Tag: Llangollen

I’m doing better than Martyn when it comes to dropping things in the water. I confess to a handcuff key. So far he’s tossed overboard:

• One handcuff key (OK, probably doesn’t count because he fished it out)
• One slipper in Llangollen Basin
• One glove at the top of the Frankton Locks
• A microfibre cloth at the same location
• Plus a Fitbit!
• And the chimney. We got it back with the boat hook, but I guess that’s put paid to his habit of laying it on the roof while we’re cruising!

It’s hard to believe I haven’t updated this for a week. We’re now nearly back at the beginning of the Llangollen Canal. None of the landmarks that gave us grief on the way up seemed as bad on the return journey, although I walked through the Chirk Tunnel on the pretence of telling Martyn it was clear to proceed! The narrows? No problem. All those impossibly tight bridges on bends? We sailed through them with aplomb. I even bossed the lift bridge at Wrenbury and it’s antecedent tight turn feeling very smug.

We moored up one evening at the top of the Frankton Locks, and walked down the next morning to have a look at the Montgomery Canal.

The lock keeper at the Grindley Brook Locks advised us not to venture down because of the combination of overhanging vegetation and shiny new paintwork, but we’ll have a go next time.

En route we spent a very pleasant couple of days in Ellesmere (not to be confused with Ellesmere Port). Ellesmere is the type of town I could happily live in, small, rural and where residents appear to know each other. Jenny introduced me to Ismay’s, a shop that sells comfortable ladies clothes I can happily wear on the back of the boat, or out and about when I don’t want to look like a feral boater. There’s a nice coffee shop-cum-delicatessen called Moolah staffed by a couple of boaters, an excellent butcher, and a Tesco that doesn’t mind you pushing your bottle-laden trolley back to the boat (as long as you return it afterwards).

According to my guide book there are seven meres close by. Although we wondered after Pennington Flash whether they were the remnants of an industrial past, they are shallow lakes formed at the end of the last Ice Age. Shropshire’s own Lake District as it were, and very pretty.

We made good time through the long stretches of the canal with Wales on one side and England on the other, and then the locks that start with a bang at Grindley Brook with the staircase and become more friendly and better spaced apart afterwards.

Today it’s raining, so it’s the perfect day to hunker down in front of the fire and take stock before we leave the Llangollen Canal tomorrow.

We made it. We crossed the Pontcysllte Aqueduct without incident. It is absolutely awesome, and definitely one of the wonders of the canal system. It’s also blooming scary, as you look over the edge, 127 foot down at the highest point, and there is no safety rail. The boat is in a trough, so there’s no way you can fall out of it, but facts never stop the mind playing tricks.

The views over the River Dee and the Welsh Countryside are awesome. If you ever have the chance to make this trip, grab it with both hands.

The Llangollen is the canal that keeps giving and keeps challenging. The Chirk Tunnel was far worse than the Pontcysllte Aqueduct. It’s only 420m long but it meets my private definition of hell. I’ve never been in a tunnel before and felt it was never going to end – until Chirk. I don’t think I’ve ever nearly cried in a tunnel either but Chirk very nearly broke me. The problem was we couldn’t get the boat off the side. The Llangollen flow had us pinned, and also because of the flow, it was such slow going. We pushed forward, inch by painful inch. I’m still traumatised by the memory.

In comparison the Narrows were a doddle. They are three stretches of canal where the cutting has been blasted out of solid rock, and the Llangollen, hardly a wide canal at the best of times, reduces to the width of a singe boat. If you’re travelling with other boats, or you have crew it’s a simple matter to send someone on ahead to check the way is clear, but if you’re a solo boater … well, I don’t even want to consider how difficult it must be to reverse.

And then we got to Llangollen, an absolute jewel of a town nestled in the Dee Valley. Apparently it’s called after Collen ap Gwynnawg ap Clydawg ap Cowdra ap Caradog Freichfras ap Llyr Merim ap Yrth ap Cunedda Wledig. Try saying that after you’ve had a couple. Whatever the origins, Llangollen is charming, pretty, interesting, and well worth the trip. We moored up in Llangollen Basin for the permitted 48 hours.

In the unseasonably warm autumn sunshine, Martyn and I walked right up to the source of the canal at the Horseshoe Falls, beyond the limits of powered navigation. So we can now say we’ve navigated the entire length of the canal. We’re happy with our achievement.

When you cruise the canals you take the beautiful scenery and the fun of boating for granted. But one of the highlights of this trip has been meeting Jenny and Trevor. We first came across them at Grindley Brook locks, and have been travelling together almost since then. Two nicer people you couldn’t meet. They’ve done this trip before, and know all the perils and pitfalls, as well as the best places to moor. We’re enjoying their company immensely and while the weather holds the evening ritual of a couple of drinks on the towpath is a little treat we look forward to.

We’re in Wales. Two days away from Llangollen basin by my reckoning. We haven’t had a day off this week. The state of the world being what it is we don’t want to risk not getting there because Wales goes into lockdown again, so we’ll dawdle and stop to smell the roses on the homeward journey. That said, we don’t do long days on the tiller. Yesterday we travelled a bare 4 miles and that’s good enough.

The Llangollen is unusual in canal terms. Narrowboating is shuffling down a muddy ditch in a tin bath. The Llangollen is more like a river, it has a flow. The canal draws its water from the River Dee and was built to feed the Shropshire Union Canal and the Hurleston Reservoir in Shropshire. Apparently 6,000,000 gallons of water a day flow out of the river and down the canal. We’re pushing against it, which makes progress slower than usual, and the further we get towards the source, the more noticeable the flow is. It also doesn’t help that we’re in a 20-mile pound and water levels are low. Travelling in the other direction, especially with the narrow bridges, could be a bit of a white knuckle ride.

We got on to the Llangollen late on Monday. On Tuesday I decided I really disliked it. If Martyn had said let’s turn around I wouldn’t have argued. I just had a bad day. We queued at the Baddiley Locks for well over an hour because a paddle was out of action, the lift bridges are heavy and I managed to cut my finger on one, and for some reason I lost the ability to tell my left from my right on the tiller. Add in the fearsome bywashes at the locks and it seemed everything was out to get us. By the close of play on Wednesday harmony was restored. We’d had a lovely meal at The Swan in Marbury on Tuesday night, we’d been up the Grindley Locks and our first staircase for years, and met a lovely couple, Trev and Jenny on their boat the Life of Riley. Sitting on the towpath sharing a drink and a good conversation in the evening is part of canal life.

And the Llangollen is charming and beautiful, as well as a bit of a challenge with its twists, narrow bridges and blind bends. There are plenty of really beautiful places to moor – with rings mostly – and we haven’t had a day when we haven’t passed a water point. They seem to breed on the banks, there are four in a line at the top of the Grindley Locks. Plus we keep seeing people we know. We passed Fran and Rich on Constanze who YouTube as Floating Our Boat. They feel like old friends to us, although we don’t know each other in real life. I shouted as much in passing, and Rich replied: “No, but we know your boat”. I’m wondering how?

Now, you might wonder how we get the diesel to power the boat? Usually we drive up to a fuel pump in a marina, just like taking the car to the garage. But sometimes the fuel comes to us. There are fuel boats and other roving traders on the canal, which all add to the flavour. Yesterday in Ellesmere Martyn heard a put-puttering coming up the canal behind us and flagged down a fuel boat.

While Richard filled up Beau Romer I had a lovely chat with Ruth on the butty behind. A butty is an unpowered boat, so it always makes a pair and is towed along behind a powered one. They’ve been plying their trade on the canals for 12 years. It must be hard work, but Jenny says Richard used to be a lorry driver, but really he just likes messing around on boats. We’re very happy to support them and their diesel was considerably cheaper than the marina just a couple of hundred yards down the cut (which was full of returning hire boats – I’ll write about them some other time).

So onwards. By the next time I sit down to write we will have crossed the Pontywhatsit aqueduct. Or fallen over the edge. I like to leave the blog on a literal cliffhanger.