Granny Buttons

Blisworth Mill at midnight

23rd Sept 2006 at midnight. I'm really on a roll with Blisworth, aren't I?  No more for a while, promise. 

Oh, except I got chatting to one friendly chap (he tells me he's a director of a local football club) who lives in one of the apartments, and he gave a cheery farewell wave.  So here's one last b0nus pic of Blisworth, taken from the counter of Granny Buttons just before I set off. 

He said he just loves living in Blisworth Mill, and who can blame him?    And considering the more unfriendly gestures (e.g. here and here)  I get from people canalside, can you blame me for wanting to show the nice side too? 

He also said he noticed I seemed constantly to have a cup of coffee in my hands as I walked around the canal taking photos, but who can blame me? 

Incidentally, look at these historical photos of Blisworth Mill.  One of the people in the 1920 photos of the Mill is 'A Denny'.  Is that why I'm so drawn to Blisworth?  Spooky coincidence, or morphic resonance in action?

Stoke Bruerne Locks shadows

Stoke Bruerne Top Lock, 5pm Sept 23rd 2006.

How clean is your canal boat?

Do you watch the TV series 'How clean is your house'?  Production company Talkback TV are in the middle of filming another set of programmes, and they urgently need new subjects to stand abjectly in front of Kim & Aggie and be told how dirty their homes are and to be verbally spanked. 

It occurs to me that a narrowboat deep-clean would make an interesting episode.  Have they already done one?  I don't have a TV and I've never seen the programme.  However, I feel like I know it well, because I've read about it in the newspapers until the cows came home into your homes.

Talkback TV researcher James Carter emailed me to promise:

We can transform a filthy dusty hell hole into a haven of peace and purity, and the lucky candidate does not pay a penny. Obviously we require them to appear on the show but believe it or not we have transformed lives and given some people back their hygiene standards, social lives and indeed in some cases their sanity!

If you are interested in having Kim & Aggie teach you a thing or two, please email James on [email protected] or tel 01494 733596. 

Cleaning a filthy dusty hell hole canal boat that's also a home is an interesting subject that deserves a whole blog in itself.  (And I mean a whole blog, not a single post)

Close to nature as we are, we boaters play home to many more organic hosts than the average home.  I often rise in the morning and find a cobweb in my face as I walk to the bathroom, and I'm skilled at helping spiders from the bath and gently tipping them through the window onto the gunwale. 

And cobwebs, of course, are a blessing on summer nights when midges and mozzies and moths are drawn to the lights of our boat.

Cleanliness was above godliness in the old days of the working boats.  Some fleets (notably the Ovaltine boats on the Grand Union Canal) shined so much that spick-ness and span-ness was arguably more important than punctuality. 

And owner-operated working boats (the old 'Number Ones') were just as well-kept.  After all, if you had a canalside business in Birmingham and wanted thirty tons taken to London, whom whould you trust?   The cleanest or the scruffiest operator?  (Rhetorical question)   

When transport moved to the roads this lesson wasn't lost.  To this day, Eddie Stobart, for example, places a premium on cleanliness, and his trucks shine and his drivers are smart.  (I heard somewhere - apocryphally - that a Stobart driver even got fired or sacked for removing his tie).

By the way, I'll be very interested to see what Kim and Aggie have to say about cleaning brass.  That's a subject close to the heart of Granny Buttons, and many narrowboaters.  Will they recommend Brasso or Brass-Mate?  Or can we do it in more homespun ways, such as with vinegar and salt and jute cloths? 

Or won't Kim and Aggie care?  Will they simply remove our useful cobwebs instead and leave us with dulled, untouched brass?  I hope a liveaboard will volunteer for the show and confirm or shatter our preconceptions. 

Candle Bridge Lake

Midnight near Candle Bridge, at Blisworth.  This curious private ornamental garden and lake is (for some reason) floodlit overnight. And it's hauntingly atmospheric in the quiet lonely of the dark, with cows lowing frequently nearby.  Perhaps they are kept awake by the lights?  You can see it (centered) here on Google Maps.  Worth a late-night stroll to see.

Blisworth Tunnel shaft

Tunnel ventilation shaft on Blisworth Hill, dusk, Sept 23rd 2006.

In the middle of Blisworth Tunnel

Blisworth Tunnel, 5.42pm Saturday 23rd Sept. 

Emerging from Blisworth Tunnel

Blisworth Tunnel, 23rd Sept 2006, 6pm.
"You look at the world briefly anew when you emerge from a long canal tunnel", I told my guests.  "See how colours are brighter, sounds clearer but softer".  They looked and listened.

Compare with the same location three weeks ago while going into the tunnel,

Blisworth to Weedon

From Blisworth Mill to near Weedon Station Bridge.  11am to 3pm.  Or so. 

I paused at Gayton at noon to see if the narrowboat-dwelling brewers of the Buntingford Brewery (which I wrote about earlier this year) were in.   Nope.  Just my bad luck - I was hoping to taste a sample! 

A straight run, pausing a while to take photos of a stream of anglers near Banbury Lane Bridge (above).

Here at Weedon Granny Buttons will stay for a couple of weeks, before continuing north to Market Harborough.

Fine George's Bridge in the dusk

Bridge No.9, nr Weston Lock, Trent & Mersey Canal, Feb 2003.   

When I passed this way, I saw a glorious ochre rose taupe salmon-coloured sunset and and old man sitting relaxedly with his dog.  I took several pictures, and I was so entranced that I've held the image - and the feeling - in my mind for over three years.

I've spent some time scanning this picture from the original colour negative and editing it to reflect the image in my mind.  The camera might not lie, but my memory is on oath too, and the truth of memory trumps reality every time. 

Still, if you want a second witness, below is what came out of the camera.  Discount it, it can't be trusted!  Above is what really happened.

Cosgrove to Blisworth

From Cosgrove at noon, to Stoke Bruerne at 5pm, through the tunnel to Blisworth at 6.30pm.

Today is a rare point where I had guests aboard.  I welcomed Simon and Sharon Aspin, whom I photographed at their wedding three weeks ago (see their wedding Flickr photoset here, but I'll photograph Bar Mitzvahs and other life-changing ceremonies too, on request).

Simon Aspin is a client, and I'm on my best behaviour with him - though I'm hardly an expert on behaviour.   Anyway, it was great to have their company today.  Sharon brought a huge selection of food from Waitrose, and left most of it behind at the end, so I'm set for the week in the larder.

It's great to have novices aboard. I can talk to them continually, telling them new things without repeating myself.  I told them a lot about the waterways today, even though they only live ten or fifteen miles away.  It's amazing how close you can live to the canals, and how much of it is new when you actually come aboard.

We lunched at the bottom of Stoke Bruerne Locks, reached the top around 4.30pm, and after a choc-ice we went through Blisworth tunnel, where I broke all the rules without thinking:

They sat on the roof throughout the tunnel, and I forgot the official BW instructions to keep within the profile of the boat.  I was in charge and therefore it was my fault and I won't do it again, m'lud.

Blisworth Tunnel is a tall tunnel and people can sit on the roof and not have to duck.  They have to dodge the water pouring from the ventilation shafts, of course, but that's easily done with an umbrella or two. 

Except one of the umbrellas I provided didn't open properly!  Oh dear.  Sharon screamed as the water splashed her, as girls do on fun fairground rides that get them wet.  I took it as a compliment that she was enjoying herself. 

The worst of all was the last shaft, pictured left.  I've got a splendid photo of it taken from above ground at dusk, which'll be my PotD later this week.

When we emerged, I told them to look at the colours, sounds and light.  Everything is more vibrant when you come out of a canal tunnel.

When we tied up at Blisworth, they gave me a lift to my car at Cosgrove, where we then drove to Weedon, where we left my car and they drove me back to Granny Buttons.   I don't have to worry about getting to my car tomorrow.  It'll be there at Weedon when I arrive.  Which is a wonderful car shuffle.

Afterwards, alone, I took a stroll to the Royal Oak Pub in Blisworth Village. It's an unassuming pub, characterful but slightly forbidding to strangers - everyone looked at me as I walked in, but perhaps that was because I had a camera on a tripod slung around my neck.   

Julie and 'PJ' got chatting to me, and invited me to photograph them - which I did, as you can see here.  I'm sure they are 'just good friends'.  They live close to Candle Bridge, by the canal, and they told me about the nearby 'lake' which they said I should photograph. 

And so I did, and shall shortly make it a PotD.  It's a wonderfully atmospheric place, strangely floodlit at midnight.  I wondered why the owner should floodlight his ornamental lake and garden at night.   And why are the cows nearby lowing at midnight in their stalls?  Are they kept awake by the lights? 

I also photographed Blisworth Mill at night, and it, too, is full of atmosphere. 

I love my midnight photography jaunts.

Alvechurch boatyard and fleet

February 2004.

BW and the socialist curators

After British Waterways put up several dozen redundant workboats for auction earlier this year, it withdrew 14 from the bidding after someone complained they had 'heritage' value.  Those 14 are now being offered "to charitable waterway groups to assist them in the promotion of the waterways".

When the issue was raised earlier this year I said I disliked this 'heritage authoritarianism'.  Why do they have to go to charity groups?  Who's to say charitable groups will value or treasure them any more than individuals who buy them outright?

One or two people agreed with me in public comments, and several others agreed in private emails. None of my correspondents believed there's any more likelihood that 'charitable groups' will treat them more sympathetically. 

BW now says:

The historic workboats are being offered to organisations such as canal trusts, waterway related charities, museums and education programmes that can show a heritage interest.  The boats are not being offered to private individuals or commercial companies.

British Waterways requires details of an organisation’s committee membership, constitution, objectives, accounts for the previous two years and a summary of projects that the organisation has undertaken.

This reminds me why I am - will always be - an individualist, never a socialist.  They are only old workboats, for heaven's sake!  They are hardly the equivalent of the Vasa or the Mary Rose, let alone Duchess-Countess or Cressy, and while old and of curiosity value, they were in regular use quite recently and I bet they aren't unique.

But even if any of those boats were as interesting as Cressy, I'd still trust a random individual boat lover buying them at public auction with his own cash and turning them into private liveaboard homes, rather than allow the earnest rigidity of a 'heritage' organisation take them over. 

The process of having to stump up all the ...

...details of an organisation’s committee membership, constitution, objectives, accounts for the previous two years and a summary of projects that the organisation has undertaken [probably in triplicate]

... is bound to rip out the heart and spirit of any desire to have these boats for the pleasure of owning and using them. Rather, I'll bet the 'charitable groups' will pursue the boats simply for what the boats can add to the groups themselves.  Just as I madly snap up whatever fresh food Tesco has reduced to 10p that's just about to pass it's sell-by date, and tell myself I really, really wanted it.

This sits strangely at odds with BW's stated aim to turn a profit out of selling off canalside assets privately, and feels like a bit of a sop to those who'd protest about all the loss of heritage from private waterside development.   

Please, BW, put these boats up for sale again and let boat-loving individuals who want them buy them.  Unlike waterside property, people don't buy old boats to asset-strip them.  Look at the colour of their money, not the:

... details of an organisation’s committee membership, constitution, objectives, accounts for the previous two years and a summary of projects that the organisation has undertaken, orders sent in triplicate, sent in, sent back, queried, lost, found, subjected to public enquiry, and finally buried in soft peat for three months and recycled as fire lighters. 

Lockside dog, Grindley Brook

I recall this dog is called Bruno, and he's a sweet-natured mutt owned by the people who run the Lockside Stores at Grindley Brook on the Llangollen Canal.  But the photo was taken nearly three years ago, and the dog could be dead now, or the business bust for all I know.

Somerton Deep Lock postcard view

Everyone else and his dog has got a picture postcard photo of Somerton Deep Lock, so I don't see why I shouldn't have one.  28th May 2006.