Two Weeks on the English Canals: Day 3

Day Three
Monday
July 22nd
     A fairly short run today--about four hours to Braunston, a small town on the Eastern limits of our journey. Within an hour of getting underway, Lyn called on the cell phone from the other boat running ahead of us. We were approaching the aqueduct at Brownsover Town. An aqueduct is a bridgelike structure supporting a canal as it passes over a river, road or lower ground. What a strange concept--instead of a bridge carrying the road across a waterway, the bridge carries a waterway across the road! As we slowly chugged across, we passed over a bridge which in turn passed over the River Avon, the river being perhaps a hundred feet beneath our boat.
       Another hour saw our canal meander away from the built-up Rugby area and into the beautiful English countryside. The rest of this day's run was an experience in beauty, a portrait of pastoral life.   Cattle and sheep grazed in verdant pastures and large trees perched at water's edge, planted by nature to shade the boater and add beauty to the canal.
       Four hours and three locks after getting underway we approached the village of Braunston, with yours truly at the helm. Before us, milk cows and a few calves grazed. Beyond them, the tall spire of All Saints Church dominated the stunning vista. As I steered the 70-foot boat up the narrow channel, I looked through the open rear door of the cabin at my camera, lying on the bunk. Two seconds--that's all that it would take to grab my camera. What were the chances of trouble if I let the rudder swing free for a mere two seconds? But my habitually pessimistic view of probability held sway and my hand continued to grip the tiller.
     We tied up both of our boats at the village's edge and boarded our van for a short trip to the village of Stoke Bruerne. This small village is the site of the Canal Museum and very close to the 1.75 mile long Blisworth Tunnel, the longest tunnel in the navigable canal system.

Click here for some history of the Blisworsth Tunnel.

     The chance to experience the tunnel was a surprise to most of the group, as they had not been told of this adventure beforehand. We boarded a narrowboat designed for tours and chugged into the hole in the side of the hill. We putted onward, the gloom only being pierced by the headlight of our boat.   During the 35-minute trip, we met one other vessel. Our sturdy steel hulls bumped gently against one another as we passed in the narrow passageway, a friendly handshake between the boats sharing the tunnel.   We passed under one of the ventilation shafts. I peered into the hole in the tunnel top, eerily lit from the other end by a distant opening to the sky. At numerous places throughout the vertical passageway, rivulets of water emerged from between the brickwork and dribbled down the shaft, narrowly missing my dodging face as the water joined the canal.
     One of the major reasons for this excursion was the opportunity to sing in the tunnel. The boat guide turned off the headlight and we sang. Our notes bounced off the inside of the tunnel and returned to our ears microseconds later as pleasant reverberations. The narrow tunnel sounded like a huge cathedral, the nearly total darkness completing the uncanny illusion.
     Up ahead I could see the other end of the tunnel, an approaching oval of brightness. As we emerged, Pam, our driver, was waiting for us, the van being parked a short distance up the hill. As our van headed back, the guide pointed out one of the ventilation shafts, a brick column rising upward out of the apex of the hill. Our vehicle required less than five minutes to reach the Canal Museum, very near our starting point of 35 minutes before.

     The Canal Museum is housed in a restored corn mill. This treasury of canal history vividly tells the story of the canals and the people who worked on them. The exhibits are well presented and distributed among the three floors of the museum.
     All the stair climbing at the museum necessitated a period of recuperation. The ubiquitous and welcome pub, appropriately named The Boat Inn, beckoned from a convenient location across the canal. The management had thoughtfully provided a small but suitable bridge. We consumed our pints at an outside table and chatted with the tunnel guide, Brian Mayland, who was also a local artist and an old friend of Tom's.
      I could not escape the lure of a beautiful Rose of Sharon shrub in front of the pub. The flowers glowed a rich pink with darker bars radiating from the center. I had noticed this specific variety of Rose of Sharon often while in England, but I cannot remember ever seeing it in the US.
      Sara and I soon returned to our berth aboard the Tame Valley. The day had been eventful and active. Our eyelids were heavy and the time was not yet 7:00. There seemed time for a nap. The bunk pulled at us.
     It was 9:15 when I attempted to clear my eyes and look at my watch. I nudged Sara.
     "We better see about something to eat," I muttered. There was a problem in that all the pub kitchens closed at 9:00 PM, more or less, depending on business. We walked to three successive pubs, simultaneously increasing our hunger while failing to appease it.    Finally we settled for vinegar potato chips, peanuts, and beer at the Wheat Sheaf, a Braunston pub which had been in continuous operation at that location since the 17th century. While walking the half mile back to our boat, we had the time to notice some interesting things about our surroundings.
      Slanting curbs were decoratively set with baseball-size stones. Their rounded ends stuck out of a matrix of fine concrete and served to gently discourage the pedestrian from drifting into harm's way in the road. Every hundred feet or so a double step was provided for access to the road.
     We passed All Saints Church, whose needle-like steeple had provided such rich visual accents to the scenery when we had approached by boat earlier in the day. The church was beautifully lighted, glowing in the night air.
     "That's not tax money that lights that steeple," the pub owner had said a few minutes earlier. "People got together and contributed the money, they did. Still do, last I heard."
     The church was on a corner and we passed along the side of the building rather than the front. As we went by the rear churchyard, ancient tombstones cast dim shadows in the reflected light from the illuminated church. I wished that I had my camera, a tripod, and the energy for an attempt at capturing the lighting and mood of that moment, but fatigue was pulling at us again and we did not tarry as we returned to our boat.