Four weeks at Chadderton

(Boat Flamingo - posted by Alan/Cath)

Forget-me-not & Hazel - two other historic boats trapped on the Rochdale

Well, we moored Flamingo and Saltaire at Chadderton, near to the Rose of Lancaster pub, and we waited for a few days to find out from CRT what had happened to the lock, and what was going to happen about it. Because it was a weekend we didn't find out until the following Monday. 

 

Still like this on 9th June

CRT said that the lock was completely unusable and they had no idea how long it would take to fix. There were many rumours flying around as well - for example, many people thought that the gate was so badly damaged that it couldn't be repaired, and a new gate would have to be built.

 

It is a fairly spectacular failure!

We decided that Alan had to go back to the mooring in Northamptonshire by train and bus, retrieve the car that we had left there, come back up to Manchester, then take our valuables off the boat and us to go home for at least a few days. Our plan was to take David home until such time that we could restart the journey so that we would reduce pressure on water, power and toilet. If we had stopped at Littleborough we would have had access to water and toilet, but where we were there was no where to fill our water tank, or empty our toilet cassettes.

 

Gates are not meant to rest one on the other!

We drove home, taking any valuables off the boat, and all the washing (so that we didn't have to use the limited water supply on the boat). While there we went up to the moorings to see Sickle, which had been painted while we were away. Then after a couple of days Alan and I went back up to Flamingo at Chadderton. 

With a car we could drive to the nearest Elsan emptying point - some eight miles away across Manchester, and involving a 4 lane motorway. We also filled some large water containers that we had fished out of Sickle's hold so that we could eke out the water for longer. We stayed clean by going to the local sports centre for a swim and a shower. I at least got to go running up and down the towpath carrying on with working through the NHS couch to 5K programme.

 

By the 25th a coffer dam was in place to allow the lock to be pumped out.

We were on the edge of the town, with fields by the boat, but with a large housing estate starting very near to the boats. It wasn't an unpleasant place to be, but there was quite a lot of foot and bike traffic past the boats, and we didn't want to be too obviously abandoned by the canal. Lynnette was on Saltaire in the evenings, when other demands on her time allowed, and we tried to cover times when she wasn't available to be on the boat. 

This looked like overkill by CRT, as all work was limited to the bottom end.

Local people walking by started to notice that the boats had been there for a couple of weeks, and they started asking questions. There is not much you can say but the truth, so we told people what had happened if they asked. Then the next day we would have people stopping to chat saying 'you are the people that are stuck here, my friend told me all about you'. So much for trying not to be noticed.

Some of the detritus removed from lock bottom 
- up to 30 bikes for a start!

This went on for four weeks. We drove up and down the motorway, trying to be at home for Morris events that we said that we would be attending (including 4 events in 3 days). I found the driving particularly exhausting.

However, we were determined to take our newly painted Sickle to Braunston historic boat show - as it may be one of the few historic boat rallies we can get to this year. We had a fantastic weekend, in excellent weather, and saw many of our friends.

However no effort was made to remove trolleys below the lock, I think.

Finally, CRT had got the lock gate rebuilt, and a new quoinstone into the lock. They opened the lock on Thursday 4th July - a day earlier than originally scheduled. We couldn't do that date because we had planned for us all to drive back to Chadderton on the Thursday, and Alan to return the car to the mooring on Friday by reversing his journey. Alan had already booked the train tickets for Thursday. Both times, as well as the longish drive, it involved 3 trains, one bus, and a fair amount of waking.

We arrived at Chadderton on Friday 7th June, we left on Saturday 6th July. Four weeks. Added to the time we had to stop at Hebden Bridge this means that on our 'big trip up North' we've spent more than 5 weeks kicking our heels somewhere trying to eke out water and power.