How fast could we go?

With the death last weekend of Sir Roger Bannister, I got thinking about how fast could an unenhanced human run. Sir Roger, as I’m sure you know, was the first to break the 4 minute mile barrier, on 6th May 1954 in Oxford he ran the distance in 3:59:24.

Since then the record has been broken many times, even within the first 2 months, but the rate at which faster times are recorded has been slowing down. The current verified fastest mile is 3:43:13, set by Moroccan Hicham El Guerrouj. In the first decade following Bannister’s epic run the record was broken 5 times, from 1964 to 1974 3 times, from ‘74 to ‘84 7 times. incidentally 5 of those were from the British athletes Steve Ovett and Sebastian Coe. In 1985 Steve Cram ran 3:46:32, taking a second out of Coe’s final record, but since then it’s only been bettered twice, once in 1993 and then the current record in 1999.
It could be argued that the mile is an archaic distance, superseded by the 1500m. So nobody tries the mile any more, hence the lack of improvement. But the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), the governing body for athletics, still recognises the distance. And the 1500m (the "metric mile") record of 3:26:00, set by the same guy who holds the mile record, hasn’t been bested since he set it in 1998.
So it seems that we’ve just about reached the maximum middle distance speed for the Mark I human. Still, an average speed of 16mph ain’t so dusty, is it…

In contrast, the marathon record has been broken seven times since 2000. Still not beaten the magical 2:00:00, though. In the last 18 years the time has come down by 2½ minutes, standing since 2014 at 2:02:57. Three minutes light of that tantalising time. Maybe in the next 20 years?

Bannister went on to become a leading neurosurgeon, and was knighted in 1975. He died on Saturday, aged 88.

This morning we headed back up stream, the weather has turned again and the snow has thinned and most of the ice has gone. We even had some brief spells of sunshine!


Crossing back over the border into Wales.

Murky on the hills


Those spectacular icicles in Chirk Tunnel have now gone.

Still unbroken ice on Chirk Marina’s basin though.

We went through Whitehouse Tunnel as well, then pulled up between the tunnel and Whitehouse Bridge.

Looks like being a good day tomorrow. We’ll be heading to Pontcysyllte, if there’s room and it’s not too icy in Trevor Basin we’ll cross the aqueduct and moor there for a few days.

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It must be warmer in England…

The last two days have seen us move back over the border, stopping last night near Whitehouse Tunnel, then arriving this afternoon to moor on the Poacher’s moorings, only to find them full! We managed to squeeze on the end, though.

The continuing cold weather has finally had an effect on the canal. Slushy, soft ice started forming on the canal on Wednesday night, carried in slicks on the flow downhill. Slightly thicker bits clung to the vegetation on the bank.



After we tied up we were kept entertained by this chap on the hunt for food…
One of our transatlantic cousins of course. The local population of indigenous Red Squirrels has long since been pushed out.

As dusk fell and the temperature dropped, more and thicker rafts of ice went floating past, a sign of things to come…

It snowed on and off throughout the night, leaving us with about 3” on the towpath.

Whitehouse Tunnel just ahead of our mooring

As we entered the tunnel we were treated to a glittering display of icicles hanging from the ceiling, caused by water dripping through the brickwork.


I don’t remember seeing this phenomenon before, usually tunnels stay warm enough to prevent ice forming. The freezing wind must have been blowing through the bore.

Out the other end the ice was getting thicker, stretching across the channel, and varying from about 4mm to 10mm thick in the more exposed patches.

I don’t think anyone’s going to be coming out of Chirk Marina for a few days…

The tree-lined cutting leading to Chirk Tunnel was mostly ice-free, the overhanging branches keeping the frost off, and then we reached Chirk Tunnel. I thought the icicles in Whitehouse Tunnel were pretty good, but was unprepared for the astounding showing here…


Some were longer, the roof of the boat broke them off and I had to duck under the remainder.
It was only at the north end of the tunnel, the south end is drier.

Back out into daylight there was a bit of thin ice to crunch through to get to the aqueduct, but it wasn’t anything like as thick or widespread as to the north.

White Wales


Crossing back into England


The track-bed drains under the viaduct arches had frozen as well, but they weren’t a patch on the icicles in the tunnel…




We cruised the ice-free water above Chirk Bank, then turned to go under Gledrid Bridge to see a row of boats here outside The Poachers.
We snuck on the end, though. It’s been quiet on here all winter, sometimes we’ve been the only ones here.

It’s been warmer today, above zero from dawn to dusk. An improvement on yesterday, and the way things are shaping up for next week according to the forecast.

I riddled out and relaid the stove this morning as normal, it keeps ticking over so was still hot. Then I noticed something odd. The throat plate in the upper part of the firebox was looking a bit out of sorts. I knew it was getting past it’s life so had already sourced a replacement…

That’s what it should look like…


…I think we’ve had our money’s worth!

The fire draws better now as well!

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Snow on the ground and a bitter chill in the air

Well the “Beast From the East” arrived in Llangollen yesterday, though compared to other parts of the country ours is more domesticated than wild…

While others have suffered with deep snow and drifts, this neck of the woods has only had a dusting of powdery stuff, no more than an inch or two. 

It has been cold though. Minus four and minus five these last couple of nights. We decided to move on today, so, after a quick provisioning trip down into town, we set off through the narrows.




Fine views as we clear the trees and head down the Dee valley



I wasn’t looking forward to crossing Pontcysyllte Aqueduct. The bitter easterly would be blowing right up the valley, or so I thought. In fact it hadn’t bothered me much at all so far, just short stretches where it funneled in but it was instant numb cheekbones when it did.

But for some reason there was little wind across the valley as we passed over, just a brisk breeze at the far end.

Looking downwind, up the valley


We got to the lift bridge at Froncysyllte and I told Mags to stay inside. It was still cold, even though we’d seen a bit of sunshine.


I tied up, walked up to the bridge with my windlass and started turning the manual pump for the hydraulics to raise the bridge deck. And nothing happened. The shaft was hard to turn, and I thought it was just thick oil from the very low temperatures. So I wound it harder and faster, working up a sweat to no avail. I tried turning it backwards and forwards again, and still the bloody thing wouldn’t lift. So after 5 minutes I gave up and called the CRT helpline.

The two people who came out had an idea what the problem was. It had happened earlier in the week with a work boat. The bridge deck gets stuck down to it’s support base as water running into the joint freezes. I’d already got a kettle full of boiling water ready, so with one pouring and the other winding it should have shifted…but it didn’t.

“Give it a nudge” was the suggestion. So I did. With 18 tons of narrowboat. That did it.

So I got away with not having to raise and lower it. Nice one. I left them scraping off the build-up of ice , so hopefully it’ll not happen again. Today, at any rate…

We tied up a half-mile further on, in sunshine which wasn’t to last. I’d just got the dish set up for tonight’s TV and the snow started.

I’m glad we didn’t have to cruise in that!

It’s another cold one tonight, half-seven now and we’re down to -4°. Add in the wind chill and it’s considerably less. That’s outside of course. In here it’s 28°. Just about warm enough for Mags. I'm in shorts...

Hi Diane, Brian. Yes, the electric points in the basin are taped up so they aren’t used, but here on the main line they’re still available for the winter moorers.

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Out onto moving water…

We’ve had the weekend moored in Llangollen Basin, with very little in the way of company. A couple of boats came and went, one even stopping overnight, but it’s been quiet.
I made a trip or two down into the town for supplies, there were quite a few folk, many touristy types, clogging up the main street. It was a pleasant, sunny weekend.
The stream railway was running trips up the valley, and somewhat slower but considerably quieter, one of the horse boats was taking people to Chain Bridge and back.

The Dee and Llangollen Railway Station from Dee Bridge.




Hercules the horse wasn’t working very hard, I reckon there was only three people aboard!

All the media is talking about the bad weather on the way. Rather dramatically called “The Beast from the East” (don’t you just love the tabloids…) this cold front moving in from Russia is supposed to bring heavy snow and sub-zero temperatures. It’s already been into minus numbers overnight for the last couple of nights, but sunny days have made it quite pleasant. Starting tonight though we’re looking at -5° or lower, and barely above zero through the day. Ice will form on any still water, like the mooring basin here at Llangollen.
In fact, last night we had a taste of things to come. On Sunday morning there was a few bits of ice in sheltered corners, but this morning it had spread further, forming between the pontoons and reaching out from the far end of the basin.



Time to head out onto the flowing water of the main line.

We topped up the water tank, got rid of the rubbish and recycling, then reversed off our pontoon and out of the basin, past the wharf and through the narrows to the linear moorings above the town.
Being tied up for the weekend I’d not run the engine much, relying on the solar panels to put a few volts in the batteries. But they were well down this morning, so I decided, if there was room, we’d pull in on the moorings and plug in to power overnight to top them up. There was, so we did. In fact there’s room for four or five boats still, I think there’s only a handful of winter moorers here this year.

The forecast predicts snow for most of the day tomorrow, but a better day on Wednesday, so the one night here might stretch into two…

Hi Tom, Jan. Yes, I know that there’s power on up here, but I’m always reluctant to stay here. The basin is more open and there’s less footfall, and I feel a little uncomfortable taking advantage of the hook-up here for free, when the winter moorers are paying £270 a month for the privilege. Still, I’ll get over it… It’s only for two nights.

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Up to Llangollen Basin

After a couple of days at Trevor it was time to move on a bit. We’d not been idle, on Wednesday we were picked up and taken for dinner at our friends, Val and John’s, house. John needed some help in cropping an old willow tree growing in the garden too, so a couple of hours later their wood store was full and the tree was considerably smaller. A good job done.

So Thursday morning we set off, struggling over the mud bank under Bridge 29W and wending our way between the hire boats to the head of the aqueduct.

There’s very little water under Bridge 29W!
The bridge numbering demonstrates that this was intended to be the main line of the navigation, heading over through Ruabon and meeting the Mersey at Netherpool, now Ellesmere Port. Bridge 30 is the now-blocked one at the end of the arm, and 31W crosses the Llangollen feeder channel bringing water down from the Dee.

The chicane formed by the Anglo Welsh hire boats.

Under Bridge 31W. Note the similarity in design to 29W.  

We made steady progress against the flow, scraping the bottom occasionally if we drifted off the main channel. We are just about on the limit of the recommended draught for this section.

Heading for the hills…


Through the first single-width section just past Sun Trevor.

This final upper section of the waterway was not originally planned to carry traffic, it was intended to be a feeder for the Ellesmere Canal. Hence the limited dimensions. It was plagued by breaches, the worst occurring in 1945 which resulted in washing out a section of the Ruabon to Barmouth railway line. The first train of the day, a mail and goods train, crashed into the breach, killing one and injuring two others. Most of the train was destroyed by fire.

In the 1950s an enterprising manager at the British Transport Commission, at that time responsible for the navigable waterways, made arrangements with the Mid and South-East Cheshire Water Board for a supply of domestic water to be taken from Hurleston Reservoir. The reservoir was built around 1808 to supply the Chester Canal. The payback was that the water company would maintain the feeder from Horseshoe Falls to Trevor. The reservoir was extended in 1959 to accommodate the increased demand, and the channel here was repaired and strengthened using the concrete edges in evidence today.

We pulled in at a regular spot, just shy of Llandyn Lift Bridge, with a fine view down the Dee valley.

We had a hard frost overnight, a taste of things to come I think, but the clear skies gave us a bright sunny day for the last hour or so into the mooring basin at Llangollen. It’s only 1¼ miles, but it’s slow going.

Setting off this morning


We had to give way to a day boat from Llangollen Wharf at the start of the narrows leading to the linear moorings…


...but that was the only one we saw today.


More narrows above the town


Llangollen Wharf.



We weren’t surprised to see the mooring basin almost empty, just one other boat tucked into the far corner.
With no free power here now it’s a less attractive proposition…
The white structure on the left is the Eisteddfod Pavilion.

We’ll stay here over the weekend, but will need to be back out on the main line on Monday to avoid being frozen in when the Arctic weather arrives.

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