Tootling from Tottenham to French France

Please excuse the time manipulation of the blog today, but if I try to do from the last entry to today it’ll take me days to write and you hours to read and I don’t want us to fall out.  We’ve been in France (should still be, but more on that later) and all things conspired against me to get a blog entry done; slow/non-existent internet, time (too busy enjoying myself doing other things) and Mike’s laptop wouldn’t read the photo card and I can’t do the blog on the iPad – besides which we’d not taken the photocard adaptors for it anyway….. So, that’s my excuse, but here we are, just a little catching up to do.   

We spent the night of 21 August at Tottenham in a long line of London Boaters, pulling out the next morning for a fairly longish stint to Waltham Abbey, our next stop on the River Lee and new territory for us.  It’s a rather uninteresting stretch of the river, a bit industrial really, kind of bland and once we were clear of the London Boaters, the boats were relatively few and far between – especially moving ones.  The locks kept us occupied with heavy gates competing with the ones on the Buckby Flight and we were flying solo so they were quite hard work.  At Enfield there seemed to be an abandoned widebeam on the lock mooring, so I went ahead to see what was going on, finding the owners on the lock taking tips from the two narrowboats coming down.  There was much chat and not much movement but I gleaned that it was only Mrs Widebeam’s second lock in her life and she was very nervous about sinking the boat.  Mr Widebeam had been living aboard for a few months now and seemed pleased to have Mrs to do the locks…..  I don’t know what their circumstances were, I’ve learned not to ask as the stories tend to be awfully long…..  Finally the two boats exited the bottom of the lock and Widebeam made her way in.  Slowly.  Then Mrs Widebeam did two turns of one paddle and waited.  We waited for quite some while and I asked if she’d like me to put a couple of turns on the other paddle.  No.  With the fear of God in her eyes she said she’d been told only to do two turns of a paddle otherwise the flow of water would throw the boat about.  She’s right, it is wise to do this, until you see the lie of the land (or water), what the boat’s doing etc and once you’re within a foot or so of being filled can usually fully open both paddles with no problem.  But no, she was terrified she’d bounce the boat around and sink it – never mind it was a widebeam with only an inch or two either side to bounce off.  Eventually they moved off and we took our turn coming up, helped by a lovely lad who was holidaying with his dad moored nearby.  He chatted away, very well socialised and just a dead nice kid.  We seemed to have been at this lock for hours so were glad to get underway.

Accompanied by pylons much of the way

Cute viking boat sculpture at Waltham Abbey

After getting stuck behind Widebeam at the next lock while we waited for their two turns to fill the lock we were relieved to see them pull in for lunch and we passed them as we came up.  We made good way to Waltham Town lock where there were kids jumping in the lock.  Not really a smart move, especially when a boat coming down was manoeuvring into the lock.  Our turn came and they kept out of the way while we came up, again, quite nice kids, chatty, one of them did a great Scottish accent taking the piss out of me!  There were a couple of spaces in a long line of boats so we pulled in, moored up and went to have a look at the waterpark, which was used in the Olympics.  We’d met a couple coming down who said it was great, worth stopping off to see.  It looked a lot smaller and less exciting than it had in 2012 on the telly……  Until they ran the water – wow!!

Empty and sad

Looking better with some water

Whhhooooooooosh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BBC were there to do a news feature on the end of the Rio Olympics but weren't allowed to stand on the water side of the white fence unless they put life-vests on!!!

In the evening I did a short run, 30 mins, aware that we were going to be toing and froing about for a few weeks quite soon and my running would grind to a halt during that time and we had dinner and watched tv in the evening.  Next morning I was keen to get off as I’d seen Widebeam come up later the previous afternoon and we hoped to get to Hertford today, so didn’t want to get stuck behind her.  They were just having their morning cuppa as we cruised past just after 9am (yes, that’s an early start for us).  As we got more rural, things got prettier and it is a nice river, but when you’ve been spoiled by the Thames any other is only going to take second place at best.

Pretty Riverfront at Ware

 

It was a hot day as we made our way and as we headed through Broxbourne the river became the M25 of the waterways with tons of little rowing boats, day boats all out enjoying the sun.  It was a bit of an obstacle course and we were glad to get through it.  On through Stanstead Abbots and at Stanstead Lock there seemed to be a bit of a queue, and another widebeam sitting on the lock mooring.  I managed to get Mike off by coming alongside a moored boat further back and he climbed across it onto the tow path and went up to the lock to see what was going on.  Someone was going up, a narrowboat, and had only just started filling, so could have waited for us to go with them – boo!  There seemed to be a lot of chat and not much action and I was hovering as there was no room on the lock mooring, until the widebeam owner offered to take a rope from our front and tie it to their back.  This was fine, except they had a wooden platform protruding from their rear holding their bikes.  I was terrified I’d ram the thing and snap it into kindling……  After a lot of apparent palaver, the other boat was up, someone came down and the widebeam entered the lock.  I could see Mike trying to keep calm as there seemed to be more faffing than moving, lots of people around but nobody doing anything but eventually it was our turn and we went up – again, we probably ended up spending over an hour at one lock.  Through Ware, and on to Hertford where on approaching the lock we could see a ton of kids all jumping off the gates into the river below – nightmare.  However, it wasn’t.  As Mike get off at the landing, the oldest lad came to meet him, chatted up to the lock and the next thing had our windlass in his hand and was shouting at the others and getting the lock ready.

As I drove in, a wee lad at the side shouted, “Hello!!!” with a big cheery grin (and there was me thinking we’d be getting stoned to death or wee’d on as we went passed…..) and we exchanged pleasantries about the weather, the water etc.  Mike sat chatting to them as the older lad filled the chamber and Quaintrelle rose up.  When the lock was level, the lad shouts to his pal, “Oi, get the other gate, can’t you see he’s got a bad leg!!”, as Mike was wearing his knee brace – hahahahahahaha!!!!!!!  Brilliant!

Our helpers at Hertford Lock

Nice mooring outside the Old Barge

The moorings at Hertford were rammed so we continued up towards the end of the navigation, where there was one space left in front of The Old Barge pub.  We were hot and knackered as it had been a much longer day than we had anticipated, but were rewarded with Hertford being rather a nice town which had a Waitrose that we made use of.  An early tea and then a quick drink in the pub, then bed.  We wanted to start off quite sharp in the morning again as we wanted to get to our mooring at Roydon Marina on the Stort by lunchtime and although it should only take 3-4 hours, we seemed to have been plagued with hold ups and slow locks so didn’t want to leave anything to chance.  We left at 9am and already the day was roasting.  

Back the way we came!

Lonely locks

New territory as we turn on to the River Stort

We found ourselves going solo again the whole way; it must have been too hot as we didn’t see another single soul on the move until we reached the first lock on the Stort.  Again, there was a boat in the lock, lots of people around but no one seemed to be moving or doing anything, so I climbed across another moored boat (as someone was on the lock mooring) and went to check out what was going on.  There was a dayboat sitting in the lock chamber and it was quickly clear to me why they were sitting in there for so long.  “What way are you going?” I asked.  Blank looks all round……”Are you going this way (pointing up the Stort), or this way? (Pointing down).  “That way” (pointing up).  “Well you need to shut these paddles!!!!” I said, pointing to the bottom gates.  The numpties had all four paddles open, the two on the top gates and the two on the bottom so the water was basically running through the lock and the boat going nowhere……..  They were so busy taking pics and were none the wiser but the two other boaters from other boats looked a bit sheepish and apologised saying they’d thought something wasn’t right but hadn’t noticed what they’d done.  I tried to explain to the day boaters how to do a lock, but they said a fisherman had told them to open all the paddles so the fish could get through!!!!  Once they were up, the next cruiser came down, then it was our turn.  As we rose, a few wee wooden rowing boats arrived and then a narrowboat that just pushed right passed them to the lock entrance, meaning we couldn’t get out!  One of the rowers was doing the lock and silently simmering, “He almost rammed us at the last lock coming out of the marina!”, and proceeded to shout at the driver to reverse so we could come out.  As we passed I said, “The rowing boats are next, you’ll have to wait,” and he just shrugged – nice type.  Anyway, this was the only adventure that day so we made great progress and were at the marina just after 12!!!  We had booked the marina for the next month as we had to go up to York, Fife and then were heading to France for three weeks for a holiday.  We did what organising was left to do for our trips and as the afternoon wore on faded away in the heat.  I spent an hour lying on the floor of the boat as it was coolest place I could find – there was not a breath of air.

Roydon Marina - space on the left under the bridge for Quaintrelle

The next day was still warm as we set off to the station for York for a couple of days, and then on Saturday we headed up to Fife.  We picked up Citty Cate and went on up to Pittenweem on Sunday for the night where my mum and brother John and nephew Alex were spending a week on holiday.  We had a lovely night with them, although it was a bit trying getting there as Citty  Cate seemed to have a dodgy battery, but then it seemed to fix itself after we’d ordered a new one online and it was all a bit stressful…….  On Monday she started off fine and we started off for York, stopping off en route for a very short visit with my very short Aunty Nancy.

Three Scotts and a Queenan at pretty Pittenweem harbour

Hmmmmmm - little did we know this wouldn't be the last time people were standing behind the car in such a manner :(

Me and my FAVOURITE Aunty Nancy xxxxx

An overnight at Norfolk Towers, from where we caught a great view of a balloon, and then it was on down to the marina for a night to get packed for France and load up Cate.

Citty's on the Road Again.....

On Wednesday 31^st, with the car running fine, we headed off down to the Chunnel, quite excited as neither of us had ever done it before.  The sun was shining and everything went to plan (despite leaving a bit later than planned and having to drive a bit faster than planned) and by 1.30pm we were in French France and driving on the right side of the road!!

Down to the train

On the train

Parked up between a mini and a Range Rover!

FRANCE!!!

We drove for a few hours down the motorway to our first stop near Rouen, where we stayed in a gorgeous Chateau and had a lovely meal at the local Auberge.  In the morning we had a quick tour of the 17^th Century cider press, apparently one of the only ones of its age and type left as far as the owners are aware and then headed for our next stop.

The chapel of the Chateau

Chateau

 

17th Century Cider press