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Christmas with Foxy


Peter X

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A few weeks ago I got a PM from Emerald Fox inviting me to come along as crew for a week or so over Christmas up north. Much of my boating so far has been around Braunston, but he meant way up north, going up the Pennines on the Rochdale, subject to the canal not being iced over, always a possibility. Always being open to the opportunity to crew for someone I said yes, and that is why I now find myself about to sit down to Christmas dinner with Foxy. Duck, stuffing, roast potatoes, carrots, parsnips, and Brussels sprouts of course. And cranberry sauce, and Foxy says a very acceptable Reisling. Foxy’s cookery is good, we had some nice Mexican pancakes yesterday, but he has just partly burnt the Brussels and is doing his best to rescue them.

 

It’s nice and warm inside the boat with the stove going, but outside is a different story. To a southerner like me who’s never been to the Pennines before (and only up north at all on a few occasions), the Pennines in winter conjures up a picture of a lone shepherd (wearing the obligatory flat cap) searching a 3 foot snowdrift for lost sheep on a TV news item about bad weather. In fact I haven’t seen any snow but it is cool, sometimes rather windy, and it rains a lot. Ee, it’s grim up north.

 

There has been some clear weather but unfortunately most of it was on Wednesday when Foxy had to be away for the day.

That was also the day when we had to get through the Tuel Lane lock because CRT have to operate that, and opening times are limited. So Foxy, being a very nice trusting type, agreed that I could single hand his boat through the set of three locks although I had very little experience of single handed boating. Though I say so myself, I think I did it pretty well and managed not to crash into anything. The combination of the rain and Foxy’s packed social calendar means we’ve been moving rather slowly by my standards so far, but there does appear to be a chance that it could stop raining for a while on Sunday. Maybe.

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Nice story peter!

 

I've just finished scoffing an enormous roast pheasant xmas lunch. Ok I was a bit late starting it as I went on a bike ride up to the Bruce Tunnel first, then I decided to pluck the damned thing. (It was a magnificent cock pheasant as big as a small chicken, picked up from the A338 Hungerford to Pewsey road ten days ago and been hanging in my cratch ready for xmas.)

 

The last few I have skinned so I decided to pluck this one just for the experience. Never again, life's too short. Horrendous mess, back of my boat is covered in feathers as I did it on the rear slide and it was raining. But there we are. Two still hanging in the cratch, not sure how I'll cook them...

 

All washed down with a nice bottle of Viognier HAPPY XMAS everyone here! (Well, most of you haha!) ;)

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. (It was a magnificent cock pheasant as big as a small chicken, picked up from the A338 Hungerford to Pewsey road ten days ago and been hanging in my cratch ready for xmas.)

 

 

All washed down with a nice bottle of Viognier HAPPY XMAS everyone here! (Well, most of you haha!) ;)

Wow first your shed burgling skills,now eating road kill. Your Aquadid credentials are shining through Mike. It's just your liking for fine wines that is letting you down. Surely you should be drinking white lightning or maybe mad dog 20/20.

 

Regards Kris

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Nice story peter!

 

I've just finished scoffing an enormous roast pheasant xmas lunch. Ok I was a bit late starting it as I went on a bike ride up to the Bruce Tunnel first, then I decided to pluck the damned thing. (It was a magnificent cock pheasant as big as a small chicken, picked up from the A338 Hungerford to Pewsey road ten days ago and been hanging in my cratch ready for xmas.)

 

The last few I have skinned so I decided to pluck this one just for the experience. Never again, life's too short. Horrendous mess, back of my boat is covered in feathers as I did it on the rear slide and it was raining. But there we are. Two still hanging in the cratch, not sure how I'll cook them...

 

All washed down with a nice bottle of Viognier HAPPY XMAS everyone here! (Well, most of you haha!) wink.png

I love roast pheasant with a stale bread and whisky stuffing the recipe also calls for peeled grapes as well but its a pig to peel half pound of grapes.

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Grim up North? Surely not grimmer than Croydon?

 

Bon appétit to you both.

The weather is certainly grimmer than Croydon, the radio says it's only raining a little in the south east, but here it's been heavy continuous rain since 3pm yesterday. Foxy's ash bucket on the stern has collected about 10" of water in that time, let's say that means 8" of rain to allow for the bucket rim being wider than the base. The forecast says heavy rain goes on for the rest of today then we get three mostly dry days, so we might yet make it into Lancashire.

 

Calderdale certainly looks quite nice in a sort of grim industrial way with all those old soot-stained buildings and chimneys everywhere and mountains towering over the valley all along it. It lacks the big steel and glass office blocks of Croydon, but I don't think I miss those.

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It's getting grimmer, there's a torrent of water flowing over the towpath next to us and away down the road. I've started a separate topic for that "Possible emergency at Stubbing Wharf...". Depending on what damage the water has done here and/or at other points along the canal, our aim of going over the summit and down a bit into Lancashire may well have to be abandoned.

 

We're not attempting to move at the moment, but we're OK; we took on water and emptied the Thetford yesterday, and we have enough food and drink for the time being. Foxy says "Send help, I'm running low on whisky! (single malts only!!)".

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Floods in Todmorden, hebden and Walsden today, best stay on your boat! Littleborough is also flooded, I think I'm stuck at home at the moment, high and dry above it all. If you do get through in the next day or so the grimness turns to stunning scenery as you leave Todmorden. You may well need wellies on the gauxholme flight! Towpath can get a bit damp.

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We moved on this afternoon, as the rain had stopped at last and there seemed to be some risk that the towpath breach 5 yards up from us could get worse, leaving Foxy's boat stranded in a low pound. We hoped it might be possible to get up through lock 12 into the next pound, but after passing another rather scary breach then seeing a big breach ahead of us where the River Calder now flows into the canal, and a bit of dry towpath before it offering a safe mooring, we took the sensible option and moored up to a telephone pole. No cyclist can hit our line because our section of towpath is an island!

 

I have some photos too, which I hope to post upon my return to Croydon next week, mostly featuring lots of grim northern water in a hurry to get from A to B. There's also a close up of a Coastguard Rescue helicopter which was coming in to pick up a winchman from the houses across the river from us; they have water running out of their doors about a foot above the river. I think that's entering their houses on the other side, but we only have a limited view of that down an alleyway and cannot talk to them even though they're only 30 feet away due to the noisy river.

 

We're hoping the level might go down enough overnight for us to walk along a path that we think is there under the water, to get to the next lock and see what's what there. Looking on the bright side, we moved off the last mooring just inside its 24 hour limit, and are now on a 14 day stretch. No CRT enforcement checker can get to us on foot anyway!

 

Meanwhile our supplies are mostly in the "happy boater" part of the graph, but we may find ourselves following a strange menu if there's a long siege. It's raining again...

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Meanwhile our supplies are mostly in the "happy boater" part of the graph, but we may find ourselves following a strange menu if there's a long siege. It's raining again...

I would normally suggest that if you need provisions, you could walk back along the towpath to the Co-op, but perhaps not today:

 

1762.jpg

 

(Photo from http://hebdenbridge.co.uk/news/2015/242.html)

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We moved on this afternoon, as the rain had stopped at last and there seemed to be some risk that the towpath breach 5 yards up from us could get worse, leaving Foxy's boat stranded in a low pound. We hoped it might be possible to get up through lock 12 into the next pound, but after passing another rather scary breach then seeing a big breach ahead of us where the River Calder now flows into the canal, and a bit of dry towpath before it offering a safe mooring, we took the sensible option and moored up to a telephone pole. No cyclist can hit our line because our section of towpath is an island!

 

I have some photos too, which I hope to post upon my return to Croydon next week, mostly featuring lots of grim northern water in a hurry to get from A to B. There's also a close up of a Coastguard Rescue helicopter which was coming in to pick up a winchman from the houses across the river from us; they have water running out of their doors about a foot above the river. I think that's entering their houses on the other side, but we only have a limited view of that down an alleyway and cannot talk to them even though they're only 30 feet away due to the noisy river.

 

We're hoping the level might go down enough overnight for us to walk along a path that we think is there under the water, to get to the next lock and see what's what there. Looking on the bright side, we moved off the last mooring just inside its 24 hour limit, and are now on a 14 day stretch. No CRT enforcement checker can get to us on foot anyway!

 

Meanwhile our supplies are mostly in the "happy boater" part of the graph, but we may find ourselves following a strange menu if there's a long siege. It's raining again...

Why can't you post pictures now?

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Why can't you post pictures now?

I've only ever got pictures from my Blackberry phone to the forum by first downloading to my home PC via a cable I don't have with me. Maybe my phone's browser can get me on a site where I could upload photos to somewhere, I don't know.

 

We are better off than those locals across the river who are flooded, because we float. As we're only able to moor to one telephone pole tonight, we don't have diagonal lines, just a centre line, but we're not going to drift away. Foxy's got the line quite slack to allow for the likelihood that the level can go up or down overnight, so the boat is bobbing about a bit against what's left of the bank.

 

Cabin fever has not yet set in, Foxy's keeping busy by tidying up the boat.

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