The thoughts, fantasies and random ramblings of Ashton Boatman Chris Leah, largely, but not exclusively, connected with his work for the Wooden Canal Boat Society, restoring historic wooden canal boats and putting them to work doing good deeds for the community and the planet.
Joe the tree feller bought himself a wooden narrow boat called Benevolence. She was built in 1938 by Nursers of Braunston for John Green of Macclesfield. In the 1980s my late friend Martin Cox was given the Keay Award for his work on her, but, since then, she's been rather neglected. Joe brought her from Oxford to Ashton, narrowly missing getting stranded by the breach at Bosley.
This week Benevolence has been on dock at Ashton Packet Boats. Joe said he was just going to have a look, put some patches on leaky bits and measure up for future replanking. Instead he ripped out a substantial length of rotten plank. I wondered if he was going to be ready for launching on Saturday, but, today he let in a substantial length of temporary pine plank. He's still cutting it fine, but Joe is a grafter!
When he gets back to his native Cumbria, Joe will be looking out for some nice big oak trees that need felling.
I woke up late this morning and, as I lay in bed enjoying my first coffee, the radio started broadcasting the Sunday Service. If I’m still listening at this point I normally switch off. This morning I was a bit slow to move so I caught the vicar’s opening words which, unusually, resonated with me.
She said “God wants us to bless the communities in which we live and work”.
I switched off part way through “Bread of Heaven”.
Nothing Earth shattering about what the vicar said, but it got me thinking. As it happened, I was thinking about the oak trees that I’ve planted over the years at the time. That is a way of blessing the community that I live in. Of course, I derive some personal pleasure from it. The trees I planted 30 years ago are now grown up and, with the help of the Jays, spreading their acorns each autumn to begin more trees. I love to see this, and I love to check on the younger trees and imagine the beautiful woodland that they will form.
They will provide homes for countless creatures and spiritual uplift for people who walk amongst them. They will also sequester carbon from the atmosphere, much needed on our overheating planet and, perhaps, eventually, provide timber for a future generation of wooden boatbuilders.
Of course, I won’t see most of this. The best I can hope for is to view the adolescent oaks in 30 years time from my wheelchair. This is my way of blessing the community where I live and work.
A few days ago one of my friends posted on Facebook “What’s the point”? A more complicated question than it appears. The ruling idea in Western culture is that the only point is personal gratification. Liberals have an idea of enlightened self interest, where pusuing your own personal gratification has the happy spin off of benefitting others. Sometimes it does, but, often, the pure pursuit of personal gratification really benefits no-one, including oneself. I think of the Simon & Garfunkel song “Richard Cory” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euuCiSY0qYs
Interestingly, when the self interest of a political leader, normally backed by that of the owners of the military industrial complex of whatever nation or political bloc, require us to go to war, then the self interest of ordinary people is thrown out of the window. Young men (and women nowadays) have to sacrifice themselves for the ‘greater good’ and their parents, spouses and lovers have to grin and bear their losses whilst working all hours to keep the production lines running to supply more military hardware.
So, where does religion come into this. As a child I rejected the Christianity that I was born into because, despite including the commandment “Thou shalt not kill” it’s leaders clearly condoned warfare. It was also, in my mind, associated with a hypocritical establishment and seemed to be offering a promise of everlasting life that was a claim that could not be substantiated.
re hypocrisy- Malcolm Muggeridge, for all his holier than thou ness was a serial philanderer, Bishop Mervyn Stockwood was a closet gay.
Despite this, I’ve always had a sense of there being something more than the here and now. The idea that we are more than mere mechanical creatures and contain a spirit that lives on when our bodies die. That does not necessarily mean that our consciousness lives on.
In trying to understand this I’ve worked my way through paganism and pantheism, finally (perhaps) arriving at Panentheism. This is the idea that there is a deity that is within every atom of the cosmos, including each of us, and beyond. That includes before the big bang and after whatever finally happens to the universe. It is what I call The Great Spirit, but others may call God, Allah, Rama or whatever. I have a spirit, you have a spirit, everyone has a spirit. They are sparks that have come from the great spirit and will ultimately return to it, only to be sparked off it again to inhabit another being.
We can choose to grow our spirits by living in a way that brings joy and growth to others, or we can choose to diminish our spirits by living selfishly, concerned only with our own short term gratification. If you’re looking for enlightened self interest it lies in the true joy that this brings, so much greater than the brief enjoyment of owning things or experiencing physical sensations.
My way of communing (for want of a better word, the English language is reaching its limits here) with the Great Spirit is through the Latihan, a spiritual exercise organised by an organisation called Subud. Each Latihan is a unique 30 minute session of a spiritual experience that I cannot describe, words fail me. While I call myself a Panentheist, others, beside me in the Latihan, may call themselves Muslim, Jew, Christian, Buddhist etc etc. It really doesn’t matter.
It’s a great shame that so few people know (or care?) about this.
Though we have already got two oak logs and two greenheart beams,
we realised a while ago that we would still be a few planks short for
replanking "Hazel". I was just starting to look around for
more sources of timber when a friend of a friend posted on Facebook a
message that he was felling some oak trees and thought they might be
of use to someone. I got in touch and soon I was heading for Cumbria
to have a look.
Joe reckons he's the most eco friendly tree surgeon in Cumbria,
which means he often does himself out of work by persuading land
owners that they actually don't need to fell any trees. In this case
however, an expert from the Woodland Trust
http://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/en/Pages/default.aspx#.TvTBeXreLv0
had been along to advise on the management of the woodland and had
advised on its thinning out. Joe does forestry work for the woodland
owner from time to time and had been asked to find a buyer for the
timber.
My first trip was to have a look at the wood. I took the WCBS van
for the day, drove up the M6 and found Joe at his yard beside a
gurgling stream near Tebay. We climbed aboard his elderly Range Rover
and he drove me over the hills and down into the Eden Valley where we
eventually turned through wrought iron gates and hooted as we passed
the facade of a minor stately home known as Crossrigg Hall
http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/en-422659-crossrigg-hall-bolton,
then up a track through an avenue of Welingtonias
Sequoiadendron is a genus of evergreen trees, with two species, only one of which survives to the present:[1]
into the woodland.
Someone was cutting up a felled oak with a chain saw so we walked
over to where he was working and had a chat, then Joe showed me round
the woodland and pointed out the trees marked with the yellow spot of
doom.
The expert had consistently marked the younger trees for felling.
The strategy would be to take out the smaller trees to open up the
woodland and allow the more mature tees to spread out. While this
makes sense aesthetically, it means that the timber will not be very
useful, at least, not for boatbuilding.
I was disappointed, but then Joe showed me a more mature oak that
they had decided to fell because it had die back in its upper
branches. This was of a useful size and had just the right curve in
it. Another tree had caught my eye as, though of a disappointingly
small girth it had some useful looking curves in it.
David, the owner of the estate came out to join us and we went to
look at the relevant trees again. We agreed a price and got back in
the Range Rover to return to Joe's yard. Inside the old caravan,
nicely camouflaged with green painted wood, that he uses as an
office, there was a nice warm atmosphere created by the woodstove.
Millie, Joe's obsessively affectionate spaniel played catch the ball
unceasingly as we drank tea, then I headed back home again.
A few weeks passed as I tried to find a reasonably priced lorry to
move the wood. What a shame there's no canal to Appleby. With this
problem settled I tried to get back in touch, with no immediate
success. It turned out that David had gone on holiday. Ultimately,
with Christmas fast approaching, the connections were made. Joe
offered somewhere to stay.
Tom Kitching is an excellent fiddler https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Iq4GZBUAvc and he's also part owner of the wooden tank narrow boat "Spey"
Unusually he found himself with no fiddling or boating to do for the
week before Christmas, so he offered to come and help with "Hazel".
I suggested a couple of days in Cumbria planking logs.
The plan was to pick Tom up from his home in Chorlton at about
7AM, but with having to prepare the boats at Portland Basin for my
absence and road chaos it was about 20 to eight when we finally got
moving through the darkness towards the motorway. I had filled the
back of the van with all kinds of things that I thought might come in
useful. Somewhere around Lancaster I suddenly realised that I'd
forgotten the chain block. This could be a problem if we needed to
move the logs at all for cutting.
The long motorway drag ended at Tebay, where we took a B road
through Old Tebay village in a roughly North Easterly direction. We
passed the end of the track that leads to Joe's yard as I'd arranged
to meet him in the woods. Tom had asked to stop at a shop and,
spotting a sign advertising the village shop, we turned off into
Orton Village. As I waited in the van and studied the map I'd printed
out, a small woman approached and introduced herself as Joe's mother.
I had briefly met her on my previous visit. She explained that she
was going to see her grandchildren singing at a Christmas event at
the church that evening but she would make us a hotpot and we could
stay either in her house or Joe's office. I thanked her and
introduced her to Tom, then we set off again.
Leaving the main road on high moorland we bounced and swerved
along tiny stone walled lanes, over rustic hump backed bridges and
through villages built along rushing streams. This part of Cumbria
seems pretty much untouched by tourism, and perhaps I should shut up
before I encourage more visitors to spoil it!
Eventually we turned in through wrought iron gates between stone
pillars and down the gravelled drive to draw up in front of the grand
porch of Crossrigg Hall. I got out and rang the bell, half expecting
Jeeves to open the huge front door. I waited a long time, listening
to Joe chainsawing away in the woods. I was beginning to wonder if
the bell was working, perhaps I should use my mobile 'phone, when the
door slowly opened and David, the owner, peeked out. A jovial man in
his sixties, he greeted me jovially, and jovially handed me an
invoice for the timber.
We drove on through an avenue of huge Wellingtonias
http://www.kew.org/plants-fungi/Sequoiadendron-giganteum.htm
to park the van behind Joe's Range Rover and Trailer. Joe had
arranged to be there to cut up firewood from the various branches of
the trees that were being felled. Walking over to the larger of the
two trees my heart sank as I saw that it would need rolling before we
could plank it as it was lying with its curve upwards rather than to
the side.
There was a track leading to the log so I decided to try backing
the van towards it. After about 15 yards the wheels sank into the mud
and the van became immovable.
David came out with paperwork to settle up. He would have liked to
have stayed to watch the fun, but a seasonal flight to the
Mediterranean was calling, so, cheque in hand, he had to rush away
again.
We carried our equipment the rest of the way. If I had remembered
the chain block, rolling the log would be easy, instead, after Joe
had lopped off the branches and cross cut the log at the place that I
indicated,
we had several hours work with jacks, levers and a rather
inadequate winch of Joe's before we got the log on its side.
The wooden guide rails that Bernard had made for this job were
assembled and laid on top of the log, supported in places by lengths
of 3"X3" to allow for the knobbliness of the log. I started
the chainmill and made the first cut, mainly removing bark and high
spots on the log. I re-set the guide rails and made another cut, this
time getting into the meat of the log. We lifted off the guide and
the first slice to reveal the beautiful grain of the oak. It seems a
shame to cut planks from this then cover them with tar.
With the bark completely gone we were left with a flat surface for
the chainmill to run on for the next cut, so the guide rails were put
to one side. It was hard going though, harder than when I'd been
cutting greenheart. This was probably because I hadn't got the chain
quite as sharp as it might be. By the time darkness fell my arms were
aching from pushing the chainmill through the wood and, worryingly, a
couple of my fingers had developed a pins and needles sensation.
In the gathering gloom we carried the nickable items of tackle
back to the bogged down van. With it loaded, and as much weight as
possible on the back wheels, we tried to move it. Despite Joe and Tom
pushing we could move no more than a few feet, the wheels making
steadily deeper furrows. Joe uncoupled his trailer, now laden with
firewood logs, and backed his Range Rover towards the van. A tow rope
was soon set up and the vehicle persuaded on to firmer ground. Tom
and I set off in the van, closely followed by Range Rover and
trailer.
At the first road junction our routes diverged as Joe had clearly
decided on the main road route. For my part, I love driving along
tiny bendy roads. At one point on our route we passed a construction
site where a considerable amount of floodlit plant was engaged on
digging a large, square, steel piled hole in the ground. A strange
industrial insertion into the rural scene. We wondered about the
purpose of this.
The bendy roads nearly caught me out in the dark. A long straight
avenue of trees, the best part of a mile long, suddenly ends where
the road tumbles over an escarpment and turns sharp left round a
tightening bend with an adverse camber. I wonder how many would be
rally drivers have landed in the hedge here.
Catastrophe avoided by sharp braking, we arrived at Joe's yard and
parked up, then, lit by head torches walked down the track to the
main farm 3 abreast. Leaving our coats, bags and boots, we entered a
proper farmhouse kitchen, heated by a woodstove. Joe's mum (JM)
appeared, clad in a dressing gown, and got busy preparing the hotpot
that she had promised us, accessing high cupboards by standing on a
stool that she moved around the kitchen. I realised how covered in
sawdust my clothes were and went to dig out some clean clothes from
my rucksack.
With the hotpot declared ready, JM prepared to leave. I asked her
where she was going. "To church" she replied "I'm very
religious, you ask Joe about my religion". I imagined that
religious faith must be a bone of contention between them.
The hotpot was excellent, and very generous. Tom suggested a visit
to a pub. Joe was supportive of the idea so, with the hotpot polished
off, we boarded Joe's Range Rover and headed for the Cross Keys in
Tebay http://www.crosskeystebay.co.uk/
The pub is a pleasantly old fashioned country pub with a selection
of real ales. We sat in an alcove and discussed wood, boats, trees,
the music business and various bits of putting the world to rights.
Tom received a message telling him that he had been played on Radio
2. "I'll get £12 for that in about a year" he said.
Another message told him that his band was among the top 10 most
prolific bands of 2011. He explained that this was through doing
absolutely loads of gigs very cheap and it nearly killed him.
I raised the subject of religion, thinking that this would be a
lively subject for debate, bearing in mind JM's remarks. It turned
out that Joe and his mother were not at all at odds over religion, it
had just been her bit of fun. It seemed that we all shared the view
that organised religion was more trouble than it was worth (though
personally I have a lot of time for disorganised religion).
When Tom and I were happily loaded with beer, Joe having
restrained himself as he had to drive back (I did offer), we climbed
aboard the Range Rover and travelled by dark bendy roads back to the
farmhouse. JM was already back and we sat in the farmhouse kitchen
discussing religion, again, the work we were doing, the wonderful
countryside around us and the extensive renovations that JM had
carried out on the ancient farmhouse. JM showed Tom and I to our
quarters. I got the nursery bedroom where her grandchildren stay,
full of toys and childrens books.
The next day began early, well before dark, as we planned to be in
the woods at first light. Tom and I breakfasted then said goodbye to
the wonderful JM before walking up to Joe's yard and setting out in
the van, Joe following with the Range Rover. We timed it quite well
as it was just after daybreak when we arrived at the woods. Joe lent
me an electric chainsaw sharpener and this, combined with regular
hand sharpening, made the day's work a bit easier.
The routine was for me to start the chainmill and offer it up to
the end of the log. With the guide running on the flat surface
already cut I would push the saw, set at 2" depth, through the
log. Tom would follow up tapping wedges into the sawcut to prevent it
closing up and trapping the bar. After about 10 feet I would stop the
saw and slide to back down the sawcut, with Tom levering the gap open
and moving wedges to allow the machine through. I would then refuel
and resharpen the saw, slide it back into the groove, start it and
carry on. This procedure was repeated until the chainmill emerged out
of the other end of the log. The resulting 2" thick oak board
would then be lifted to one side and the whole procedure started
again. By this means we cut a number of very useful looking oak
boards.
Whilst Tom and I were planking the log, Joe was scaling various
condemned trees and cutting the top branches out. They would fall
intermittently with a great crash, before being cut up into firewood
logs and loaded into the trailer.
It was still light when we finished planking the first log, but
there was not enough day left to make it worthwhile starting on the
other one. Joe's trailer was fully loaded too, so we decided to call
it a day. Tom was interested in seeing Joe's yard, which is
completely off grid and powered by wind, sun and wood, in daylight,
so we decided to meet up there for a brew before heading for home.
On the way I stopped the van at the intriguing hole in the
ground,hoping to find out what it was for. The hardhatted workers had
already gone home, so it will be forever a mystery. The idea of
seeing Joe's yard in the daylight didn't quite work out as it was
pretty much dark when we got there. Nevertheless we enjoyed drinking
tea and chatting about the joys and perils of tree surgery before
once more setting out down the M6 towards Mancunium.
Over the last couple of weeks Stuart has been busy cutting and
planing planks whilst I've been working on the sternpost. The
stempost is now up and I could get the sternpost fitted today, but
I've noticed that Janet, our neighbour, has just hung a line full of
washing out in the sun. As I will have to heat some chalico on the
stove to fit the post and the wind is blowing in her direction I
think I'll put it off until tomorrow.
We've a new volunteer, a retired sheet metal worker called John.
He's been grinding the knobbles off the knees, which are now back
from being shotblasted.
For several weeks "Hazel" has been looking very bare.
Her new bottom is in place and the moulds are up to give a skeletal
trace of her shape, but she has no sides and only the apparition of a
cabin propped up on sticks to remind us of the boat that she was, and
shall be again.
Soon we'll be putting the knees back in place, then steaming the
bottom strakes or garboards to shape, and so a new boat will rise
from the crumbly rottenness of the old, new wood, but the same shape
and the same spirit.
Talking of wood, we don't have quite enough of it. To make up for
the shortfall I've found some oak trees that are to be felled in
Cumbria. I will be able to plank them with the chainmill, but
transporting them is proving to be a problem. They never completed
the famous Taunton & Carlisle Canal. In fact, the nearest the
canal system ever got to Appleby where the trees are was Kendal. Now
that waterway is truncated by the M6 at Tewitfield, and anyway, our
boats are all 10' too long to access it. There'es really no choice
but to use lorries, and they're expensive. So, if you happen to have
a lorry long enough to carry 30' lengths of timber, give me a ring on
07931 952 037.
It was still dark when I arrived at Knowl St at 5 past 7. I opened
up the container, switched on the lights and started to gather fire
lighting materials and get them arranged in a crude fireplace. At
7.30 I put a match to the pile of paper, cardboard, shavings and
sticks. When I could hear crackling noises, indicating that the wood
was starting to catch, I started piling on bigger pieces of
wood. When Stuart arrived at about 8 AM the flames were climbing
up and licking around the old oil drum that serves as a crude boiler.
I climbed on top of the pile of scrap wood and started throwing
pieces down to Stuart who piled them on to barrows for transporting
to the fire. I learned my lesson about not keeping the firewood near
the fire many years ago at Ellesmere Port where the fuel pile once
caught fire when I was steaming a plank for Lilith. I had asked
volunteers to try to get there for 9, and people started to show up
from 8.30 onwards. Wisps of steam began to rise from the steambox at
5 minutes to 9, so the time for bending the first plank was set at 5
to 11. A plank has to spend an hour in the steambox for every inch
thickness. Soon a goodly crowd was assembled, though with little
to do except stoke the fire, fetch more wood and drink tea. Steaming
planks requires a good crowd for just 10 minutes per plank, when it’s
actually being fitted. The rest of the time there’s not much to do
except be sociable. Stuart had the excellent idea of doing a dummy
run, using one of the planks for the fore end. We manhandled the
plank through the boat and then carried it back from the steambox
then forward into the hoodings, the people at the other end of the
plank having to walk on a temporary platform sticking out over the
water. Stuart clamped the plank into the hoodings and everyone pushed
the other end towards the boat to bend it. I was just expressing
concern about the amount of pressure being put on an unsteamed plank,
when a bang from the sternpost end confirmed my worst fears. A bit of
short grain near the end had failed and about a foot had broken away.
I looked at the broken plank in horror, but Stuart was smiling. “It’s
OK” he said “The plank starts behind the broken bit, I haven’t
cut the end yet”. We put the plank away near the bow where it
belongs and got on with getting clamps etc ready. As the water boiled
away in the oil drum boiler and the fire grew steadily more intense
so the steam rising from the steambox grew thicker and hotter. Rather
than using the electric kettle we brewed up by placing an old kettle
on top of the brick furnace next to the boiler where tongues of flame
were constantly playing. Time ticked by, and at 10.50 everyone
assembled around the plank. When time was called,Stuart undid the
tarpaulin shroud that was stopping too much steam from escaping at
the steambox entrance. We pulled the plank out and dropped it on to a
row of trestles while Stuart screwed a block near the end to hold the
clamp. We then picked up the plank, pushed it into the hoodings and,
once Stuart had it clamped up, bent the plank so that it touched the
knees. Getting the bend is not as tricky as getting the twist. Ryan
manoeuvred the heavy planktwister into place and screwed it against
the lower part of the plank to bend it into the V shape between the
moulds and the bottom. The plank then had to be forced downwards by
bonking it with a big rubber mallet. This didn’t quite do the
trick, so we tried forcing the plank down with a hydraulic jack
pushing on a piece of wood screwed to the knees for this purpose. It
was to no avail, the plank stayed with a stubborn gap under it, which
will have to be removed by planing away some of the lower edge of the
plank where it does touch the bottoms. Other than this, the plank
fitted really well. With the first plank in place we began to
prepare for the second one. Ryan unscrewed the small bung from the
oil drum, producing a jet of steam. This soon settled down and, once
some priming problems with the pump were resolved, it was refilled
with cut water, the bung screwed back in and more wood put on the
fire. We then had to carefully move the steambox to the other side of
the boat, insert , the plank and steampipe, then close up the
steambox entrance and wait for the water to come to the boil. With
a good fire already in the hearth and everything hot we had steam up
in half an hour, and the time for bending the second plank was fixed
at 5 past two. Time for everyone to have lunch and enjoy more
beverages. As Steve the Viking had arrived there was proper coffee
for those who wanted it.
The second plank was
more straightforward than the first and, with the day’s tasks
accomplished by 2,30, people started to drift away. A few of us
stayed and enjoyed potatoes and sausages cooked in the embers, before
packing away the tools and dousing the fire.
After the hectic activity yesterday it was quite a quiet day on
"Hazel", just me Reg and Ryan. Reg left at dinner time to
go and visit his daughter in Leeds. To be honest, there's not much of
"Hazel" left now. The new bottom forms a base to build the
boat up on, but we've now removed most of the sideplanking after
carefully spiling it and recording the plank edge bevels. Highlights
of the day have been offering up the new stempost, it looks like it
will fit, and removing the old sternpost to make a copy. As usual
there was a bit of forensic archaeology involved, working out which
bits of the boat have ben replaced in her 97 year history, and which
bits (not many) are original. As I removed the bottom strake at the
stern end I was surprised to find that it was made of oak and about
60mm thick.I was expecting 2" pitch pine. I decided that it had
been replaced at the same time as the bottoms as there was only one
set of ironwork in the wood, indicating that it had never had
replacement bottoms fitted to it. The question is, when was this
done? It looks likely that the sternpost was renewed at the same
time. Was it 1951 at Rathbones dry dock in Stretfored or 1970s at Ken
Keays in Walsall.
