With rain all day yesterday the Trent was steadily on the rise, but the banks are high where we’d moored, maybe 2½ feet above the water.
That was on Sunday.
Last night at 11:00 there was 4 inches of bank, at half-two this morning there was an inch, and at eight this morning there was four inches of water on top of the copings!
Still a bit of soggy towpath above water level, but at that rate it wouldn’t be visible for long. Using a handy bit of flotsam (a car wheel) as a step I lifted Meg off and we went to have a look at the bridge heights at the entrance to the Erewash Canal.
Not looking good, is it!
Quite a bit of water coming down the canal, too.
The plan was to get up the lock and moor on the visitor moorings above. There we’d be fine for as long as it took, with easy access to the “facilities”. But there was the issue of the air-gap below the two bridges over the entrance channel…
Hmmm…
Normally not a problem, but with the river nearly 3 feet higher? We couldn’t stay where we were, so I untied and we motored around, staying close to the bank out of the main current. Close to the bridge I could see it was a no-go, we could probably have scraped under the towpath bridge (above), but the one across the tail of the lock was lower.
I was contemplating the one mile upstream to Sawley Cut but wasn’t too keen; with at least 3mph against us and lots of debris coming down all it would have taken was to pick up something large on the prop and we could have had a bit of trouble.
Then noticed that a couple of boats had braved the weather yesterday and vacated the pontoon moorings a little way upstream. That’ll do for us!
A bit of dashing about ensued, trying to get the fore end tied up before we disappeared back towards Thrumpton Weir, but we got there. And here we’ll stay till the river starts to behave itself again.
A duck going past amongst the plastic bottles, tree branches and mats of reeds.
Not sure what breed that is…
Now I’ve got to work out a method for retrieving this branch.
Some useful fuel there!
Locks 0, miles, well, just 300 yards!
5 comments:
Would you not have felt more secure up the inside of that floating pontoon like the yellow and red boat the day before? You could have got your whole boat against it ....... That said I guess you were just relieved to find somewhere safer and didnt fancy clouting that stone structure. Although I'm sure you are far too experienced to do that. well done! ....... just be careful you dont have too many sherbets in the Trent Lock Inn and walk off the end of that pontoon upon returning to your boat! ;D
Blimey Geoff, I did wonder whether you and Maggs had made a break before the weather came in yesterday.
Looks a bit lively where you are but safe enough I guess.
Take care you both.
Ade
Stay safe! x
Phew! At least the pontoon will go up with you! I was stuck on the Nene a while ago and the landing stage nearly disappeared under the boat. Apparently the Thames has got angry as well. Stay safe.
Great you found that pontoon free Geoff that certainly took the pressure off where to moor. One question though..
Why didnt you moor on the other side of that pontoon instead of behind that boat?
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