Up the Grand Union in drought

[Dominic M]

I’ve just moved a boat from the Slough Arm (Packet Boat Marina) to Stowe Hill (nearly). It’s been 15 years since I cruised the Grand Union along this length. The big issue - the drought. Climbing up the many locks to the Tring summit I was struck by how many boats are now anchored to the towpath. With a few gaps in between, it was relentless towpath mooring. I have no objection to this in principle, but in places such as Rickmansworth, boat owners had taken over the towpath, littering it with junk.

 

Tring summit was closed until 10am Monday morning, but all the way up we encountered locks with both gates left open wide, and paddles not closed down. The abiding impression was one of some people who care not a toss about the need to save water, and who live on the canal as a means of accommodation, and nothing more. How different from 20 years ago.

 

On the Sunday evening at Tring summit, we found several boats waiting to get through the following morning at the 10am kick off. At dusk, up turned Archimedes and Emu, on their way to the Droitwich Festival. They drove straight into the lock, and parked up overnight. Needless to say, this caused some ill feeling with every other boat waiting there. They had departed every lock below the summit leaving the gates wide open, according to another boat that had followed them up. Whilst it was true that the pound just below the top lock was low and these boats deep in the water, they could have moored up and waited their turn, using planks to get ashore.

 

Delayed by the “working” boats, (and I was working) we managed to get away by 11:00 and made Leighton Buzzard by the evening.

 

Onward the next day through Milton Keynes, another part of the canal now littered with towpath moorers. Here the friendliness encountered so far turned to unpleasantness. Chugging past one boat in MK a fat man armed with a can of beer yelled, “Are you in a hurry?” We were not going fast. Shortly afterwards, also in MK, another shouted a similar question. Some distance from any road, they had a whirly washing thingy and a motorbike on the towpath. I had to say to them, “If you don’t like the canal, pay for a mooring in a marina.” He yelled back, and the engine on this boat was quite loud, “I’m going to report you to VW!” So that’s me excluded from buying a new Polo then. Apparently it’s not OK to cruise on that bit of the Grand Union, but it is fine to ride a motorbike on the towpath. Slobs.

 

Finally arrived at Stoke Bruerne bottom lock, and that was it. Shut until 10:00 tomorrow.

 

A fantastic voyage, a great reminiscence, but I am amazed at how once empty stretches of canal are now linear moorings, and it is of no surprise to me that people using the canal to cruise give up slowing down past moored boats. Why should they? Is the canal a cruiseway, or a housing estate?

Edited March 27, 2012 by Dominic M

[tree]

Nostwaith dda Dominic ( good evening to everyone else whilst looking for a boat last year, i practiced a bit of welsh with Dominic Now returning back to the 'cut' after many years away and slowly on my way to Northampton, I only hope that the folk I meet on my way are more pleasant. I do recall years ago on the BCN that you had good boaters and bad. Sadly this is a bit of a reflection on some members of our society today .. to not give a damm about anyone else,but themselves. I can assure everyone lol that I always go slow past moored boats because its just common courtesey

[Keeping Up]

That's why, starting from Stoke Hammond, we can't wait to get through Milton Keynes to head north.

[Dominic M]

Nostwaith dda Dominic ( good evening to everyone else whilst looking for a boat last year, i practiced a bit of welsh with Dominic Now returning back to the 'cut' after many years away and slowly on my way to Northampton, I only hope that the folk I meet on my way are more pleasant. I do recall years ago on the BCN that you had good boaters and bad. Sadly this is a bit of a reflection on some members of our society today .. to not give a damm about anyone else,but themselves. I can assure everyone lol that I always go slow past moored boats because its just common courtesey

Yr yn peth i ti. 98% of the trip was wonderful. Just soured by a couple of miserable sods who live on the canal bank on scrappy boats and think they own the place, and object to anyone going past, or at least after lager o'clock. (10:00am). The sad thing is that BW have allowed this to proliferate, in my view. Are canals for cruising, or for an unregulated housing overspill? It seems that the latter is proving to be the case, certainly on the Grand Union as it approaches the home counties..

[alan_fincher]

Perhaps I just have an acceptance of the way things now are, having returned to the Southern Grand Union around 7 years ago, after many boat-less years ?

 

I really don't find it as bad as the rather bleak picture that Dominic paints, to be honest.

 

People now talk of an extra half day, or day, to navigate down this way because of all the moored boats, but I honestly think such claims are greatly exaggerated.

 

We are not exactly famous for hanging about, but only very rarely do we get complaints about passing people too fast.

 

I am aware, as "a local", of one or two lived on boats where the owners are constantly on the look out for anybody to shout at, just because it is a ritual, and they like to do it. Knowing which these are, I make a point of crawling past, because it really costs me no extra time to play by their silly "rules".

 

I must admit I'd far rather have to slow down for a lot of moored boats, (Southern GU style), than spend long periods in a queue for over-popular locks, sometimes for hours, rather than minutes, (as we did last Summer on bits of the four counties). I actually think it's by far best if many of them don't want to move, if I do!

[Dominic M]

Perhaps I just have an acceptance of the way things now are, having returned to the Southern Grand Union around 7 years ago, after many boat-less years ?

 

I really don't find it as bad as the rather bleak picture that Dominic paints, to be honest.

 

People now talk of an extra half day, or day, to navigate down this way because of all the moored boats, but I honestly think such claims are greatly exaggerated.

 

We are not exactly famous for hanging about, but only very rarely do we get complaints about passing people too fast.

 

I am aware, as "a local", of one or two lived on boats where the owners are constantly on the look out for anybody to shout at, just because it is a ritual, and they like to do it. Knowing which these are, I make a point of crawling past, because it really costs me no extra time to play by their silly "rules".

 

I must admit I'd far rather have to slow down for a lot of moored boats, (Southern GU style), than spend long periods in a queue for over-popular locks, sometimes for hours, rather than minutes, (as we did last Summer on bits of the four counties). I actually think it's by far best if many of them don't want to move, if I do!

Not bleak, Alan. I loved the trip. More observation than anything else. But why tolerate the people who dodge paying their way, at the taxpayer's expense? The towpath pisstakers who pretend they are "continuously cruising?" and then have the cheek to hurl abuse at passing boats? At very best, they should learn to tie up their boats properly, and shut up properly.

Edited March 27, 2012 by Dominic M

[alan_fincher]

Well you have earned two "greenies" already, so some clearly agree with you!

 

I do agree with you 100% about the tying up thing - very frustrating, and no excuse if you don't like your boat to move at all for not trying to tie it up to prevent undue movement.

 

I'm less certain about the "at the taxpayer's expense" bit though. Other than maybe a bit of fuel duty and VAT on the extra fuel they use to move on occasionally, how would the governments coffers be greatly swelled if they did take a more active position in their definition of "continually cruising" ?

 

Frankly if they are forced to move when they don't want to at the moment, it just means less of that precious reservoir water available for those of us who do want to boat. To me, in the current situation, it seems bonkers to make them move just so they may end up closing the canal completely a bit sooner, (when they'll not be able to move at all, of course!).

[Sue1946]

Hi Dominic,

I guess it's just human nature at its poorest level.

I'm a land person, and was treated recently to an enjoyable day cruising with a regular in here. The litter picker was fully employed!

The news tonight was about poor parenting re the riots last year, the real reason is the lack of opportunities for the poor unfortunates who were not educated/did not bother to study/take exams/speak comprehensible English and it is all our/your/someone else's fault.

I do despair.

I fear it is far too late to bring back the birch - now what does the sardonic smiley look like? is it this one?

Edited March 27, 2012 by Sue1946

[Dominic M]

 

I'm less certain about the "at the taxpayer's expense" bit though. Other than maybe a bit of fuel duty and VAT on the extra fuel they use to move on occasionally, how would the governments coffers be greatly swelled if they did take a more active position in their definition of "continually cruising" ?

Council tax. For the place they live in and the services they use. For a contribution towards the education and health services within the local authority they "continuously cruise" in. For the right to utilise the towpath that the taxpayer funds. For the cost of collecting their rubbish. For the right to vote. For the right to live in Britain.

 

Edited to add: To pay for their membership of society, and not expect others to fund it for them.

Edited March 27, 2012 by Dominic M

[Sue1946]

Dom - my friend and I did try exchanging some costs re licence inc water and etc versus my home exps but I guess is not relevant to this topic.

I re-iterate that there are bottom feeders everywhere and they will continue to bring hurt to those of us who drive at 30mph or 4mph, those who take litter home/pick up and dispose/help a neighbour whether afloat or land based. Oh and etc by the way!

As long as 'our leaders' have no need to see the speedo then we are all doomed as Fraser would say in 'Dad's Army'.

Decency is going speedily out of fashion and I am sad.

ed spikkung

GARR - and whilst I'm on the Ed high - why do all those cars need to be used on - eg xFactor, Apprentice? How green is that? Give 'em underground tickets pls?

Edited March 27, 2012 by Sue1946

[Dominic M]

Thinking through what you say, Alan, the logical and fair thing would be for those who claim exemption from council tax because they may or may not be permanent in one local authority's area, would be for them to pay a fixed amount by way of tax equating to the Band A rate average.

[Sue1946]

Dom - was so nice meeting you at Gongoozlers Rest

[Dominic M]

Dom - my friend and I did try exchanging some costs re licence inc water and etc versus my home exps but I guess is not relevant to this topic.

I re-iterate that there are bottom feeders everywhere and they will continue to bring hurt to those of us who drive at 30mph or 4mph, those who take litter home/pick up and dispose/help a neighbour whether afloat or land based. Oh and etc by the way!

As long as 'our leaders' have no need to see the speedo then we are all doomed as Fraser would say in 'Dad's Army'.

Decency is going speedily out of fashion and I am sad.

ed spikkung

GARR - and whilst I'm on the Ed high - why do all those cars need to be used on - eg xFactor, Apprentice? How green is that? Give 'em underground tickets pls?

Sue - you make it sound so bad. It isn't, but just don't be intimidated by this handful of plonkers who aren't boaters, they just have bits of metal welded together glued to the towpath.

 

Dom - was so nice meeting you at Gongoozlers Rest

Repeat would be great. I'm starving!

[jenlyn]

I’ve just moved a boat from the Slough Arm (Packet Boat Marina) to Stowe Hill (nearly). It’s been 15 years since I cruised the Grand Union along this length. The big issue - the drought. Climbing up the many locks to the Tring summit I was struck by how many boats are now anchored to the towpath. With a few gaps in between, it was relentless towpath mooring. I have no objection to this in principle, but in places such as Rickmansworth, boat owners had taken over the towpath, littering it with junk.

 

Tring summit was closed until 10am Monday morning, but all the way up we encountered locks with both gates left open wide, and paddles not closed down. The abiding impression was one of some people who care not a toss about the need to save water, and who live on the canal as a means of accommodation, and nothing more. How different from 20 years ago.

 

On the Sunday evening at Tring summit, we found several boats waiting to get through the following morning at the 10am kick off. At dusk, up turned Archimedes and Emu, on their way to the Droitwich Festival. They drove straight into the lock, and parked up overnight. Needless to say, this caused some ill feeling with every other boat waiting there. They had departed every lock below the summit leaving the gates wide open, according to another boat that had followed them up. Whilst it was true that the pound just below the top lock was low and these boats deep in the water, they could have moored up and waited their turn, using planks to get ashore.

 

Delayed by the “working” boats, (and I was working) we managed to get away by 11:00 and made Leighton Buzzard by the evening.

 

Onward the next day through Milton Keynes, another part of the canal now littered with towpath moorers. Here the friendliness encountered so far turned to unpleasantness. Chugging past one boat in MK a fat man armed with a can of beer yelled, “Are you in a hurry?” We were not going fast. Shortly afterwards, also in MK, another shouted a similar question. Some distance from any road, they had a whirly washing thingy and a motorbike on the towpath. I had to say to them, “If you don’t like the canal, pay for a mooring in a marina.” He yelled back, and the engine on this boat was quite loud, “I’m going to report you to VW!” So that’s me excluded from buying a new Polo then. Apparently it’s not OK to cruise on that bit of the Grand Union, but it is fine to ride a motorbike on the towpath. Slobs.

 

Finally arrived at Stoke Bruerne bottom lock, and that was it. Shut until 10:00 tomorrow.

 

A fantastic voyage, a great reminiscence, but I am amazed at how once empty stretches of canal are now linear moorings, and it is of no surprise to me that people using the canal to cruise give up slowing down past moored boats. Why should they? Is the canal a cruiseway, or a housing estate?

Agree with some of what you are saying. I feel there's just no consistency with BW policing the towpaths. I think they are concentrating far too much of their resources on the Olympics area of GU. The gates and paddles were left open from Cowley to Ricky last Saturday as well, every flippin one!

[Sue1946]

Dom - it is bad - sorry! Just my take on people. Boaters, me, all sorts of topics I'm not allowed to mention here. Near here are brick livers who have rubbish of all descriptions in their gardens and so do residents in Kingston upon Hull (cos I've seen it), and probably also in Kingston on Thames (cos I used to live nearby).

I am trying to say that the folk who don't care about any decency are not limited to land or water - they are just too garr DIM! I must stop or the Doc will be right about my raised blood pressure!

 

(err Dom? keeeeeeeep off those brekkies or else agree to take my share of blood pressure !!lol ducky xx

 

Jen - you take up too much watter!!

 

naw - was joking!

It is just all so inconsistent if you read the blogs etc

Edited March 27, 2012 by Sue1946

[Lady Muck]

Well you have earned two "greenies" already, so some clearly agree with you!

 

I do agree with you 100% about the tying up thing - very frustrating, and no excuse if you don't like your boat to move at all for not trying to tie it up to prevent undue movement.

 

I'm less certain about the "at the taxpayer's expense" bit though. Other than maybe a bit of fuel duty and VAT on the extra fuel they use to move on occasionally, how would the governments coffers be greatly swelled if they did take a more active position in their definition of "continually cruising" ?

 

Frankly if they are forced to move when they don't want to at the moment, it just means less of that precious reservoir water available for those of us who do want to boat. To me, in the current situation, it seems bonkers to make them move just so they may end up closing the canal completely a bit sooner, (when they'll not be able to move at all, of course!).

If everyone moved as much as they were supposed to, my boat would be permanently aground. More than half a dozen lockings a day and im on the bottom!

A friend of mine has just decided to cc. In London. She asked my advice, but also spoke to some of the ccers who told her it's ok to do. Ive explained wht being a continuous cruiser means, why deciding to cc when the canal and river trust takes over might not be wise, how busy it is, etc. What she really wants is a mooring, near us, but of course there arent any available. I suggested she needs to take a longer term view (it took us over 6 months to get a boat and a mooring), but she doesnt want to wait, what can you do? She has never boated but at least we are taking her out over Easter on ours to learn the basics. She asked me if moving between Camden and Hackney would be ok, I suggested she might want to see how big those moorings were and to read the signs at the moorings as many of them are 7 days in any one year. Thing is, everyone wants to live in Camden and Hackney but hundreds of boats into a handful of mooring spots won't go. The way I see it, unless the canals are policed the same as roads in London, people will do what THEY want to do. There are even more people living in vans and campers in London but you dont even know they are there - they move every day. Anyway, my friend is self employed like me and a I've said before, housing options for us are limited, because we cant provide proof of a regular income, commercial landlords arent interested. They can cherry pick the safest salaried tenants. The last flat we had was £800 a month and rat infested, the mould was so bad I ended up on lots of evil steroids for my asthma. Rentals have gone up since then. We're on the canal for the same reasons as the ccers. We need to be in London for work, but we cant find anything on land that we can afford that isn't disgusting, or we have to get a room in a shared house, as if we were students, at our age.

And meanwhile, Haringey council continues to make me despair. My link

[Leni]

Seems from this thread that you're damned if you move and damned if you don't on the southern GU at the moment!

 

Don't forget it's still 4 days to the end of the Winter Mooring period

[Pykebird]

I am sorry that you had so much hassle, Dom. But I am not suprised at the boats/ people involved!

I too have been on the recieving end of the anticsof these guys and unless we ALL report their behaviour to Sally Ash at BW, their behaviour will NOT change!

Having spoken to seceral friends who liveaboard on the GU, this was not the only incident that occured.

It seems very unfair that whilst most of us are trying our best to help the lack of water situation, there will always be the few that just don't seem to give a damm.

But if we do tell bw whats going on, surely they can't just ignore it?

[alan_fincher]

Council tax. For the place they live in and the services they use. For a contribution towards the education and health services within the local authority they "continuously cruise" in. For the right to utilise the towpath that the taxpayer funds. For the cost of collecting their rubbish. For the right to vote. For the right to live in Britain.

 

Edited to add: To pay for their membership of society, and not expect others to fund it for them.

But even if they were "continually cruising" in a manner that nobody could possibly argue didn't fully meet the requirements, then they would quite legitimately have access to all the things you refer to, but still would not be paying a penny in council tax, would they ?

 

Surely if you follow this line, you could equally accuse all those retired types genuinely making their way around the system in their floating cottages of "free-loading" couldn't you ? They don't generally attract the same attention, though.

 

Other than the long-standing argument about what meets the "continuous cruising" requirement, and what does not, I can't see that those who travel the country are necessarily contributing more to the costs, (other than in fuel duties), or necessarily using less resource than those who are not.

 

You could even argue that those paying a BW licence, but who don't wish to move, (and hence are only using facilities like water points, Elsan & rubbish disposal, but not tens of thousands of gallons of water each time they pass through a lock), are subsidising those of us who also use the facilities, but expect to be able to move our boats around lots.

 

Ducks and awaits incoming !

[jenlyn]

It has been mentioned that BW are going to suspend the 14 day rule for 6 weeks over the Olympic period. Also, that they will not be pushing for cc'ers to move about to much whilst we have the drought conditions, thus giving pleasure boaters some sort of boating season. I have not seen this announced officially, but gleaned from a patrol officer.

[alan_fincher]

........and unless we ALL report their behaviour to Sally Ash at BW, their behaviour will NOT change!

I'm sorry, but you must have a lot more confidence in sally than most boaters do!

 

It seems very unfair that whilst most of us are trying our best to help the lack of water situation, there will always be the few that just don't seem to give a damm.

It seems to me that in the current water shortage situation by far the best thing is to try and save the water for those who actually want to go somewhere!

 

It would seem particularly daft if it were being used to force people to move when they don't need to.

 

I shall get shot down in flames, I'm sure, but I actually suggested to Jeff Whyatt, (Manager South East BW), at a recent meeting on the water problems, that they should be relaxed on the topic of enforced moving on, while the drought continues.

 

I would also hope that if I do end up stranded somewhere because of the restrictions, I don't find my boat "stickered", because I'm unable to move it on within the normally prescribed periods. Again, I suggested to Mr Whyatt that there needs to be tolerance of those who have a paid for home mooring, but which they are not able to get back to.

[Proper Job]

At dusk, up turned Archimedes and Emu, on their way to the Droitwich Festival. They drove straight into the lock, and parked up overnight. Needless to say, this caused some ill feeling with every other boat waiting there. They had departed every lock below the summit leaving the gates wide open, according to another boat that had followed them up.

I'd have told them to sod off back to the end of the queue

 

What gives them the right to jump the queue

[the grinch]

I'd have told them to sod off back to the end of the queue

 

What gives them the right to jump the queue

 

there are two sides to every story, and i have just had the other straight from the owners themselves paints a different picture entirely!!

[magpie patrick]

there are two sides to every story, and i have just had the other straight from the owners themselves paints a different picture entirely!!

 

 

Well, come on Kevin, let us know, otherwise we will remain of the view that the crew of Archimedes and Emu are friends of the political elite and professional bankers spelt with a W

[Proper Job]

there are two sides to every story, and i have just had the other straight from the owners themselves paints a different picture entirely!!

Which is.............. ?