Narrowboat Eileen Dover: Retracing our Steps

Tuesday 8^th September 2020

We had a big day planned today, in terms of miles at least, always looking to put ourselves in the right place on Friday morning for the big climb up 27 locks into Birmingham. Having taken advice from several people on narrowboat forums, the consensus seemed to be Curdworth, which is very close to the south end of the M6 Toll – although I had never noticed the canal in all the times I have driven that way. Counting back this meant that we would need to be well down the Coventry on Wednesday night, which in turn would require us to make good progress back towards Fradley Junction by this evening. The challenge is that once past Burton-Upon-Trent there is a long stretch of very unattractive canal for mooring, running alongside the A38, followed by the stretch of the Trent between Wychnor and Alweras. Alweras itself was probably going to have little free space, from what we saw going through a few days ago, and that meant that we would have to rely on finding a mooring in the short stretch between the end of Alweras and Fradley Junction. Even that would mean a journey of at least 20 miles, which is quite a lot in a day, especially factoring in a fair number of locks.

Consequently we got up early, fed the dogs and started our journey by half eight. Our first task was the two big double locks – Swarkstone and Stenson, at both of which we were on our own. Although you need to beware of getting stuck on the cill, in other respects going down a lock is easier than going up – the rush of water into the lock when the paddles are opened on the way up produces much stronger undertows and currents, and it is very hard to hold the boat steady and avoid crashing into one gate or the other. When we got to Stenson Loulie elected to get out with the windlass, rather than be left to rattle about in the lock.

After that we pushed on through Willington and on towards Burton. We were conscious that the dogs would need exercise, so after Willington Loulie got out and took them for a mile or so along the towpath, which here is well away from the A38 which shadows us all the way along this stretch. I picked them up soon after the canal had crossed the river Dove – the aqueduct we were on is about 250 years old, but it is modern by comparison with the old road bridge alongside, which was built by monks many centuries before the canal arrived.

The old monk's bridge over the River Dove

We travelled past Burton, with a single lock near the centre, and towards the far side we moored. Loulie took the dogs for another walk, and I went about half a mile to a Morrisons which I had spotted on the map, to replenish our supplies of food and wine – I had a heavy burden which I just managed to carry back to the boat. We carried on – three more locks took us down to the stretch alongside the A38, and then Wychnor Lock saw us back on the Trent. It now seems really very small, compared to its width down below Sawley.

Alweras Lock took us back on the canal, with evening approaching. As we had expected there was nowhere to moor at all, even though we are now getting quite used to mooring close to other boats. So we carried on up Bagnall Lock at the top of the village, into the short stretch before Common Lock, which marks the start of Fradley Junction. There were a couple of boats moored along there, and though the bank looked a bit soft we investigated and found a perfectly reasonable mooring, on pins, and exactly where we had wanted to be ready for the next adventure towards Brum.