Touring the English countryside by boat may sound like an oxymoron. but the truth is, Britain is riddled with 3,000 miles of navigable canals and rivers. And it's stocked with companies that provide floating hireboats or hotelboats to ply them.
Administered by the British Waterways Board, the canal system merges the tranquility of cruising through the English countryside with the excitement of such canalside attractions as the Royal Shakespeare Company or the Wedgwood China Center. Virtually all of England is at your fingertips when you pick up a modern, Winnebago-type canal boat to use as your base. They are available at numerous commercial hireboat marinas around the British Isles.We're not talking about ordinary boats here. Narrowboats, as they are called, are distinctive in design and decoration. Made of steel, diesel-powered and just under 7 feet wide (in order to fit into locks that are 7 feet wide), narrowboats can be as long as 69 feet or as short as 15.
More odd than their shapes are the traditional "roses and castles" paintings that decorate both the boats and their standard accessories such as doors, water buckets, bowls, mops and flower boxes. The bright yellows, reds and greens add a very cheery touch to the waterways.
The narrowboat experience isn't ordinary, either. Gliding along the backside of one British village after another is about as far from gridlocked London as you can get.
Dickens-style pubs dot the landscape, and the green-grocer, butcher and baker all want to know where you're from. Be forewarned, most of them seem to have made a pilgrimage to Orlando and Disney World. There's a certain charm that's a blend of the friendly hellos you hear along the canalside path, the surprisingly old historic homes you visit, and the quaint pubs with names like "The Dog and the Doublet" where you hoist a brew or two.
But probably the best part about canal boating is traveling at three miles per hour. That's slower than a bicycle! Sliding down tree-shaded waterways. Gliding along watching blue heron dive for their dinners and Englishmen equipped with delicate bamboo fishing poles stalk the wily perch. Sipping a cup of tea and eating a chocolate "biscuit" from your well-equipped larder. Or maybe even drying your hair in the sun after your shower. Cleopatra on her barge never had it so good.
That is, until the next lock comes along and you hear the person at the tiller call out "lock!"
Locks are man-made chambers in canals that allow boats to go up or down by filling or emptying the chamber with water. For example, if you're traveling uphill and arrive at a lock, the first thing you do is drain it of water so the water level will be on the same level as you and your boat. Then, you push open the lock gates, which weigh several tons, so your boat can cruise into the lock, at which point you close the gates, proceed down the 70-foot length of the lock and basically repeat the procedure, in reverse, to fill the lock. As the lock fills with water, it raises the level of the boat to the upper level of the canal on the other side of the gate. To move up a long hill, flights of 20 or more locks may be used.
Or perhaps you'll come to a lift bridge that requires just that - working a crank to lift the bridge out of the way so your boat can get past. Then, there's always the job of steering your 50-foot-long, 7-foot-wide boat down a canal and into a 7-foot-wide lock, if you'd rather "rest" at the tiller.
However impossible it may sound to some people, if you're a certain type of person, doing these things will make you feel great. Best of all is the can-do attitude you develop - if you can move a 20-ton boat and push around a bridge - you can do just abut anything, can't you? Kind of like an out-of-control Arnold Schwarzenegger.
You actually can toss out, loudly enough for the lunchtime pub crowd to overhear it, something like, "Sure, I can lift another bridge, now that I've had lunch." And the best part is that, with a little help from counterbalances, levers and the like, none of it is really that hard.
Lunch brings us to English food. It's fun to sample - for about a week! Even if you branch out into the Indian and Chinese restaurants, you'll find the fried plaice, french fries, fried eggs and grilled ham steak get a little boring.
Nevertheless, whether for lunch, dinner or a drink, pub visits are a must. Sometimes, you'll watch someone playing darts or strike up a conversation with the group at the next table. And a glass of cold cider, a steaming hot lamb rojan or a piece of thick warm apple pie can do much to revive spirits along a lengthy lock flight.
A real advantage of a canal boat is that you also have your own kitchen. Plus, small but well-supplied shops along the route help stock your ship's larder. Don't forget English chocolates and "biscuits," as the British call cookies. Often, you can buy prepared quiches, pot pies and cornish pasties on the route as well to keep cooking simple on board.
By the way, the local outdoor markets offer a fascinating glimpse of British life. The Saturday market in Stafford, the Friday one in Stratford or the ancient one in Market Harborough are jammed with stalls that sell everything imaginable. Whatever you might need - from Cheshire cheese and fresh fruit to china cups and plastic "Welly" rainboots, is hawked by local vendors.
Quaint old towns, like Congleton on the Macclesfield Canal, Stone on the Trent and Mersey or Market Harsborough on an arm of the Grand Union Canal, offer fun shops to browse in, coffee shops and bakeries for refreshment and little museums to poke about in.
If you're cruising the Oxford or Stratford, try to arrange a side trip to Warwick Castle, well worth a little overland travel. Although it can be crowded, it is the archetypal castle of your imagination. Round out your visit to Warwick with a walk down Mill Street, an ancient cobbled road leading to the ruins of the old bridge on the London and the colorful, flower-filled Mill garden, both situated at the base of the castle.
Another pleasure cruise explores the Macclesfield Canal, built in 1831 and studded with beautiful serpentine bridges that snake over the waterway. However, the exquisite bridges were built not for their sensuous lines, but because the design permitted tow horses, the pre-diesel boat's motive power, to remain hitched to a boat when crossing from one side of the canal to the other. Nowadays, the towpaths are used for walking, jogging and bike riding.
The Macclesfield Canal, which goes through the small towns of Congleton, Macclesfield and Bollington, reaches up into the fringes of the Peak Forest district.
If you factor in the time for it, narrowboats can be used as a base for sightseeing - whether it's hiking in the Peak Forest or visiting an ancient National Trust Property like Little Moreton Hall, also on the Macclesfield Canal.
In fact, canal boating can be a fun and economical way to visit many British cities - especially the more crowded and expensive places like London, Manchester and Birmingham. The boat is not only your sleeping quarters, cooking facilities and toilet - it's also your transportation and a good deal of your entertainment and exercise, too.
The Regents Canal works its way through London and, moored in the right place, it can be your home away from home in a city where hotel rooms can run up to $200 a night or more. In fact, several narrowboats can be seen on London canals in background shots of the popular 1988 movie, "A Fish Called Wanda."
Located in the heart of Birmingham, the recently renovated and restored Gas Street Basin Moorings are a taste of 18th and 19th century Birmingham in the very midst of the modern metropolis. Lovely old brick buildings, many of which house pubs, bring up memories of Dickens. Arched bridges curve over the system of canals to add an almost Venetian charm to the area. Yet, only a block or two away, the modern glass towers of the Hyatt and Holiday Inn hotels offer convenient amenities like telephones, a theater, shops and services. It's not far to the Birmingham Bus Station either to catch a bus to visit the Balck Country Museum in Dudley (about 40 minutes away). The living museum features a restored 19th century industrial canal port.
In Nottingham, the narrowboat moorings are close to the city's castle, canal museum and lace museum. Nottingham Castle's exterior doesn't have the majesty or sense of antiquity that some of the other castles like Warwick or Windsor have. But it houses informative exhibits and an interesting gift shop. The canal museum is a must if you're an aficionado. And, the lace museum is much more than a museum devoted to lace. It's filled with one diorama after another featuring authentic costumes of bygone eras.
Although not every place in Britain is accessible by narrowboat, almost all of England, except for the extreme southest, is crisscrossed by a web of canals. During the heyday of canaling, from 1761 to the middle of the 19th century, there were 6,000 miles of canal built to transport both raw materials, such as coal, and manufactured goods, such as Cadbury's chocolates and Wedgwood China, to markets. So, the canal system, starting with Manchester's Bridgewater canal, was really a result of the Industrial Revolution. Wales, Ireland and Scotland have their share of canals as well.
The rise of the railroad led to the decline of the canal system, but it was only after World War II that the canals were, briefly, in danger of extinction. During the war, many all-women crews kept the canal boats delivering supplies all over the country for Britain's war effort. Hitler didn't know the canals existed so they were able to operate relatively unscathed. But, by the end of the war, they were sinking into oblivion when British and European tourists discovered them. Since then, a thriving industry has arisen to supply the needs of the many narrowboaters who take to the British waterways every season. (Although people do boat year-round, October through April is pretty much the off-season.)
Costs can vary but if you shop around for a cheap airfare, pick a relatively inexpensive week and go with a few other people, it's possible to do the trip for as little as $1,200 or so per week, all inclusive. With hotel rooms often costing $100 or more per day, it's not hard to see that canal boating is actually a reasonably priced alternative way to travel.
You'll see all kinds of people "on the canal cut." Hireboats are up to 69 feet long so families, students, groups, young couples, retirees, the disabled and even a few foreign tourists can be found cruising. For some reason though, except for a few Germans, tourists from other countries are far and few between. By and large, the British seem to have kept canal boating for themselves.
You can visit the almost mythic England of fantasy and see the quaint, pastoral side of England by simply renting a canal boat. You can visit an ancient castle, pull into Stratford-upon-Avon to see the Royal Shakespeare Company, dock at the Cadbury Factory to learn about the making of English chocolate. When you get bored with the tourist scene, cruise away to another scenario of blooming foxglove, songbirds and lush green ferns. Then, at the end of a brisk turn at the tiller, enjoy the snug feeling of settling into a comfortable wing chair and sipping a cup of hot tea. In the evening, pull up to a little town, wander its byways and visit the local pub for a dinner of fish and chips. Maybe even hang around and watch a dart game or the village dominos championship.
Believe it or not, a slow boat through the countryside is actually the fastest way to get to the heart and soul of England.
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ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
More information
For a copy of the 12-page information sheet called "Inland Waterway Holidays," write the British Tourist Authority, 350 S. Figueroa St., Suite 450, Los Angeles, CA 90071, or call (213) 628-3525.
The information sheet includes maps and listings of hireboat companies. It also gives you names and addresses of U.S. contacts for English hireboat companies.