#WTY #LadyTeal #rivercruise
We always say it but we are so lucky with our lovely guests. The picture is of a great card that one of our guests did for us. The Kingfisher was on the front because she really wanted to see one, but unfortunately we didn’t. We frequently do see them, but this year there have been far far fewer of them.
It’s always fun to mix in with the big vessels, and make use of my marine radio license!
Exol Pride, formerly Humber pride, is a tanker built in 1979. is 60 metres, almost 200 foot, long and 6 metres wide.
She takes oil from Hull, via Goole down to Doncaster. Someone bigger than us!!
All our guests on Lady Teal, and ourselves , can’t believe this weather, it has been super, but of course I start to worry about water! Haven’t seen the May rervoir report yet but I do hope there has been some rain on the tops.
There have been some huge storms around but they have passed us by. We have been basking in heat and sun forever it seems.
All the youngsters are doing well on it, see below, and it has been lovely, if a bit warm for some of the flights.
The new time limits on Wigan seem to be really good and we have to say the team there are superb, volunteers and seasonals.
Lady Teal leaving Liverpool again, such a great trip we do love it. Many thanks to Alison the keeper who gave us a hand at Stanley flight.
There is a new regime now for coming into and out of Liverpool and I have to say I think it is a lot better. It removes a lot of the time pressures that existed when you had to rush from bridge to bridge and to the locks, also you used to have to leave Salthouse at 8 but now it is up to 9.30, much more civilised.
So a lovely sail out and then a glorious sunset as we finished up dinner.
As those of you who regularly look at my ramblings know, and I hope there are some out there, I do love a good sunset.
There has been no post processing on this shot, though I do have to admit it was slightly underexposed in order to enrich the colours, I hope you like it.
Lady Teal at what has to be at one of the best parts of the whole UK inland waterways, and we get to stop here for lunch, how lucky are we.
It’s a busy time as we continue to prep the boat for the new season. We have had our food hygiene visit and retained our score of 5, full marks!
The boat spent a week in dry dock and along with being blacked we have done a lot of less visible stuff. For instance the battery bank has all been replaced, not like changing the batteries in a torch! The old batteries each weighed about 280lbs, so getting them out was fun and we upgraded some of the associated electronics.
There have been a number of other things as well , but we will leave you to spot those!
A few more odds and ends and , weather permitting, another good polish then we will be ready to go.
Sorry and easy pun but difficult to avoid. Another lovely day on the New Junction Canal, with its interesting bridges and aqueducts.
These two swans flew low past the boat and swooped in to land, a lovely sight.
Well it was up early this morning! Splashing noises and plaintive yelps from the other side of the Stainforth & Keadby, all at about 6am!
On going out there was a poor dog scrabbling, and failing, to get out the other side, bear in mind this is a wide navigation. It was clearly in distress and very tired. We were worried that starting the engine may scare it more so, as it bobbed under the water, Gina managed to call it across, I don’t think Lady barking was the help she thought it was!
We coaxed it across and with my trusted rope skills I managed to lasso it, not sure if the dog or me was the more surprised! A few tugs and we had it up onto the bank, panting and looking tired, the dog wasn’t too good either!
It seemed ok and despite trying to find someone, RSPCA, council whoever, to pick it up no one was interested. It perked up and seemed to know where it was going and with a look at us and a wag of its tail it went on its way.
This helicopter was not part of the rescue but flew low over us yesterday, brilliant!
A great run through the middle of Leeds, such a contrast from the countryside. It is such a lovely vibrant city.
So what better time could be to have a Kir Royal on lawn on Lady Teal!
Ok, not the best weather ever today, but I think that’s been true across most of the country. At least here we didn’t have the winds that others had.
But it’s been good fun with guests out a lot of the time and helping with locks, the tunnel is always fun and everyone loves going through it.
Then what a great place this is to moor up, middle of nowhere surrounded by drumlins, look it up.
Grey sky but great view.
Well it may be too early to call summer but we have had some great weather.
Coming up out of Leeds on the Leeds Liverpool morning coffee and cookies was had on the roof deck. Next will be the cygnets then the Kingfishers will be back, that’s when it really is summer on a hotel boat!
Following on from an incredible sunset in Leeds we have had a glorious day to climb up the various staircase locks out of Leeds to end up in great countryside. The green route out of Leeds is truly lovely. We are now just past Rodley in the countryside with cows sipping from the canal and Moor Hens making nests, it relly is wondrful, loving being back at work!!
A busy day sorting things on the boat, almost there! Thanks to Ian and Glen we we ticked off lots of stuff on Ginas list. Just a glimpse of canal in the picture
list.
#LTA16 @MarketingLancashire A busy day yesterday with a radio interview and the awards ceremony. Check out our interview at Radio Lancashire around the 3 hour 21 minute mark
Then it was off to the awards ceremony in Blackburn Cathedral, unfortunately no award this time, we were told we were close, and its good to be finalists!
Well a load of pictures for this post, as a hotel boat we do get around a bit. Not a sunset this time but it was actually a long exposure at night on the New junction Canal heading toward Doncaster. A lovely “new” canal. It was probably the last commercial canal dug, completed in 1905. One lock, with swing bridge in the middle, and a bucket load of lift bridges, so you cant hurry, oh one swing bridge as well, just for good measure.
The River Don Navigation is also lovely with little villages and big views.
At one of the lift bridges we met Freda Carless, built in 1964 she carried various cargoes under the ownership of Flixborough Shipping. See her entry on the National Historic Boat Register, sorry ships. Owned by a lovely couple who really do continuously cruise with her, quite a sight and they skipper her really well.
Then the wonderful aqueduct come weir, look at the sides of it, over the Don. Guillotines at each each end, so careful about losing your head as you cross (sorry about that). They guillotine gates are they so that if the river is in flood it flows over the aqueduct and stops it flooding the navigation.
Right guess I had better get back to polishing the boat, a hotel boat owners work is never done!
