18 November 2017 Canal Boat canalboat.co.uk
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CONVERSATIONMore from my walk up the Erewash
#Canal at Ilkeston following @IWA
Diane Richardson @DianeSmoilerI saw the amazing Pontcysyllte Aqueduct
yesterday! #llangollen #riverdee #wales
Stanley Kaye-Smith
@StanleyKayeSmitDifferent day, another nice sunrise
this morning!
Journey with Jono @journeyjonoThe photograph taken by 13-year-old Rory Gibbs
(CB, Oct) reminded me of Wolverhampton
Rendezvous, a painting by Birmingham-born
renowned railway artist Philip D Hawkins (above).
The 1950s scene shows a bridge crossing
the flight of locks on the BCN Wolverhampton
section running down to the Staffs & Worcs canal
at Aldersley Junction.
On the bridge there’s a mighty Great Western
Railway Castle Class railway engine. Beneath and in
the lock is BWB boat Atlas. It appears that the crew
of Earl of Dudley are passing the time of day with the
husband and wife crew of Atlas.
The boatman’s faithful towing horse is seen
enjoying a short rest as the sheeted-up boat passes
through the lock.
The boat is in the familiar yellow and blue livery
introduced by British Waterways at the time of
nationalisation in 1948.
DAVE COOPER, via emailA canal and railway painting of pure class
Don’t tip the ashes while they’re still hot
Having just spent the summer down on the River
Nene and Great Ouse it was quite a shock to get
back onto the canals and find it so busy, it shows
the system is being well used.
With summer so suddenly over and the onset of
autumn upon us, it’s always lovely to finally have an
excuse to light the stove and warm the boat as the
nights start to turn chilly.
This is the reason for my letter. I have just had
to put out a fire caused by the carelessness of
a fellow boater, who put his hot ashes into the
hedgerow and then pulled away with just a cursory
backwards glance.
Not much later, we noticed billowing smoke and
flames coming from the area. A mad dash, bucket
in hand, it took several minutes to finally put out thefire and dampen the surrounding area enough to
know that it would not start up again. I cannot think
of any reason why the boater concerned didn’t just
cover the hot ashes in water himself, with the aim of
making them safe, even better, use an ash bucket
and let them cool and dispose of them safely at a
later date.
I would be grateful if you could highlight the
importance for vigilance and the use of common
sense when it comes to the discarding of hot ashes
on the side of the cut.
It was only by sheer luck we were still moored up
and had noticed it before it got out of hand, as the
fire had potential to spread rapidly due to the
strong breeze.
TONY SKELLING, nb Lottie Jane