On the canals again!

Ater one of our longest journeys for many years we are at last off the rivers and on the canals.

Northampton Lock

On the Northampton Arm

On the Northampton Arm

On the Northampton Arm

We left Northanpton Marina at 10:15, completed the final 1/2 mile of the River Nene and ascended Northampton Lock which marks the start of the Northampton Branch of the Grand Union Canal. The first 5 locks are well separated and travel along the canal was very slow because of the narrow and shallow waterway, the amount of waterweed,  and the flow of water.  By 13:00 after 3.5 miles we had reached Rotherthorpe Lock scenically situated in a tunnel under the M1.

From then on travel was much faster as the remaining 12 locks were all a short walk apart.  This eabled one of us to walk ahead and set the next lock ready for the boat to enter directly after leaving the current one.  This worked well for the first 6 of the locks but then we hit problems.

The top gate of one of the locks refused to close properly and was leaking a significant amount of water.  After spending about an hour partially solving the problem by removing waterweed debris from around the base of the gate with our barge pole a boat came down the flight and the extra pressure of water closed the gate.

But progress was delayed further as the canal beyond was short of water and the boat gounded.  It was necessary to walk on to the next lock and flush some more water through. We had to repeat this for the remaining locks reaching the top lock at 16:30.

We were just in time to stop at the nearbyGayton  arMina to buy some filters fr our engine as it is in great need of a service, which we hope to get done tomorrow.  Then at last after 7 hours of cruising we moored up on the Grand Union Canal soon after the junction with the Norhampton Arm.

5.23 miles, 17 locks 7 hours cruising