DO CRT ACTUALLY KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING ??

Birstall Lock

Leicester to Nottingham, 39 miles, 25 locks, 2 rivers and 2 canals.

So Tuesday, and we were stuck in Leicester, Birstall Lock ahead of us was closed and so was Kilby lock behind us. We made the most of it and headed for the Salmon, a Black Country Ales pub, so we knew they would have Pig on the Wall mild on for the Captain. At the pub he had a choice Pig on the Wall or Woolley Bugger, a damson porter from the Izaak Walton brewery of Stone. He had to try both of course.

https://izaakwaltonbrewhouse.com/

When we returned to the boat we had been joined by Lady Sienna, a hire boat from North Kilby wharf.

Now not only were the 2 locks I mentioned closed, but so was North lock, the first lock you get to after the moorings, but only for the day. Lady Sienna had been moored on Castle Gardens, but not knowing North lock was closed they had set off, when they returned they had lost their previous mooring so joined us.

Next day and the news from CRT was much worse than we expected. Birstall lock was going to be closed until the following Tuesday. The Captain went and broke the news to the hire boaters. As he did a boat appeared coming towards us. It turned out that it had managed to get through the broken lock with care. We made a quick decision to head down to the lock to see if we could get through and the hire boat joined us. I did make sure there were shops and pubs near the lock if we couldn’t get through

There were 3 locks between us and Birstall, the first being North lock, which in my opinion is one of the worst locks on the entire system. CRT were meant to have done some work on it to help with its problems, but hadn’t been successful and it took 3 of us to open the bottom gate.

We got to Birstall lock and CRT hadn’t chained the gates shut so we were able to enter the lock with great care, pulling the boats in one at a time. There wasn’t a problem with the bottom gates and we were soon out and free, we stopped at Birstall, but the hirers (never got their names), kept going to make up for the time they had lost. Hope they enjoyed the rest of their holiday doing the Leicester ring.

A couple of interesting things we passed on our journey to Birstall, a friendly ginger and white kitten, and someone giving a haircut on the towpath, giving a new meaning to mobile barber.

Birstall had 3 pubs, The Earl of Stamford, The Plough and the White Horse. We decided to try the Plough, as the Captain seemed to remember it had a decent stout last time we were in. He wasn’t disappointed, a very nice pint of London stout. We had a very enjoyable visit chatting the locals and landlord. It is a very dog friendly pub too.

https://theoldplough-birstall.co.uk/

Thursday was a day for bird life. I spotted a Green Woodpecker, a Little Egret and a Common Tern.

Green Woodpecker

After 4 locks we stopped above Mount Sorrel lock for the night and gave the Waterside pub a go. As expected no darks on but the food menu looked interesting.

https://www.watersidemountsorrel.co.uk/

As we set off next day a small boat was coming up the lock so off I went to help, they were a friendly bunch. Behind them was Serenade, one of the widebeam charity boats from the Peter La Marchant trust. The crew came up to help me lock down, and we were soon on our way. We passed their other widebeam Symphony later on

https://www.peterlemarchanttrust.co.uk/

We stayed in Loughborough for a couple days and tried the Organ Grinder, a Blue Monkey pub on the first night.

https://bluemonkeybrewery.com/organ-grinder-pubs/loughborou

Next day, after shopping we set of to do the 3 locks to Kegworth New lock, where we planned to moor for the night. At one of the locks we met Dandelion, a charity boat from the Baldwin Trust, it had a group of very enthusiastic kids on board, who were very ‘eager to help at the lock.

https://www.baldwintrust.co.uk/index.php/the-trust/our-boats

We were soon moored in a lovely spot by the weir above the lock, its only issue, it was right in the flight path for the East Midlands airport. We started planning our visit to Nottingham and catching up with family. It wasn’t that easy, Adam could only do Friday, Jess Sunday, and Di not the weekend at all. So after a bit of toing and froing we (mainly with Di) things got sorted, but it meant a bit of a detour for us up Trent Lock and on to the Erewash for a couple of nights.

Monday and after 3 locks we were moored on the Erewash. Whilst doing the lock a very nice lady asked if she could video us, most people don’t ask and we don’t mind, but its nice to be asked. She was cat sitting nearby and the video was for her elderly parents. Turned out she was a professional photographer.

https://www.sandrabarberphotography.co.uk

Later we headed to the Steamboat to say hi to Simon and have a couple of well earned pints, they had Dark Drake by Dancing Duck for the Captain, happy days.

https://www.steamboattrentlock.co.uk/

Next morning we headed down the canal to wind (turn the boat round) and moor nearer to Long Eaton so we could catch the bus into Nottingham the next day to meet Di. Disaster struck when we tried to wind. Something was round the prop, as we drifted in the centre of the canal the Captain went down the weed hatch to discover a thick fleece coat wrapped tightly round the prop. It took a while to free it, but eventually we winded and were moored up in a very nice spot.

Next day we caught the Skylink into Nottingham to meet Di and Mick, it was lovely to catch up with them.

Thursday was a very long day, well for us. Firstly we stopped at Trent Lock for water and bins, then headed to Shardlow marina for a pump out, we were going to use Castle Marina (which would have been so much easier) until we found out that the price had gone from £12.50 to £26, the Captain nearly had heart attack when he heard and Shardlow was only £10.

There are 2 locks, the first being a large river lock, and yippee, manned by volunteers, the next is a small flood lock, here we met NB Briony Rose, a boat we met at a lock in Leicester when they were heading to Kilby Bridge. They got stuck for a week between the 2 lock closures, so they were not happy.

So we started at 9.30am and were moored up in Nottingham at 4pm, a very long day for us, we didn’t head for the pub, just too tired.

Now looking forward to a pleasant weekend of family visits before heading back on the Trent, and hopefully onto Ripon.