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.
It's bank holiday Monday evening and I'm staying on board "Hazel" tonight to get her batteries fully charged ready for her first guests of the year. It's an airbnb booking so not her proper work, but it helps to subsidise the well being work. We've applied for some grant funding. If we get that we can cut down on airbnb's so that more of the people who really need it can enjoy time on "Hazel".
We charge the batteries at the garage of Dixon & Smith, Motor Engineers, in Dukinfield, who kindly let us plug in. It's an easy job to shaft her across the aqueduct and tie on the outside beside their garage. It can get interesting in windy weather though. Tonight is a little breezy but very sunny. A lovely summer's evening with doves cooing, other birds twittering, occasional trains passing and the constant murmur of walkers chatting on the towpath.
For many years Dixon & Smith used their great skills and ingenuity to keep my succession of old Ladas running, then the WCBS tormented them with a series of old vans. Now they are semi retired and, though they still do some paid work, spend much of their time working on their own vehicles, which include motorcycles and two beautifully restored 1950s American pickups.
I'm staying in "Hazel"s back cabin. The conversion is all cleaned and sanctified ready for our guests. The back cabin is in some disarray because its winter overhaul is not yet finished. I like staying in here anyway, especially in Winter when I have the range alight to keep me snug and boil my kettle. Too hot for that tonight so I have a flask.
Can't wait to get boating again. It's been a long winter.
Today Aaron and Nessie brought "Forget me Not" and "Hazel" back from their time under the motorway bridge to Portland Basin.
The first thing was to go to Lumb Lane to wind. Aaron steered the motor.
On the way we passed this lovely conker tree that we planted a few years ago (do kids play conkers any more)?
There was a bit of water bird agro as we passed a woman and her child feeding the swans from a bag. A goose climbed out on to the towpath and tried to grab the bag, which fell to the ground and spilled its contents. The swan was not happy and chased away the goose together with its wife and children.
Now they are back at the basin we have to get them cleaned up and ready to go back into service. Any volunteers?
I'm currently not too well with long haul covid, but I took the time today to visit a volunteer called 'Nessie' who's doing some repairs on 'Hazel'. I wanted to see how he was coping without much help during the lockdown.
Nessie told me that over the past few days he's been preparing boards for Hazel's roof using a planer thicknesser. The wood came from some Leylandii trees he got from a friend's garden. When the boards are planed to the right thickness they are bent with g clamps. When they are released they'll 'remember' some of the bend and will fit on a curved roof.
Nessie likes to tell me what he's doing in fine detail, so I was down there a little longer than I anticipated. It's great though when you meet someone who takes so much pride in his work and does a really good job. Some people are just like that!
If you're new to this blog you might not have seen my GoFundMe page. It's the first time I've done this sort of thing. It's for a good cause, namely to buy us a new van because the old one has broken down for good. We can't manage without a van, either at the charity shop or the boatyard. If you can spare a few quid then THANK YOU!
At last we've got away from Ashton for a few days with "Forget me Not" and "Hazel". We're running the trip with the crew socially distanced from each other and from the guests. Me and Aaron are in for the whole trip, with a back cabin each. Other people come and go as they can to help us through the locks and lift bridges.
The water level was low and we struggled to get clear of Tameside. Dunkirk bridge and Captain Jack's moorings were particularly bad. I was very pleased to see that the long promised dredging has started though, even if we did have a hard time getting past the dredger. The mud is being unloaded at Warble boatyard.
It was a lovely afternoon as we swung the pair round the tight turns at Gee Cross,
Towards Woodley there were some very odd ducks. Are they Grebe? Any ornithologists reading this?
Today we worked up Marple locks. Liz, Peter and Kim came to help. Tomorrow we're on to Bugsworth. Darren is coming to help. More crew needed for the return trip.
We've had a very pleasant couple from Worksop staying on "Hazel" for a week and they booked a trip up the Peak Forest. We went up to Marple on Friday, a glorious summers day, winded and returned as far as Chadkirk. The crew were me, Aaron, Liz and Darren. We all wore masks whenever we had to come close to each other, maintained strict separation from our guests and sanitised the tiller etc when we changed steerers.
Aaron, Liz and Darren cycled home once we had tied for the night. I stayed aboard "Forget me Not". The crew returned for a 2pm departure on Saturday to bring the pair back to Portland Basin. Liz's husband Pete came too.The weather wasn't quite as good but still an enjoyable trip.
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.
I decided to cycle over to the Heritage Boatyard today. There are a lot of cats that occupy the boatyard. They're not feral, they all have homes to go to and servants to look after them. They just like to hang out in the boatyard. I don't mind as they help to keep the vermin at bay, and they seem to have learned not to crap all over the walkways.
I opened the door to the boatyard to be met by one of them retching among my potato plants. In front of the engineering container I found a clue as to what had upset pussy's stomach.
This particular ex rodent was pretty much undamaged, except for being dead, but I suspect my feline friend had consumed one of its relatives. They must have been brave rats, or just infected with the Toxoplasma gondii parasite. Thisnasty little organism lodges in the animal's brain and makes it seek out rather than avoid it's predator.
After disposing of the corpse I wandered over to the canal side. I noticed that the water was moving, indicating that the locks were in use. Sure enough, after about 15 minutes a boat appeared heading towards Ashton.
It was called "Goliath" and was the first boat I'd seen moving since the lockdown. The steerer said he was going to Yorkshire via the Rochdale as Standedge tunnel is still closed due to social distancing difficlties. I wished him luck.
For ages we've had such a poor turnout for weekday evening recycling trips that we've had to do them by road. I was pleased on Monday 4th to find that we had plenty of volunteers.
Aaron took the tiller and we had a pleasant journey down to Fairfield.
On Monday evenings we collect on Fairfield Road and Gorsey Fields. This time most of our crew were youngsters who were shy about knocking on doors, so they did the barrowing back. We had a reasonable haul to take to the charity shop.
On Tuesday afternoon we had a trip on "Hazel" with a really nice couple with an autistic child. The mother seemed interested in the canalside history. As we passed Oxford Mills
As we passed the old mills on the returned trip I noticed a strong smell of burning plastic. I checked in the engine room to make sure that nothing had fallen on to the exhaust manifold, but that was fine.
I went home for my tea. While I was there my friend Bev Ackford rang to tell me there was a fire in a laundry near the canal.
On my return to Portland Basin I found that there was an even better turn out for the Tuesday evening trip. Ominous black smoke was billowing from a big fire close to our intended route. I was unsure if it would be safe to run the trip but Debbie Leach told me that she had just cycled up the towpath to join us and there was no problem.
After a bit of boat shunting we set off, rather later than usual. As we approached the burning area we were enveloped in smoke but I could see that the fire was well back from the canal so we would be able to pass safely.
Fire persons were busy working between the fire and the canal, pumping water out to spray on to the burning buildings. There was some banter with the fire crews about them stealing our water.
Oxford Mill was an E shaped building. One wing had been largely demolished before it was listed. As we passed I saw that the fire had spread from the relatively modern buildings where it started into the upright and middle stroke of the E. The remaining wing remained untouched, though shrouded in smoke, so I hoped that this at least could be saved. I had noted previously that it was used for storing stuff in cardboard boxes.
At Brewery bridge tape had just been put up to close the towpath. A smart young firefighter was just climbing the steps on to the bridge. Debbie, who never misses the opportunity for a bit of banter, asked him if he was touting for business. I chipped in by offering him a lift to Canal St (Canal St is the heart of Manchesters gay village). He took it in the spirit intended.
We had another good collection in the Ashton Hill Road area of Droylsden. By the time we were ready to return it was nearly dark, so I turned on the headlight. At Brewery Bridge, at the South end of Pottinger St, we got a good view of the fire. The brigade's efforts had seemingly been in vain. The whole area was now blazing well, particularly the top of the E, presumably turbocharged by whatever was in all those boxes. The gable end of this wing was close to the canal and it was clear that parts of the building had already collapsed. If the gable were to fall outward as we passed we would be toast.
We backed up into the bridgehole and I managed to get a pin into the tarmacced towpath (grrrr) to tie to.
I left the boat guarded by Aaron and walked rather a long way round to Portland Basin to collect the van. Kids had removed the tape on the towpath and were whizzing up and down on bikes despite the danger. I chose not to go that way.
The streets had a carnival atmosphere, like a huge free bonfire party for the whole community. As I walked I heard a rumble as anothe bit of historic mill tumbled.
Returning with the van I had to take an even longer route as the main Stockport Road was closed. Luckily I know the back streets well. We unloaded the goods from the boat into the van. I parked it up for the night then, after taking a few photos,
I retired to "Forget me Not"s cabin for the night.
In the morning I woke at about 5 AM and made coffee. As i lay in bed enjoying my first brew of the day I could hear intermittent bursts of police radio. I hoped they wouldn't try to stop me returning the boat to her home, as I clearly couldn't leave her there. I felt the boat move as though someone had stepped aboard, then heard a rat tat tat on the cabinside. I stuck me head out and saw a man and a boat. He had made an early start to go to Manchester but "Forget me Not" was blocking the bridgehole. I explained that I wasn't dressed yet. He offered to move the boat. I agreed and, as I dressed, I could feel the hull grinding against the copings as he pulled her backwards.
He tied the boat to the railings of the high level footpath that leads to Guide Bridge Station, at just the right height to decapitate passing cyclists. Luckily there were none and I was soon untied and on my way, kicking up lots of froth, presumably from chemicals washed into the waterway.
I had to walk back from Portland Basin to collect the van. On my way I took some pictures of the smouldering remains being damped down.
