Ouse News - Summer 2011 The Cambridge Branch Newsletter covering the Great Ouse area Campaigning for the conservation, use, maintenance, restoration and development of the Inland Waterways. The Inland Waterways Association Boat Gathering at Reach Fayre Photo: Jonathan Mead The views expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the Inland Waterways Association or of the Cambridge Branch. They are, however, published as being of interest to our members and readers. Contents: Branch Committee p2 Chairman’s Corner p3 Book Review p5 Playboat p6 Fen Lighter p7 Campaign Rally p8 Keil Canal p10 Branch News p12 Accident Report p13 Reach Fayre p15
Transcript
Ouse News - Summer 2011 The Cambridge Branch Newsletter
covering the Great Ouse area
Campaigning for the conservation,use, maintenance, restoration and
development of the InlandWaterways.
The InlandWaterwaysAssociation
Boat Gathering at Reach FayrePhoto: Jonathan Mead
The views expressed in thispublication are notnecessarily those of theInland WaterwaysAssociation or of theCambridge Branch. Theyare, however, published asbeing of interest to ourmembers and readers.
Following the election of the branch committee at the AGM in March, youmay be pleased (or perhaps not!) to note that I have the dubious honour ofbeing elected Branch Chairman. Needless to say, I will do my best to be aworthy successor to Stephen Foote and further progress branch activities.
Stephen has kindly offered to take up the role of Web Master with a view todeveloping the branch website. We were also very pleased to welcomeSteve Smith to the committee as Programme Secretary and look forward tohim presenting the 2011/2012 programme in the next edition of Ouse News.
Please do not hesitate to contact either myself or any other committee mem-ber if you would like to make any suggestions as to what the branch shouldbe getting up to, or require help with any related matter.
The last formal meeting on the current programme was the branch AGM,followed by the usual annual report from Nathan Arnold outlining the year’sactivities carried out on the river by the Environment Agency. I must say thatpersonally, I was impressed by the amount and depth of improvements car-ried out by the Agency on a very limited budget. Whilst there is always ademand for money to be spent on additional 48-hour mooring facilities (par-ticularly on the tributaries), the on-going programme of improvement to thecondition of locks and other structures has quite rightly taken precedence.Let’s hope that the navigation budget does not take too much of a mauling inthe coming years!
You will no doubt have read that the proposed transfer of British Water-ways to a ‘New Waterways Charity’ is planned to go ahead in 2012, fol-lowed by the waterways controlled by the Environment Agency in 2015.All this is subject to protracted consultation with all parties concerned andthe outcome of the 2015 spending review.
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Whilst the proposals have been generally welcomed by waterways or-ganisations, there are still worries over the long-term funding arrangementswhich have yet to be defined.
Much has been made of consultation with bodies representing walkers,cyclists, anglers, environmental and community groups, raising fears thatthe new body will forget that the primary function of a waterway is toenable the passage of boats. Those with long memories will recall the situ-ation on the Basingstoke Canal, when just as the canal was about to bereopened after 20 years of restoration work by volunteers, an SSSI wasimposed prohibiting the passage of boats because of the presence of rarewater weeds. We must make sure that the NWC considers environmentalissues in the context of their applicability to working navigations and not asthe prime objective of the organisation.
It has amazed me just how high the water levels are in the local riversdespite it being the driest spring on record. I hope that wherever the wateris coming from, it keeps flowing throughout the summer.
Enjoy your boating. Keith Alderton
Cambridge Branch brass plaques availablefrom David Anderson at £5.00 (plus p & p)
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‘L-Plate Boating’ by Geoffrey Lewis and Tom McManus - Book review by Stephen Foote
At the Blisworth Canal Festival last year I was approached by a couple ofamiable-looking coves sporting beards and hippy haircuts.
‘Why not buy a copy of our book?’ said the first.
‘We’ll sign it for you if you want – no extra charge’ said the second.
‘As it’s us that wrote it, by the by’ explained the first.
‘Sounds like a deal’ said I and parted with £7 for a copy of L-Plate Boat-ing signed by the authors. It was a good move; this is a lovely little book.Geoffrey and Mac are what I would term ‘professional boaters’ on theinland waterways. They have skippered passenger trip boats, cargo-car-rying vessels, historic boats and more, but have catalogued some hilarioustales of how even the most experienced among us can (and do) make acomplete hash of things. A great comfort to those (like me) who think thatmaking a mess of even simple manoeuvres is something reserved exclu-sively for them and only when the whole world seems to be watching.
I particularly liked their ‘Hints and Useful Tips’ chapter which is ominouslysub-titled ‘12 Ways to Kill Yourself with a Narrowboat’; I had great em-pathy with their tale of headlights that go out in tunnels (mine went out inHarecastle Tunnel) and of the cassette toilet that everybody thought thatsomebody had emptied but nobody had.
And more besides… This is a lovely mixture of anecdotes and reminis-cences that you can dip in and out of as the fancy takes and is guaranteedto make you chuckle. I thoroughly recommend it.
Published by SGM Publishing, Milton Keynes sgmpublishing.co.ukISBN 978-0-9564356-0-0
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Peter & Jean Webb
Have you seen CHYPPS?
Chypps is a bright red wide beam boat which passed us on the OldWest and we caught up with at Westview Marina where they wererefuelling “the cheapest locally”.
The Chypps play boat is the first of its kind in the country and offers aunique experience for children and young people, schools, communitygroups and families to play on the River Cam.
The lead officers Paula Bishop, Karl Wilks and Dan Mitchell have workedhard since 2008 to launch the custom-designed, 60-feet-long, 10-ft-
wide boat, which was de-livered to Cambridge at theend of January 2011.
A group of children - theVikings - have been heav-ily involved in the develop-ment of the project, meet-ing regularly and workinghard to help with designand activity ideas and de-velop their confidence inand around water.
The play boat’s internalspace is open plan to en-able lots of space for play.
A well stocked Inland Chandlery with friendly and knowledgeable staff catering for Cruisers & Narrowboats
Come and see us (you'll find us 2 minutes walk from Ely waterfront), or have a look at our easy to use mailorder website
Boat Safety SchemeExaminations
Ouse News Page 7A Fen Lighter RevealedThose members who attended the February meeting were treated to afascinating account by John Wilson of the heroic efforts made by a groupof volunteers to raise and preserve one of the few surviving fen lighters.
The tale began in 1972 when it was learnt that the sailing wherry Albionwould be making passage around the Norfolk coast from the Broads inorder to attend the pivotal IWA campaigning rally in Ely. The group thoughtthat it would be nice to show a native craft as well and they knew that onewas lurking in the mud in Roswell Pits. A plan was therefore hatched tobuild a mud and timber coffer dam around the hull, pump out the water tore-float the craft and sail it away for restoration. Unfortunately all did notgo well and despite spending every spare moment like mud wrestlers in awatery grave, the boat could not be raised and members of the salvageteam gradually became disillusioned and began to drift away.
After some two years of hard graft, a dedicated few at last managed toraise the vessel and found it to be in remarkably good condition. With thehelp of a few tarpaulins it was in good enough shape to be floated away.However, as the rally at Ely had long since gone, it was decided to tow it tothe Museum of Technology at Cambridge, where it was lifted out ontochocks, detailed measurements taken and drawings made for posterity. Ithas been described as mid-1800s carvel-built fen lighter with a beam trawl– apparently a most unusual craft. It then seems that nobody knew quitewhat to do with it and it languished there for some 5 or 6 years until forsome strange reason it was decided to cut it into 3 parts so that it could betransported by lorry to the Norfolk Punch at Upwell. The plan was for ashipwright to stick it back together again, but needless to say this neverhappened.
The story ends this year when part of one remaining section was found atCollectors World and moved to Streatham Old Engine where it will be puton permanent display. Hopefully it will remain there as a tribute to the origi-nal craftsman who built the vessel and the valiant efforts made by John andthe many others who fought so hard to save it. Anybody interested in learn-ing more about it would be welcome to borrow a DVD from Peter Webbshowing archive footage of the raising of the craft and the subsequent jour-ney to Cambridge. Keith Alderton
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The IWA 2011 Campaign Rally – Northampton
This year we forsook the Branch Annual Gathering of Boats at Reach andon a blustery Friday morning boated from our Blisworth mooring down the17 locks of the Grand Union Northampton Arm to the IWA 2011Campaign Rally.
This event was organised by our friends in IWA’s Northampton Branch tocelebrate 250 years of navigation on the river Nene; to bring to the attentionof a wider audience the unspoiled, tranquil and slightly remote quality ofthese waters and to try to encourage Northampton to take a more proactiveinterest in maintaining and enhancing its waterside amenity. Sponsors of theevent were Northampton Borough Council, the Environment Agency,British Waterways and the Association of Nene Cruising Clubs. Co-inci-dent with the event was the opening of the new 82-berth Northamptonmarina, constructed by the Environment Agency just downstream fromNorthampton Town lock.
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The rally was attended by more than seventy boats and such was the use ofthe Northampton Arm that we were held up for an hour at RothersthorpeTop Lock on our outward journey while BW let more water down thelockflight to maintain depth. The rally opened on Saturday morning with avery good address by Tim Coghlan (who owns Braunston Marina). Manyorganisations and trading companies were represented with stands anddisplays on the festival site at Becketts Park.
On the lock island, the organisers provided a boaters’ bar and a marqueewhere quizzes and evening entertainment was laid on. We particularly en-joyed the live music on the Saturday evening and the ‘fish and chip’ supperon the Sunday evening. This was followed by a boaters’ quiz where theaudience formed itself into a series of random teams to compete. Our teamdidn’t win – but we sure had a lot of laughs. We left the rally after breakfaston Bank Holiday Monday morning after a most pleasant weekend. IWANorthampton Branch hold a boat gathering every year at this spot so wemay very well be back in the future. In the meantime we thank our North-ampton colleagues for all their hard work in organising the 2011 CampaignRally. You did us proud!
Stephen Foote
The Widest, the Deepest and the MostestThere are many canals and artificial waterways in Europe, but one has anextraordinary claim – that of being the most heavily-used artificial water-way in the world. The KeilCanal, which runs for 93kilometres (or, if you prefer,57 ¾ miles) from the mouthof the river Elbe near Ham-burg to Keil in northern Ger-many thus linking the Northand Baltic seas, makes thisclaim. In 2009, it saw the pas-sage of 30,000 commercialvessels, an average of 83ships per day.
This was down from over 42,000 in the previous year. These ships car-ried over 71 million tonnes of cargo (again, down from an all-time high inthe previous year of almost 106 million tonnes). It is said that every shipthat uses the canal shortens its journey by 288 miles on average - so lastyear alone the Keil Canal saved the owners of the ships that used it morethat 8 ½ million miles of sea passage
The Keil Canal was built at theend of the last century. In1794 the Eider Canal wasopened, which was intendedto provide a short cut acrossthe Cimbrian peninsular. Itcould handle ships up to about300 tonnes but proved inad-equate for the demands ofcommerce 100 years later.
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Container ship Veersedlik
Ouse News Page 11Count Otto von Bismark was interested to build a canal to link the GermanImperial navy’s dockyards at Keil with the Elbe and thence Hamburg butpolitical divisions of the day prevented the project from getting off the ground.In 1878 a businessman and ship-owner called Dahlstrom presented the gov-ernment with a plan for a canal between the river Elbe and Eckernforde.Both the military and commercial benefits of the venture were stressed and in1886 the government agreed the construction of the canal from the mouth ofthe Elbe to Keil. The foundation stone was laid by Kaiser Wilhelm in June1887 and construction was completed in 1895. It was named the Kaiser-Wilhelm Canal, a name which lasted until 1948 when it was re-named theKeil Canal. The canal quickly proved too small and in 1907 it was widened.The widening cost half as much again as the original construction.
The Keil Canal is 162 m (530 ft) wide at the waterline reducing to 102 m(334 ft) in places. It is 11 m (36 ft) deep and 55% narrower at the bottomthan at the top. The canal has two sets of two entrance locks side by side ateach end. The original (old locks) are 125 m (410 ft) long and 22 m (72 ft)wide with an average 10 m (32 ft) cill depth. These locks have mitre gates ateach end.The newer locks are considerably larger; 310 m (1020 ft) long and
42 m (138 ft) wide with a 14m (46 ft) cill depth. Theselocks have three gates perchamber with one set in thecentre so that smaller veselscan transit more quickly us-ing the shortened chamber.Transit time through the mainchamber is usually about 45minutes.
Pleasure craft are permitted to use the Keil Canal but as might be expected,the regulations are rigorous and it would hardly be a trip for the faint-hearted.Better to view the canal from a nice big cruise ship with someone else at thehelm. It’s a fascinating experience. Stephen Foote
We welcomethe following new members to thebranch and hope they will introducethemselves to us when coming toan event or meeting.
Mr I Cornish & Ms A Alderton,Newmarket
Mr K Fountain & Mrs H Ellerton,Burwell
Mr V Price, Littleport
THURSDAY 27TH OCTOBER 2011
Our November meeting willfeature the ‘Half Cut Theatre’and will be held on:
THURSDAY 24TH NOVEMBER 2011
Winter Meetingsare at 8 pm. on Thursdayevenings at the Cole’s RoadCommunity Centre, Milton(North Cambridge) CB24 6BL.
Members & Visitors welcome.
Our October meeting will bea talk about ‘Lakenheath Fennature reserve’ and will be heldon:
7
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Near Fatal Accident on the Hanwell FlightBy Di Warner (reprinted from the ‘Stort
Reporter’ courtesy of The Stort Boat Club)
I had an accident on 10 August 2008 and cannot believe I survived. I wasoperating the lock for us to go up hill at the Hanwell Flight, Lock 93 on theGrand Union Canal . The boat was in the lock with the bottom gates closed.I had raised the ground paddles on both the north and south sides of thecanal to fill the lock with water. At this lock there is no bridge - there is awalkway attached to the upstream side of the top gate. I was walking fromthe south side to the north to raise the gate paddles on that side. I wasactually looking down at the walkway thinking it was unusual as it has 3planks - most have 2.
Suddenly I was in the water upstream of the gates. I swam away from thegate to get to the side but after two strokes I felt my feet being draggedbackwards. I was sucked down into the culvert. I got stuck as I was widerthan the hole. I calmly accepted I would die and thought ‘Cliff, I have beenso happy but I won’t see you again’. I thought how it would be ages untilthey would find my body. I brushed my hair from my eyes and relaxed. Ithought how similar to scuba diving it was - with the bubbles rushing past.Suddenly I moved on and thought ‘hooray! I’m going to live!’ Then Ibraced myself for the landing. I shot out of the culvert into the lock and Iwas so happy that I would not die - but only for a split second as I realisedI then had to contend with the turbulence of a filling lock.
As I was at the bottom of the lock, I saw that the bubbles of air weresparkling in the sunshine. The effect of this was like two catherine wheels,one clockwise and one anti clockwise so I used this to help me. Instead oftrying to swim up and to the side, I used the current to help lift me to thesurface by aiming for the middle of the two ‘circles’. When I popped up Iquickly noticed that the nearest ladder was on my left, the side Axe wasmoored to, but Axe had been forced over to the other side of the lock soif she moved back I would be crushed. I decided to swim to Axe.
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I managed to grasp the chain at the bow of the boat and made one loudshout ‘CLIFF!!!!’ It was then that I saw my right foot was floating by myright shoulder. Cliff called from within the boatman’s cabin ‘Where areyou?’ I shouted ‘at the bow’ and as he knelt on the side I told him ‘I camethrough the channel and have a broken leg’. He threw the life ring in andtold me to get in it or at least hold it. I did NOT want to let go of that chain!I did get in the ring and doggy-paddled to the ladder. Cliff pulled me thelast bit with the boat hook. A passing cyclist called Tim helped pull me out.That’s when I screamed. My leg was at a 45 degree angle from the kneedown. Cliff asked how many times I called his name, as he had heard metwice. I had only called out once but he had heard me ‘call’ him from thebottom of the canal. I really cannot believe I am alive.
My body was forced through a tube smaller than me - my abdomen, arms& kidneys are severely bruised and have a large lump on the back of myhead. I have broken ribs and have torn most of the ligaments in my knee.But I would like other people to know that if they stay calm they too maysurvive in a lock.
In the present tense:One year on I had 7½ hours of surgery to have donated and artificial liga-ments put in my leg. The long wait was due to a very large deep veinthrombus requiring me to be on warfarin for 6 months. My knee will neverbe what it was, but I’m alive and can walk!
Lock 93 on the Hanwell Flight where Di had her accident
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Fun & Games at Reach Fayre 2011
The annual gathering of boatsat Reach Fayre over the May-day bank holiday weekend ap-pears to be gaining momentumas the years go by. This yearthe weather was relatively kindto us for a change with sunnydays, slightly marred only byhowling winds. However wedid find some shelter in the leeof the trees to have ourbarbeque. Some 11 boats at-tended this year, providing good numbers for the weekend activities. Theprogramme started on Saturday evening with an excellent meal at the DykesEnd pub. Sunday morning saw the ladies off on the now traditional walkthrough the fields to Swaffham Prior and back to Reach along the Devil’sDyke whilst the men drank beer, peered at their engines and lit the barbeques
in the equally traditionalmanner!
At the subsequent barbequethe food proved to be goodand the beer and wineflowed in ample propor-tions. On Sunday afternoon,those attending struggledsomewhat to answer thevery difficult quiz questionsset by last year’s winner
Keith Would. Your Chairman and family somehow managed to win with apitifully low score. Watch out for next year’s questions!
The Inland Waterways Association is a non-profit distributing company limited byguarantee. Registered in England no 612245 Registered as a charity no 212342Registered Office: Island House, Moor Rd, Chesham, HP5 1WA. Phone 01494783453
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Early Monday morning David Anderson arrived with the gazebo andfour grown men made fools of themselves trying to erect it, only suc-
ceeding when shown howby a team of young ladiesfrom the adjoining NationalTrust stand. The IWA standat the fayre generated agood deal of interest withvisitors wanting to knowmore about the waterways.Many thanks are due toDavid for his efforts attend-ing this and other such localfunctions.
All in all, it proved to be a great weekend – why not come along andtry it next year? All are welcome, with or without a boat.
Every so often, the viability of maintaining the Cambridgeshire Lodesfor navigation purposes is questioned and it is, therefore, vital that weuse them both to keep the channel clear and to prove that they are usedon a regular basis.
An enjoyable Sundayevening was spent with twoteams entering yet anotherquiz on the village green atReach with both teamsachieving a reasonably re-spectable score.
