Victor on the Four Counties - A struggle

A struggle

If alas its maintenance was up to scratch it would all be a pleasure, but the leakage at so many locks causes problems with the operating of locks. Many are badly balanced with their the lower gate posts having subsided so much they are a struggle to move from their open position, and consequently don't stay closed.

Still empty

The picture above shows the top gate at Otherton with water leaking into the lock. But would you believe, yet not enough to fill a lock overnight—the bottom gates were leaking even worse! And though all the gates were firmly closed, the lock was empty of water when we reached it early one morning!

Such leaking bottom gates are so bad it is difficult to get the water level to be able to open the top gate of a 'full' lock. It sometimes needing brute force to open the top gate as the water is escaping as fast as it is coming in.

The cill at Rodbaston Lock, pictured above, certainly won't last the season out if its leakage is anything to go by, but certainly confirms the new CaRT trend of 'wait until it fails' then repair it.

The collapsed bank at the bottom lock at Gailey, is a good example, as it has been surrounded with the iniquitous orange protective fencing, as She Who Must, etc etc pointed out, for the last couple of times we had cruised the canal—amounting to three years.

Will we get back?

But what is so terrible is that there is all this lack of maintenance at the very beginning of the season, so little wonder there are already stoppages, and from the state the waterways have been allowed to get into by inefficient management, there are going to be the hell of a lot more. We have already been thwarted by one failure, and can only hope we can get back to our base before we hit another, something that surely many other boaters will have worries about.

In the 22 years since we first cruised this particular waterway, on our jaunts to and from the Severn and the Birmingham canals, the reports in the logs of our two boats show an obvious deterioration, especially in the latter years.

A good mooring

One boater thought he had a good mooring that was certainly not good for anyone else—he was firmly moored on the lock mooring at the bottom of Gailey Lock, which is particularly bad for boaters using the lock as it means going forward right under the bridge to the lock gates and be met with the rush of water coming out of the lock.

There were no indications on the actual boat of its name or number, but I did notice a licence plate inside the boat—number 509781.  This is one boat that the men from CaRT should attend to straight away, as it seems a permanent fixture.

But wait a minute my friends, there is a mooring post pointing to the lock mooring area where the boat is established, and clearly states '48 hour mooring'. So Cart in its wisdom is now making lock moorings 48 hours! Do you have words to explain its stupidity?  I certainly don't.

Shroppie

And so to the Shropshire Union Canal, and Telford's wide, straight waterway with its embankments and cutting that is in great contrast to the much earlier built contour Staffs & Worcs Canal of Brindley.

What must strike so many visitors to the waterway are the seemingly endless lines of moored boats, literally stretching for mile upon mile. Though there are now a couple of marinas at its Northern end towards the Middlewich Branch, it is completely devoid of them down to the Staffs & Worcs. I for one, have always been bemused by that rush to build marinas at the honey-pot sites along such as the Llangollen, Oxford and Trent & Mersey canals, resulting in overkill, whilst miles upon miles of this part of the Shroppie have none. A couple, removing some of the linear moorings would be a blessing, especially to those regularly using the waterway.

To, of course, be continued!

Victor Swift