Granny Buttons

Dirty canal now supports fish

Dirty canal now supports fish says this news story about the Manchester Ship Canal. There are many of these heartening stories nowadays - few seem to get the publicity they deserve. I guess the MSC merits it because of the sheer mass of its water. It's amusing to see the two 'See also' links, though. It seems that any cargo by canal is newsworthy these days! And can the other story really be the only other one worth listing in this context?

SEE ALSO:
Firm sends cargo by canal
04 Feb 03 | England

Teenager drowns in canal
26 Dec 02 | England

Single handed boating.

I'm often asked how difficult it is to take Granny alone through locks, around swing and lift bridges, and generally on my own. How do I manage?, ask many incredulous boaters. In my case, I learned on the job, and never thought twice about it. It was easy, and where it wasn't, I found a way around the difficulties by myself.

But if you are concerned about the difficulties, I can certainly recommend Colin Edmondson's "Going it alone", a brief guide to the tips, tricks and traps of being alone with a narrowboat.

The ony criticism I'd have is in the densely-packed layout of text, and the lack of an index or table of contents. But that's churlish - it's only 28 pages long, clearly written, it won't outstay its welcome and it will give heart to those previously too nervous to step out on their own. I really did enjoy reading it, especially for hearing someone confirm what I had to learn by my own hard efforts.

Finch the magpie

The Towpath Telegraph regularly reports on a nefarious character known only as 'Finch'. He is prone to breaking into canal boats, stealing food and drink and - curiously - AA batteries for his radio. "YOu'll know it's him if it's the AA batteries, he never takes another type. Also, he prefers red wine and port, rather than beer.
I'm told this is him...

Coy NarrowboatWorld

Who is behind 'Narrowboat World'? This online magazine puports to be the most visited site on the web - 138,000 in October alone. It's a lively piece, full of genuine news, althhough overshadowed by a lot of opionation. There's no real identity, no way of getting in touch with it, except through an anonymous email.

I emailed the one link to ask who was behind it, and why. Were you, I asked, the 'Victor Swift' who is the only bylined name on the site? Back came a prompt reply saying "No, Victor Swift is a contributor to the site. I am the editor - a spin-off as an ex newspaper editor of 28 years."

I asked why the coyness, why no personality. "If you pick any newspaper up, you will see there is no 'ego trip' of names of editors", he teased. "[It's] how I was brought up!"

This presumably marks him as an old Fleet Street hand, where a desk job never got any recognition, and was proud to be so anonymous. It's not the way of the modern press, of course. And I'd argue that it's even counterproductive. Nowadays we *want* our news to come from personalities.

I've since heard from other sources that 'Tom' is someone called Tom Crossley, and that 'Victor Swift' is indeed his nom de keyboard, the name he uses to distance himself from responsibility for controversial opinions. I don't know if this is true, but I've heard his opinions are often read with disfavour at British Waterways. And a quick scan of 'whois' tells you that the site is registered with one Thomas Crossley at Unit 3 Sutton Springs Wood, Chesterfield - which tallies with the fondness of 'Victor' for the Chesterfield canal. The coyness concludes with a given email address of '[email protected]'.

That said, I personally think it's a lively, interesting site, with some interesting opinions and real news that one might overlook on the some of the stodgy printed pages of the stodgy canal magazines.

It's hard to navigate around NBW though, and I wish there was a way to search, to cross-reference stories, and there aren't even any external links. He (Tom? Victor?) disagrees strongly that it's hard to navigate. Indeed, he says no page is more than two clicks away from another. But then he writes the damn thing and he knows where to go. And he knows what such vague button captions as 'topical', 'basic' and 'bandits' mean.

I also think the lack of external links makes it too pleased with itself, too unwilling to share information, and too insular.

Yet, ultimately, it's updated regularly without fanfare, making it rare amongst waterways web sites, most of which remain 'under construction' or updated barely once a year. And with something new and interesting every week, albeit opinionated, it's hardly surprising it claims such high readership. Or at least, clicks.

Nantwich - Wrenbury

This was the last weekend to get on the beautiful Llangollen canal before the big lock closures of the winter begin, and there's a whole host of them scheduled at the lower end. So I wanted to 'bunker up' (fill with fuel', empty my poo tank) in case I was stuck in a restricted section for a couple of months. While at Nantwich I phoned the next marina uphill (Wrenbury) to check on their facilities. Yes, they could do it, but their prices were eye-watering. I made do at Nantwich Marina, and they were competent and reasonably priced.

The Wrenbury facility is an Alvechurch base. I'm starting to notice a theme with Alvechurch. As with Anderton Marina, they ain't cheap, nor flexible, and the excuse given on the phone is that they want to give priority to their own hire boat fleet. Maybe so, but they do advertise themselves as offering facilities to passing boaters.

The Langollen begins with a four-lock ascent at Hurleston, towered over by the reservoir.

At the top lock I met two more very helpful kids, and their dad pointed out that I'd already photographed them earlier that day. My meo