic Car Club, we returned to Crick to continue our way down to Aylesbury and the Aylesbury Canal Society.
Leaving Crick, we immediately had to negotiate the Crick Tunnel, not overly long at 1,528 yds, but a bit of a shock to the system at 8 o’clock in the morning. After the tunnel you arrive at the Watford lock flight, where Annie’s training at last weeks Foxton lock flights gave us a smooth trouble free passage, taking it easy, we decided to moor by Hayford Wharf, where we came across the “Elderly Duck” warning. The following day we made our way to Whilton Marina, the Marina where we originally purchased Xilion Rose from, just over 9 month ago.
As we made our way down towards Aylesbury, we had a bit of a scare when at around 9.30 in the evening, just as we were settling down to a nice bottle of red wine, Annie said that “maybe” she had had enough wine already because she could not stand up straight, it took only a couple of seconds for us to realise that Xilion Rose had developed an alarming list to port (nothing to do with the wine),  On checking the canal water level, we found that the area that we had moored in was between two locks, about 500 yds apart, and someone had left the top gates open on both of them, the result was that the pound we were moored in was draining away and Xilion Rose was sitting on the mud. At 9.30. on a wet and blowing night, Annie and myself had to cross the bottom lock gates to close the top gates (on both locks), we then had to fill one lock and then empty it in to the pound where we were moored, after repeating this action a couple of time, Xilion Rose was re-floated and we retired to resume our wine tasting.
The following day we arrived at the Aylesbury Arm, a beautiful canal, only 6.5 miles long, with 16 locks leading to the Aylesbury Basin.

As we are now moored for the winter, the blog updates will continue, but will be less frequent.

Cheers and all the best regards

Annie and Malcolm

Our Sunbeam at the Seaside

Be afraid, these ducks do not take prisoners