The Sumpners Afloat

8th to 22nd July – The Slough Arm and going home

Monday started sunny – a beautiful fresh morning, and we were up early to start our exploration of the Slough Arm. We didn’t get terribly far along the arm before we saw a nice quiet spot, with Armco. As the day was forecast to deteriorate, we pulled over and moored up.

We needed chains so it was a first outing for Paul’s new gizmo. Our friend Phil, aboard fellow Ortomarine-built “Hunky Dory” had first shown it to me (clever chap!) a while back, and I thought Paul would love it. Sometimes you have to get down quite low to feed the chains through the Armco when mooring and he often ends up with muddy knees. Phil’s solution? A long armed paint roller – without the roller. They have a hooked shape and the length is perfect to avoid muddy knee syndrome. I bought one as a surprise for Paul. The pic below shows Paul using it for the first time. He’s impressed!

I am feeling a little less pain today although still swollen. Trying to be positive though. The weather didn’t really help my mood, alternating between chucking it down and looking as if it was about to chuck it down. But the Coots helped, Ttey kept popping over to check if there was any more food on offer. We saw a couple of boats going down and eventually, saw them coming back. Whether they had been to the terminus or not we didn’t know.

We had a lovely quiet night there before rising at 06:00. Slough Arm – we are coming at you today! As canals go, it’s not in the “Top 10 Most Scenic” by any means. The going is largely OK – until the last half mile, when we slowed down considerably. We could see ravening hordes of carrier bags under the water, all desperate to throw themselves round our propellor – and of course, they have a bigger target to aim for, this year!

We noted that the boatyard – Highline at Iver – had changed quite considerably since out last visit. Boats are moored 3 and 4 deep outside the main canal-side building. If you wanted to call in for chandlery, I really don’t know how you’d get to them. But that’s possibly a measure of how boating as changed in these last 40 years, I think? And I doubt they get a great deal of passing trade. Which is a nuisance as we need a mooring spike, because someone left one behind a couple of days ago.

It’s a fairly nondescript terminus, with a boat annoyingly moored right on the turning circle for the winding hole. He had the good grace to apologise for being there, and said his engine had cut out. What he didn’t say was how many years ago that had happened. The plan was to stay the day there and then commence the return journey after work. Weather permitting.

I wonder how many boats make the trip down per year? It feels a bit neglected and overgrown, and while I’d absolutely hate to see any canal left to quietly fade away and become un-navigable – this feels like one that wouldn’t really be missed. Money better spent elsewhere. If we really had to choose…….

We left the basin after work and laboriously made our way back the way we had come. It’s shallow, weedy and rubbishy on this stretch and there was much reversing amd swearing, but it IS doable, so don’t be put off by a bit of inconvenience. We found a spot that would do for the night (there aren’t many to be honest) and settled down.

On the way back up to the main line on Wednesday, we rang the Boatyard to ask for advice about accessing the yard, if we could use the toilet disposal point and also whether they had what we wanted. They advised us to moor against a grey boat with a blue pram hood. When we arrived, this was clearly impractical and we decided to lurk in the nearby bridge hole. The chance of any other boats arriving were pretty slim, so we took the risk!

Paul had to carry the loo up and over the bridge and then down to their yard. It’s pretty heavy when full but he said he’d carried it further. He soon returned, also bearing two shiny new mooring spikes and some hose connectors. He said it was a very well stocked chandlery. It’s just a pity they don’t get more passing trade.

The young guy who served Paul asked if we were doing the IWA “Silver Propellor Challenge“. I guess we are – vaguely – as we have visited quite a few of the locations. But you really have to go some to visit them all. I think we’ve done only around ten on Old Nick, so far and you have to do 20. It’s a great scheme, though, which encourages boaters to visit these less popular places on the system.

We returned to the nice spot where we had spent Monday night. My friendly coot family were clearly happy to see us. It was a lovely quiet night and we’d be quite sad to leave this little spot. But leave we must, as we we are due back at Packet Boat, where we will be leaving the boat for our trip home.

Just as we were about to leave, NB Wildling passed us – we’d spotted it yesterday, moored a little further up the Arm. We noticed particularly that it was electric boat. We exchanged pleasantries and he said he’d left his boat there for just 24 hours and had had a window broken. It reconfirmed our intention to never leave the boat unattended unless in a Marina. And even then, we set the PIR alarm and the geo-fence. WE also have our motion detector security camera! Belt and braces!

In case it’s a new term to you – a geofence is an imaginary circle/polygon around your boat, which will trigger an SMS message if the boat exits the imaginary area. This is usually done through a router that has an internal GPS or on the Victron VRM/Cerbo.

Despite all our precautions, I’ll still be a bit anxious leaving Old Nick.

We had hired a van for our week at home, because collecting the car would have involved getting to a station (probably Iver and probably by taxi), catching a train into Euston, across town to Paddington and then catching a train to Rugby and a taxi to Brinklow, with the reverse of the process on our return. Time consuming and not inexpensive.

When Paul arrived at the hire depot they didn’t have the van we had booked, but could get one for us at 1 pm. Paul explained that this was not acceptable and eventually, they offered us a Mitsubishi Outlander for the same price. We’d take that! We’d gone for a van because of the dogs, hairy little tikes! They were happy for us to take the dogs in the Outlander, and so it was that we made our way home in spacious, air-conditioned comfort rather than wedged into a Renault Kangoo! No hardship whatsoever. It looked like this

We were home to see the family and celebrate our grandson Chester’s first birthday. Where does the time go? We talk to him on Facetime very day so he knows our voices and faces, but it was wonderful to see his smiley face in person. and those of our son and DIL.

We had a lovely week, catching up with friends and family and it was great to be there on his birthday, watching him opening his gifts and going to the party. He was impeccably behaved all day and the party, held at a local pub – The Cob and Pen in Wallington, Fareham, went very smoothly. It was attended by a selection of friends – many of whom we had not seen since George and Beth’s wedding back in May 2022 – and family. We had such a lovely time. We were all shattered that evening, although Chester still seemed to have some get up and go, enjoying playing with his new toys!

We were very sad to leave on Sunday, it’s always a wrench but we will be seeing them in August, when they come up to visit us. Our trip home was uneventful and the boat was just as we had left it. We quickly unpacked, received our grocery delivery and settled down for the evening.

Paul had to return the car on Monday and I had a hospital appointment. Although my face was back to normal, they had recommended a scan to check for a stone. The appointment was – rather inconveniently – at Northwick Park hospital not far from Wembley. I had booked an Uber, which turned up bang on time, thank goodness.

The hospital is huge and bewildering and I wandered around for nearly half an hour, trying to find where I needed to be. Good job I’d allowed plenty of float time! But I finally found it and checked in with almost half an hour to spare before my allotted time. They actually called me early and I saw an ENT doctor, who did a thorough examination. She recommended a scan – which is what I thought I’d actually come to have. I had assumed that I would be seen by ENT and then taken for scan, but no such luck. You know what they say about assume! The scan would have to be booked and would take up to 4 weeks to come through.

The whole thing felt like a bit of a waste of time to be honest – Hillingdon had told me that they had booked a scan but clearly hadn’t. The trip took over 3 hours and cost £60 in cab fares and I was essentially no further forward. Ah well – I’m sure they are doing their best.

We have friends joining us this forthcoming weekend – Old Nick first-timers! Really looking forward to seeing them. After that, we will finally commence our journey in to Little Venice, via Harlesden, Kensal Green and passing Wormwood Scrubs. Exciting times!

Period	Miles	Locks
1st to 12th July	0	0
Cumulative	154	160