‘President’ had been carrying three cast iron replica columns and two arches of the Crystal Palace from the Black Country Living Museum which will be taken to the Greenland Dock in London.  Here they were unloaded and taken to Upper Sydenham where they will be erected to form a token rebuilt corner of the huge ‘Crystal Palace’ exhibition hall that stood there until destroyed by fire in 1936.

The boats had been at Crick Boat Show over the Late May Bank Holiday and some of the crew were already on board on the Monday evening when the new members arrived. All the catering at the Show had closed down so we went into Crick village to the Red Lion for a good meal and a couple of pints. Agreed to get up at 07:30. Went on to the Royal Oak, (poor décor but good beer) had another pint and agreed to get up at 08:00. On Tuesday the day started early at 06:45 for Bob Crompton who cleaned the 60 odd boiler flue tubes assisted by Andre Layzell. A box of soot and Bob and Andre emerged both extremely black and the fire lit, steam rose and the whistle blew at 08:00. While they went for a well deserved shower courtesy of a friendly caravan site owner, breakfast was taken by the rest of the crew. Our captain, Nick Haynes, decreed we had a civilised breakfast around the tables in the bowels of ‘Kildare’ after which all was made ready and we cast off at 09:20. We went a few dozen yards up to the entrance to the marina to wind as we weren’t sure if we could get to the winding hole because of our 3 foot deep draught. Our efforts were not helped by a woman who moored her boat three abreast so that she could chat to her friend but she backed down both physically and psychologically.

We cleared Crick tunnel by 10:35 and arrived at Watford locks half an hour later with three boats ahead of us, not many considering how many boats had been at the show. There are bridges over the tail of the locks with no gap for the tow rope for ‘Kildare’ to pass through so we used the technique of passing the rope under the bridge using a ‘monkeys fist’ (lump of stone inside a woven rope container, several knots in the end of  the tow rope also work.) The procedure is to pass the rope over the bridge, hang it over the water, swing it to and fro and then yank it violently up and over your head back towards the lock while still holding on to it. Should you avoid garrotting onlookers or yourself the knot should sweep under the bridge and up and back over the side you dangled it over in the first place. You catch it, preferably without knocking your teeth out, walk down the far side of the bridge and Lo! there is a line to the boat under the bridge.

Our overnight stop was Norton Junction where we arrived at 14:00. There were sandwiches all round including a triple decker special for Bob Crompton in the engine room. We took on water and the day being hot and sunny made the most of the time sprawled over the bank gossiping. Richard Prince shamed us by painting the hatch cover of ‘Kildare’ and the boat shaft. He had previously had praise heaped on his head for his sausage sandwiches, “oven cooked, low heat” is the secret apparently. We ate at the New Inn, good food though not very generous but beer excellent.

On Wednesday were up at 08:00 but were greeted with a slight crisis on the milk front, it was still frozen solid. However application of hot water thawed enough to whiten tea. Left at 09:00 and were through Buckby and Whilton locks by 10:30.

There was a photostop at a new railway bridge replacing a level crossing where we were photographed by Network Rail with their new bridge in the background – contrasting the old and the new travel modes. The rain had started and persisted until we moored at the foot of Stoke Bruerne locks. Through Blisworth Tunnel brothers Martin and Richard Burke both steered, - Burkes Steerage. Later we were to witness a couple of Martins going swiftly by and a couple of right Richards in charge. After going through the tunnel we had to practically shovel soot and debris off the roof of ‘President’. When travelling through tunnels the fire has been made up to burn red and smokeless and the steam exhaust is condensed and emerges under the waterline. This means the usual ‘chuff’ is missing but so is the smoke and steam.

We met David Blagrove, a famous canal book author and lecturer at Stoke Bruerne Museum and again in the pub later. The stove in the cabin of ‘Kildare’ was lit to provide a bit of cheer and in the evening the cabins of both boats were full of wet clothes hung up to dry. We walked back to the Boat Inn for the usual meal and beer. The food is to be recommended.

As we passed a caravan site a pair of swans with five day-old cygnet were nested on the lawn surrounded by cars and people – quite unperturbed, probably having worked out that it is safe and there is a ready supply of food. Further on we saw Canada geese chicks, other wildlife has been herons, moorhen and coot chicks and numerous ducklings. Owls have been heard in the depth of the night during calls to nature. Later we were to see a pair of Mandarin ducks. A kestrel was seen hovering and then stooping on its prey and a young toad was found on a lockside. No sign of kingfishers or water voles though.

Up as usual at 08:00 on Thursday but any pretence at civilised sit-down breakfast had disappeared, we ate where we happened to be standing. Ash from the boiler was environmentally disposed of on the bank damped down with the contents of the night buckets! Cold wash and shave this morning as the gas had run out overnight but we changed over to a new bottle for a brew and cooked breakfast. The boats were singled out and we were underway by 09:00 and after a day’s cruising in cloudy and at times very windy weather we moored at the Three Locks pub. We were met by John Greatrix, Coordinator of the PCPCP (Paxton’s Crystal Palace Corner Project). In London the boats will pick up and follow the original 1852 route taken when the Crystal Palace was moved from Hyde Park to Sydenham. He was accompanied by the Project Director from the Buckinghamshire Railway Society who organised the removal and re-erection of the London and North Western Railway station in Oxford to their site in Quainton where it forms an exhibition hall. Its significance is that its construction is virtually identical to the Crystal Palace. In attendance were two members of

Oxford Brookes University who had been involved in the research project of the Oxford station.

We ate a meal and drank a round courtesy of John Greatrix in The Three Locks pub, a truly awful place adorned with aggressive messages to customers, incompetent and complaining staff, limited meals of Lilliputian proportions and grating pop music. It is to be closed soon and open under new management; there is certainly scope for improvement. We returned relatively early to ‘Kildare’ for supper of cheese and biscuits. We learned a little locking technique today; as the butty slides in past ‘President’ a mug of tea can be passed with precision from the sink side into the engine hole just as the driver has stopped engine.

Friday was a memorable day. The day started with a trip through the Leighton Buzzard area which is noted for producing sand. There were several sand loading docks at the side of the canal looking like railway platforms and one or two still had narrow gauge railway track evident. We met a British Waterways workboat loaded to the gunwales with gravel for upgrading the towpath to Sustrans cycle path standards. They very considerately manoeuvred dead slow past us as they left the lock commenting they “Couldn’t clout ‘President’”.  We were joined on the bank by a young man who now restores wooden narrow boats having been brought up on the cut. He helped us through several locks and described how when he was only eight he would scrounge lifts off passing boats returning several hours later instead of doing lessons as he was being educated at home. He showed considerable interest in the boats and we may see him as a crew member before too long. On the wildlife front a tiny yellow duckling was rescued from the pull of the paddles during lock-wheeling only to be rescued again by the boats when they arrived. There was a temporary stoppage at bridge 114, a modern concrete structure  which was having rotten concrete cut out from the underside working from pontoons. No such problems with 200 year old brick structures!  David Powell appeared at this point to re-provision us.

The weather deteriorated and we were due to stop overnight at the British Waterways yard at Marsworth and charge our batteries. The wind had got up considerably and mooring was problematic with the boats all over the canal. When they were safely gathered in we set about linking up the ship to shore cable for charging. In pouring rain the cables were eventually correctly connected and the power turned on – except that nothing happened. Suspecting that there may have been a fault we traced the route of the BW underground cable back to their information office. Fortunately the cleaning lady was still there so there was a shouted conversation through the letter box explaining our plight. She very kindly offered to phone  BW’s Ralph who came back to try to sort us out. All had been well at 13:00 when David Powell had visited to check.

It emerged that the circuit breaker had tripped so there followed a fault finding exercise which consisted one of us going to and from the shed unplugging each item that might be causing the problem and standing in pouring rain semaphoring the result back to the main building. The result was always the same – nothing. It seemed the heavy rain had got in somewhere. We did suggest that we could poke our cable through BW’s letterbox but there would have been a problem the next morning unplugging it at 07:00. Fortunately we were still on the first bank of batteries and had the second one in reserve. A change of clothing and an excellent meal at the Red Lion restored spirits however.

We decided that an early start on Saturday would be prudent as we were due to change crews at the next mooring point. So, alarm call at 06:00 and away by 07:00. The weather was perfect and the trip along Tring Cutting had shafts of golden sunlight piercing the wreaths of snow-white steam before dappling the foliage with tender light and glinting on the tranquil waters. Well it was a sight better than last night! We made excellent time arriving at about 13:30 within three minutes of calculated time to the delight of the captain. There was a captain’s round at the Three Horseshoes then it was muck out the boats, gather up your baggage and off home. Some of the replacement crew arrived late afternoon ready for their stint of pubs and boats. Bob Crompton, whose new rudder on ‘Kildare’ looks superb, was whiling away the time fitting a set of high-tech battery chargers which will ease our power supply needs though there was talk of a steam powered generator …

Martin Buckland (Almost novice crew member)