Saturday 21st May
I was unable to update last night due to our late arrival at Chadderton. What a day we had yesterday. Did I say we would be able do the locks in about 5 hours? That turned out to be the understatement of the year!
Firstly, in the wee small hours of Friday morning (3am) we were abruptly awoken by a huge bang on our bedroom window. Just some drunks on their way home from a night out having a laugh. We weren’t laughing and I went back to sleep with one ear open!
We were up at 6am preparing for the day ahead. I made some sandwiches because I knew that once we started the locks that would be it for me in terms of being able to do anything on the boat. Indeed, apart from popping in to the loo once or twice during the day and once to make tea while we were (unsuccessfully) trying to clear the prop, I spent the rest of the time walking between locks!
At just after 8-30am the lock keeper arrived and we were on our way. These locks were so much easer than the Rochdale 9 of the previous day and we were breezing through them. That is until Barry got something round his prop. You cannot imagine the amount of rubbish which is in this canal, it is absolutely disgusting, so it was not a surprise. A quick trip down the weed hatch and a fleece was soon extracted!
We were on our way again but after 8 locks the boats got grounded in the pound on the way out of the lock and we knew there was a lack of water. We had to start letting some water down from the next pound, which only served to make that one low and so on and so forth.
Things were going to get worse – much worse. On the way into the 9th lock Ken picked up something round his prop, lost propulsion and carried on drifting into the lock entrance because he couldn’t stop. Because there was so much rubbish behind the gates they wouldn’t open fully and the two boats got wedged between them. A good deal of pushing, pulling, shunting backwards and forwards, trying to get the water level up a bit, swearing and cursing was required until both boats were safely in the lock. Ken then inspected the weed hatch and discovered a whole car tyre completely encasing his prop! All sorts of knives and other cutting implements were tried but to no avail, the tyre was going to stay and we were going no where!
When the lock was full we had to devise a towing method because there was no way we were staying in that area while we waited for RCR to come out. It was full of ne’er-do-wells, cut purses and vagabonds as far as we could see and the schools hadn’t even turned out yet! In any case we had to complete the 19 locks by 4pm because they get locked up at night. We informed the BW man of our plight so he knew we were going to be delayed.
Barry started towing us and all went well until he picked up a thick plastic bag round his prop. While he was extracting this Ken had another look at his prop but it was going to be an RCR job. Barbara and I continued trying to fill the pounds with water so we could get moving.
At the next lock – disaster, Barry picked up something so bad round his prop it stalled his engine! This was not good, two boats, neither in working order! We pulled our boat out of the lock and moored up. Barry made yet another trip down the weed hatch, this time it was a huge carpet and I’m talking room sized (see photo). Fortunately this came out relatively easily.
While he was doing this I went to the other end of the lock and made a shock discovery. On the actual balance beam, right by the handle you use to pull the gate open, were a load of syringes melted on to the top (see photo)! This day was just getting better and better. In the nearby bushes were empty tablet packets, used aerosols, more syringes, it was horrendous.
There were no more prop fouling incidents and we got the water problem just about under control so we were making progress. Ken and Barry were managing to get both boats into the locks without too much problem, even though we still couldn’t open half of them fully. Then it started raining, oh deep joy!
After what we thought was the penultimate lock (actually we had one more and a lift bridge to do!) the boats got grounded again. Barbara and I went off to let some water down the top lock and discovered it was about half a mile away so this could take some time. It was nearly 4pm when we got to the lock and the BW guy was waiting for us but he got shot up the arse because although Barbara and I were there, the boats weren’t any where near! He didn’t let any water down, even though we said the boats were stuck so we just stood round waiting. He tried phoning Ken, who didn’t hear his phone (as usual) and Barry who didn’t have his phone with him.
A cyclist, who we had seen earlier, came by and we sent him off with a message for Ken to phone the BW man. Unfortunately this message was relayed wrong and it wasn’t until Barbara went back to see if they had made any progress that Ken phoned. They had made some progress but were now stuck again and this time the BW man let some water down. Eventually they arrived at the lock!
It was 5-05pm when we left there and we still had another 3.5 miles, a vertical lift bridge and another lock to go before we could moor up safely – and it was still raining. We finally found the moorings at Chadderton at about 6-15pm, but after about 20 minutes of titting about realised there was a shelf there and no way we could get anywhere near the bank! By this time we were losing the will to live. Just beyond the aqueduct over the River Irk (good name) were some more bollards and it really was last chance saloon.
As we were actually near enough to the bank to moor up if the worst came to the worst, we stayed holding our stricken boat while Barry went and checked out the other moorings over the aqueduct. They turned out to be ok and after he got moored up we set about hauling our boat over there and getting in behind them. This took quite some time as we kept getting stuck on the shelf. In the end Ken pulled the back rope, I pulled the front rope and Barry and Barbara fended us off the shelf with poles until we got there.
We finally got moored up about 7-15pm, ten and a half hours after we left Piccadilly and buggered off to the Rose of Lancaster for a pint and some dinner! Suffice to say we slept well last night!
