Torksey

Here I am Rune

Distance 15.3 miles

Total 1436 Locks 72 Tunnels

Running total mileage 2002.8 miles 

Up fairly early again today in the hope of seeing another Aegir but it was unfortunately a bit of a damp squib. It was curious to be on the riverbank and see the flow of the river change direction literally whilst you watch it but no recognisable Aegir came through. After putting a bit of fuel in we then set off up the Trent in company with one other single crewed narrowboat. This section of the Trent was quite fast for a narrowboat and within a couple of minutes of leaving West Stockwith Lock we were travelling at 7.5 Knots! The trip up was generally at about 6 knots until we got to the last couple of miles when the flood tide began to lose its strength when we slowed to about 4.5 – 5 knots. Once again we reached our destination at pretty much the right point of the tide and turned into the cut leading to Torksey Lock pretty easily, there was a very slight flood tide still coming in but not enough to cause us any real problem.

The only real problem that we had on the way down was at a point called ‘Turn Post Corner’, this was a sharp right turn about 1 kilometre upstream of Gainsborough railway viaduct. There was a sand bar on the right hand side of the river which was directing the current strongly into the left hand bank which was tree lined. Despite putting on as much power as I could, we couldn’t overcome this sideways thrust and ended out ploughing through the trees lining the embankment. No real damage caused to the boat but we certainly picked up a lot of tree debris as we emerged from them! The guy in the following boat was concerned that we might come to a halt in the trees as he wouldn’t have been able to stop and would have run into the back of us, fortunately this didn’t happens and the only thing damage was pride. The guy on the boat behind had his own drama as he went off line heading towards Gainsborough road Bridge missing the right hand bridge support by a lot less than would be desirable (about 6 feet!). Ultimately we have both safely got to Torksey but even then there was a small drama getting into the lock since the wind and current had blown a substantial amount of wood and fallen trees into the lock mouth. I went in first and, after giving the boat a bit of momentum we managed to knock most of the obstructing wood out of the way. The second boat wasn’t quite so lucky and was diverted into the lock wall by a floating tree and then took several further goes before he was able to get into the lock. Hope it will all have drifted away before we are due to go back onto the Trent to continue on towards Newark. Current plans are to travel up to Lincoln so the Trent continuation probably isn’t going to happen until after the weekend.

Just as a point of record, I note that we have now covered over 2000 miles!