Brentford

Canal Today : Grand Union

We drove up from home yesterday - there was light or heavy rain almost the whole way, with spray from other vehicles making visibility poor and requiring a lot of concentration along the motorway.

Reports that the M4 was closed for a 'police incident' between junctions 12 and 10 encouraged us to stop at Membury Services and have a cup of tea. We set off with the possibility that we might have to take a diversion through Reading but it seemed that the road might just have cleared.

In fact, we came through as quickly as normal, slowing only for the M25 intersection and there was no sign at all of what the incident might have been. Andrew joined us at Packet Boat.

We began by transferring our car to the planned end point of this short trip - Caversham, just above the junction between the Thames and the Kennet and Avon. We have booked a mooring at the Better Boating yard. Andrew drove his (very) new VW Golf over to Caversham in order to bring Mike back.

This meant that we left the marina in quite good time. Our aim was to reach Thames Lock at the end of the Grand Union as we are booked out onto the tidal river at 6:30 tomorrow morning!

The morning was rather pleasant with some blue sky and reasonably warm, much pleasanter than yesterday. Sadly, this was not to be consistent through the day! After a short distance we paused just long enough for Christine to pop to Morrisons in Yiewsley to pick up a paper and some milk.

The new arches on the road bridge at Yiewsley can now been seen much more clearly. We speculated on why this have been created, but could not convince ourselves that we had the correct answer.

The first part of today's route is quite familiar - we came this way only a week ago on our way back from London and the Lee Navigation. However, the trees and shrubs that line the canal have turned really green and blossom was blowing thickly onto the canal surface.

We passed Bull's Bridge but this time kept straight on instead of turning under the bridge and heading for Paddington. In the days when there were many commercial boats plying the Grand Union, a substantial base was kept here and boaters were given their orders - where to pick up a load and where to take it - would it be Birmingham, Leicester or somewhere closer and would they have a load to bring back?

Houseboats now occupy the place where we think the majority of boats laid up.

There were many wharves and arms at one time and a few can still be seen - the most obvious sign from a distance is the humped bridge that carries the towpath across the entrance.

It was close to lunch time when we arrived at the first of the locks today. As we wanted to use the services we managed to make this water filling stretch long enough to have Christine's latest soup (courtesy of some lamb bones from our friendly butcher back home). The former workshop site is being developed and so the sanitary station has been temporarily re-located via the bridge and around the corner.

The sky quickly turned very dark and whilst we were eating a very heavy downpour arrived. Andrew established from a radar image on the internet that it would be over quickly and indeed it was, Sadly, the map did not pick up the next shower which arrived a little later when we were part way down the Hanwell flight!

A well-settled nester seemed ready to sit out the storm!

A couple of voluntary lock keepers were helping boats through the flight - we saw them as they were going up at the to the top lock but they sat out the rain in their hut so we were well down by the time they caught up with us. At one lock we had an unexpected and new experience: a boat was coming up and taking its time - as Mike hovered in the short pound above our boat drifted to the side. Unfortunately the stem was just over one of the horse steps, not in itself a problem, but as the next lock as filled it lowered the water level so that we could not reverse away from the bank! Andrew had to go back up to the lock above and run some water through - it took less than a lockful to float us off the ramp.

The rain cleared as we completed the Hanwell flight and the rest of the afternoon was quite pleasant. We now joined the River Brent for the rest of the day, with a few lock cuts to bypass the weirs.

We spotted nb Chance which we had seen last in Paddington Basin. We hovered for a quick chat and update with James - they had just come up the Thames from Limehouse in a Tideway Cruise organised by St Pancras Boat Club.

There was not so much bird life today as we spotted on our last trip - but this heron was carefully guarding one of the overflow weirs!

Gauging Locks

We were not sure where to moor - the visitor moorings above the Gauging Locks were all full so we pulled in to what is really the lock landing. Andrew walked down to Thames Lock and reported back by phone that there was plenty of free mooring space just before the lock. Christine prepared the lock (Mike was starting on the evening meal) so that when Andrew returned they were ready to go down these mechanised locks.

The section below the Gauging Locks was originally not part of the Grand Union but Thames Lock was created later to reduce the effect of the tide and delays for boats wanting to go out onto the river. We now have to wait until tomorrow.

We would have liked to add this boat to our Unusual Boats collection but that is unfair as it is to become a houseboat and they certainly come in all sorts of shapes and sizes!

Some of the boats moored here make Take Five seem quite diminutive!

There was a hopper boat below the lock that could swallow us up and a dozen more without looking especially full!

Signs beside the mooring warned us not to tie up too tightly as the water level varies. We had not realised that this section is paritally tidal. A weir keeps the water level from falling too far but about an hour after we arrived we suddenly saw water flowing past us rather fast - uphill!

Here is the same weir about 90 minutes later.

9.9 miles - 11 locks