On Manoeuvres
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This was a planned outing with Lucy, the George’s and Burdens’s, and Nicki and I had aimed to travel down through Marlow to Boulters Lock and back. The weather was partly cloudy with the threat of a few light showers and wind speeds of about 15mph and we set off at about 11am, exiting the marina and moving on down to Temple lock. On arrival it looked pretty busy, with a couple of boats in the layby and another three opposite, so we held back with a now well-rehearsed manoeuvre to hold station far enough back to not hinder those exiting the lock. The boats in front locked in and we moved onto the layby, again staying back from the lock exit so that those exiting would not encounter our wall of steel.
A couple of other boats started to circle behind us and suddenly 15 canoes also appeared. Happily they decided to porter around the lock and the space I had left in front meant they could all lift their canoes easily out of the water.
We were next up and went through quite easily – for me this is still the scariest moment although it can also be quite rewarding when it goes well. Next target … Marlow bridge. Quite a good feeling when it looks so tight, but we know we have 8” clearance on the bow flag, which is the highest point for us. Through, and onto Marlow lock, which is quite interesting – there is a strong weir on the right as you approach from the bridge and a layby island to the left of the approach. And this particular day quite a strong breeze was blowing.
What we encountered was the layby already fully populated with about 6 or 7 boats and a couple of amphibious cars hovering near the lock gate, and we decided to hold station again just short of the layby. The bow camera worked a treat so that I could avoid getting too close but I had to contend with the current trying to drag me right towards the weir whilst slightly overwhelmed by a strong breeze trying to push me away from the weir towards the left hand bank and someone’s front garden. The breeze was winning and even with the thrusters now capable of full power, it was a losing battle as my stern moved slowly to the back.
To compound problems, more boats kept arriving. Two narrow boats followed by some small cruisers. The first narrow boat came alongside between me and the weir. I explained that I would have to keep pushing in their direction to avoid grounding myself. It was not a new barge so I assumed they had the capability to manoeuvre accordingly and this did not appear to be a problem. As we were struggling to stay away from the bank, I decided to reverse up a bit and give myself more space. This I did and managed to get into a better holding position. I’m not quite sure if the narrow boat went in front or behind but soon they were on the bank and apparently aground. The second narrow boat manoeuvred around and I thought they were aiming to extract him. When this did not happen I offered our services. A line was duly passed over and just with the bow thruster we pulled it off, but then for some reason he managed to ram us! Luckily there doesn’t appear to be any damage.
However, after a couple more manoeuvres, we decided to turn back if it was going to be this chaotic. It was a bit tight to do a turn at that point because of the number of small craft, the wind and the weir running quite strongly, so we backed up to give ourselves more space. The barge was handling very nicely and I always felt in control (although I think we found our tipping point for the strength of cross wind we can handle, especially on the stern as it is so high). The reversing was going quite well and I was pleased with my level of control so we decided to reverse it all the way back under the bridge and then turn where there was a lot more space – it went really well and I was very pleased with that.
So back up past Marlow. No space to stop for lunch so we headed back to Temple lock and moored up before the layby where we sat and ate while the dogs jumped on and off – as we were close to the dogs’ normal walk, Milly decided to take a stroll in the direction of the Marina, but luckily we noticed before she got too far and brought her back.
Then on through Temple lock, dropping Lucy off at the marina and heading on up to Hurley. By this time there was no traffic to speak of so the rest of the day was more relaxing although I missed all the earlier close-quarter action. Eventually we made it back to the marina, and said goodbye to the rest of our visitors before sorting out a few housekeeping issues with the barge and settling down for the evening. All-in-all, a very good day out.
