Standard stuff

(Boat Flamingo - posted by Alan)

The final day of a trip that ended up about 5 weeks longer than planned, and through no fault of our own.

The trip from Braunston back to our home mooring is fairly standard fodder for us, and we largely know what to expect. One of the things we know is that it is impossible to know how long it will take to traverse either the Braunston or the Buckby flight of locks.  The total transit times are highly affected by use by other boats, or sometimes even actions by volunteer lock keepers that actually slow things down, rather than facilitate passage. Also limited opening hours because of limited water supplies are making the locks busier when they are open, (although it is hard to see these measures are contributing much to water savings overall).

Braunston Top Lock - I wasn't about to let him push ahead!

When we did the same trip a couple of weeks back with "Sickle" after the Braunston Historic Boats event we made a too late start, and got into long queues even before the first lock - today we did better, and were soon into the locks. We started to work up with one hire boat, and were surprised by the fact that after a couple of locks a different one untied, and jumped in instead. Poor etiquette we thought, but perhaps hire boaters don't know this, and the "gazumped" crew didn't seem bothered by it, so we said nothing.

Descending Buckby locks

By the top of the flight the "replacement" hire boat was trying to motor out of locks ahead of us - again something I avoid if I'm the second boat who has joined another - generally whoever is "lead boat" tends to stay that way, unless a discussion takes place and changes the order for any reason, (such as when one gate can't be fully opened, for some reason, for example).

When it looked like he thought he was going out of the top lock first as well, I made very certain he didn't - a very lucky move, as he proved to be very slow in the tunnel, and I doubt was half way through before I came out the other end. I hate trying to follow other boats in tunnels at very low speeds - neither of our boats will go slow enough, in needs you to keep taking them out of gear to avoid running down the one in front - a real pain!

And Buckby Bottom - I love these rejuvenated "Weed Boats"!

I don't know where he went, but must have moored up, because after a longish wait for our place in the Buckby flight, nobody had turned up to share with us, so we set off alone. However boats in front were very slow, and in many cases there were boats waiting for the next lock we arrived at. As a result we ourselves had a boat catch us up. It proved to be the one that we had first been with in the Braunston flight - how much easier it would have been had they been allowed to stay with us throughout.

Overall Buckby took a long while - far longer than ought to be necessary, if people got their act together, but, as I said earlier, this regularly goes with the territory.


Eventually we got back to the mooring that we have been paying for throughout this whole long saga, but which we have not actually used since early May. 



Braunston to Home Mooring
Miles 10.9, Locks:13
Total Miles 365.5, Total Locks: 362