Granny Buttons

Willow with a bobbed haircut

Willow with a bob, Braunston Top Lock, Aug 27th 2006.   Does this sort of thing come naturally, or is it pure topiary?  It looks so smart and neat and yet so strange to me.

Braunston Tunnel West portal

Braunston tunnel West entrance, Aug 27th 2006. 

Christine had just handed over the steering to me and had nipped below.  And I was obviously too busy trying to get a photo to steer straight. 

Christine dislikes tunnels, just like Sue on No Problem, but unlike Sue she prefers not to steer. She'd rather that I did, and she goes below and reads a book to stop herself thinking about ghoulies and ghosties and tunnels collapsing in on the boat.

Poor old Sue.  From her cruising log of two years ago:

Braunston Tunnel tomorrow, oh i do so hate tunnels.  I always have this dreaded fear in the tunnel that the boat coming in the opposite direction with the headlamps blinding me is a 14ft wide beam, for those not in the know, the tunnel is just over 14 ft wide!  They have to phone British Waterways if they want to go through, but it makes no odds to me, I still have the same fear each time, and then of course there is Blisworth Tunnel in a few days time, that is the longest tunnel on the whole system taking some 20 to 30 minutes to get through, still I won't think about that one for now!

Braunston Top Lock

Braunston Top Lock, Aug 27th 2006, with Granny on the right in the lock.  Compare with the photo I posted a couple of days ago, showing Christine straining on the rope.

My apologies for repeating subjects so close together, but I'm scrabbling to get some photos ready to post automatically over Christmas and the New Year, because I want a new photo to show every day.  www.grannybuttons.com is like a shark, she needs to keep moving, needs constant daily feeding to stay alive.   

Braunston Junction

Braunston Junction, 27th Aug 2006.  Looking northwards, the North Oxford Canal to the left, the Grand Union (London-wards) to the right, and Ivor Batchelor's usual pitch just around the corner on the right. 

Midland Chandlers straight ahead; it's that new brick building in the 'tesco vernacular' style of architecture.

Christine holds the boat

Braunston Top Lock, August 2006.   Christine tries to hold Granny Buttons steady in a lock, while a fellow from the adjacent boat in the lock runs to get the paddles ready.

USA shows how illuminated boat parade should be done

Fundraising fleet lights up Canal - Marin Independent Journal

San Rafael, just across the bay from San Francisco, had a Canal Boat Parade of Lights last weekend.  Video of it here on Blip TV - the first time I've seen a video of a boat light parade anywhere. 

Birmingham had its own 2006 canal boat light boat parade a couple of weeks back, but I saw or heard nothing of it.  I notice my own post for last year's event (a fossil in web terms) is still No.3 in Google, and the BBC's 2004 coverage of the same event is No.2!    No. 1 is the Birmingham council site, but it doesn't report it.  These things deserve to be better covered.   

Next year in video, OK?  The next big illuminated boat procession is at the Little Venice Canalway Cavalcade, on the May Day Bank Holiday.

Almost Three Ducks In A Row

Barrow-on-Soar, November 12th 2006. 
I'm starting to feel obsessed by getting all my ducks in a row.  Not quite right here.  So nearly, though!

Belle's blog does have a feed

NB Belle is close to being handed over to proud new owner Chris Wells at Barton Turns Marina.  I'm impressed with the look of this new Sandhills boat (a baby sister to Balmaha) and wrote about it six months ago. 

But when it was being build I had to 'visit' the site to see if there were any new pictures of it being built, which meant I didn't get around to seen the site for weeks at a time. 

I asked Chris last week if he'd consider having a feed on his blog. Turns out he already has - and it's here.  It's just not triggering my Internet Explorer 7 feeds, that's all. 

I'm happy now, so I'll stop moaning and Belle can go on my boatroll :-)   Great boat, Chris, oozing style!  I'm jealous.

Canaltime scene at proposed Daventry arm of Grand Union Canal

Canaltime boat near Norton Junction, heading towards Braunston Tunnel, Aug 27th 2006.  On the right is the point where the proposed Daventry canal arm will join the canal, as reported last week in the Daventry Express.

Note the people sitting at the front.  I daresay they'd have still been in that unnerving position fifteen minutes later when they reached the tunnel.  And probably still sitting there right through the tunnel.  Good for them, what fun.  But who's to say the lack of a well deck on a Canaltime boat is a safety feature, as discussed in this post of Granny's last September?  If they fell off, would the steerer see them?

Bridgeworks hold up traffic but not boats

Road misery...for 60 weeks - Halifax Evening Courier

Motorists travelling from Halifax to West Vale face road misery that will drag on for more than a year. Drivers will be forced on to a two-mile detour for 60 weeks when work begins to repair a canal bridge in Stainland Road. ... A spokesman for British Waterways said the canal would remain open to pleasure boats throughout the repairs.

Traffic held up, but canal boats unaffected - now that makes a change!  I presume this is the bridge by the bottom lock of the Salterhebble Locks.   

Ratcliffe Power Station

Ratcliffe-on-Soar, Dec 16th 2006.

I don't get tired of those big cooling towers at Ratcliffe.  I never get tired of them, and I love them when they are steaming vigorously.  (Note the tiny farmhouse in the foreground).

I hope they are preserved in their majesty, in the way that so many mill chimneys were not.  They are best in still, blue air, when the steam (is it smoke?  no, steam, surely) can climb a thousand feet before evaporating.

I think these evaporating towers are symbols of older-generation coal-fired power stations.  You don't see them in the new bread of gas power stations, such as at Keadby.  But their grandeur always impresses me.

There are two remaining cooling towers at the Sheffield Tinsley power station, impressively visible from the adjacent M1 viaduct.  Owning company  E-On  recently announced they'd be demolished next year.   I'd be against it but they say the towers are in poor shape.

Where's Ivor Batchelor & Mountbatten?

Hugh on NB Dvbris asks:

In need of essential fuel I have always relied on Ivor Batchelor to provide the necessary.  Unfortunately, in recent months he has not be at his usual moorings next to the Oxford/Grand Union junction. Do you have any idea where he is?  I feel that without his presence and wit at Braunston, the cut will not have the same feel about it.

Sorry, Hugh, I've no idea where he might be.  It's four months since I was last there, and he was on his regular station at that time.  Does anyone else know where Mountbatten and Jellicoe are?  He often strays down towards Banbury, that's all I know.

I've looked in my files, and good lord, I don't have a photo of Ivor or his boats.  I must rectify that if he pops back into my viewfinder. 

The Huddersfield Waterfront development

Left spellbound by panto magic! - Hudderfield Daily Examiner

Some 284 children from both Rawthorpe High School and Rawthorpe Junior School were given tickets to go see Merlin and the Enchanted Mirror Christmas Show at the Lawrence Batley Theatre - courtesy of a Huddersfield company.  Ramsden and Colne developments paid for the festive treat for the delighted youngsters.

The canal focus in this story is Ramsden & Colne Developments.   This company is at the heart of the proposed redevelopment of Huddersfield's canalside, as outlined on Pennine Waterways. 

Why am I interested in this story?  Because of the local sponsorship of the children to the pantomime.  Ramsden & Colne Developments is a spin-off of Sellers Engineering, and the same people are at the helm. 

Sellers Engineering is a local company that makes (or at least made) things -  in this case, carpet & textile machinery.  And its controllers (listed here) are mostly local men, Huddersfield men, who grew up in the area and see fit to do local sponsorships.

When this story started last year I rang Sellers, and asked about the project.  I was impressed that they put me straight through to managing director David Armitage, who was quite happy to take my amateurish enquiries and answer directly and confidently, even though he didn't know anything about me.  I might have just been nutter (I suppose I am) but that didn't matter to him.

The significance, as I see it, is that this development is by a local company, with feet rooted in the Huddersfield soil, and helmed by someone not afraid to hide behind a spokesman.  Whether or not the Huddersfield Waterfront project succeeds, the developers will stay behind to care about the skyline.  That's a rarity in canalside development, and it counts for a lot.

The architects for this development are DLG Architects.  But as with any modern architect don't expect too much information from their website.  No matter; the purse strings are controlled by David Armitage and his team, and I guess that's what counts.

In Sellers Stories,  a fellow calling himself 'Mad Mick' writes frankly about his personal demons and very warmly about his days working at Sellers Engineers, which he describes as 'an oasis of happiness in an unhappy world'.  He has fond memories of the works director, whom he calls 'Captain Beaky'.

My Christmas week schedule

I'm cruising from Shardlow to Birmingham this coming Christmas week, via Great Haywood.  Hard to know exactly where I'll end up each day.  But I'm thinking of:

Sat: Swarkestone.
Sun: Burton
Mon: Fradley
Tues: Tixall
Wed: Gailey
Thurs: Wolverhampton
Fri/Sat: ...?
Arriving Sunday in central Birmingham for New Year's Eve.