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Narrowboat Chartering in England and Wales

Narrowboat Chartering in England and Wales

Five years ago, boating friends from our yacht club hosted us at their family’s vacation home in Florida. While watching the British television show, Midsomer Murders, we discovered the U.K. phenomenon of canal narrowboats, and we all agreed that we should try it someday. At upwards of 70 feet in length by only 6 feet, 10 inches in width—with two to 12 berths, and steered via outboard tiller, they seemed completely crazy, and yet intriguing.

And so, after months of research on routes and types of boats available, our friends joined us for a two-week charter on the Welsh border in September. Our boat, Garnet, was a 60-footer, with a reverse galley and salon aft, two “private” cabins and two private heads—each with a shower. We chartered her from one of the larger companies, Anglo Welsh, which claims to have 150 boats available from 9 locations scattered around the U.K.

Narrowboats are usually 6 feet 10 inches wide, and most bridges are only 9 feet wide!

Animal-drawn narrowboats came into fashion in the mid-1700s, when the British government started building a huge network of canals all across the country to facilitate the shipment of goods at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. As Britain is not a flat island, the great lengths of canals built needed a large number of locks included to facilitate the raising and lowering of the boats and their valuable cargo. The standard lock width was about 7 feet, meaning that boats could have a maximum beam of 6 feet, 10 inches. The canals were usually built to slightly more than double that width, allowing for two-way travel. Today, that network is mostly still in existence, despite a lengthy period of disuse after steam power—and then the internal combustion engine—made long-distance travel by rail and road much faster than over water.

Until recently, Britain’s charitable Canal and River Trust received some government funding to help maintain the 2,000 miles of waterways for tourism. Yet a newfound lack of financial support is today evident in the uncontrolled growth of weeds and overhanging trees and bushes along some stretches.

Still, there are many different routes available for chartering today, and a large number of reputable charter companies. One can choose a circular route on the main canals (including Oxford or Stratford-Upon-Avon, for example), or countless out-and-back trips to view spectacular sights and experience a slower pace of life dating back 200 years. The speed limit on today’s canals is just 4 mph, which could feel slow, and perhaps monotonous for some. Fortunately, canals typically adjoin towns, and there are good opportunities to moor up for the night and enjoy the food and drink of fine pubs. And happily, British pubs have learned to serve beer at a more amenable (chilled) temperature in recent years.

Our party of four flew to London for a few days preceding the beginning of our charter to help get over the time difference. As the son of a World War II RAF bomber pilot, I made it my secret mission on this trip to find the world’s best sausage roll. Every train station, corner shop and bakery in England has them on offer, so my work was made easy—or so I thought.

Taking the train from London to the small town of Whitchurch near the Welsh border the day before we were scheduled to board our charter, we spent the night in a lovely old inn with a pub. The next morning was given to provisioning at a large grocery store. After that, a pre-booked minivan ferried us, our overly large luggage (yes, one of us had packed as if for an arctic expedition) and whatever food we thought would fit aboard Garnet the 8 miles to a somewhat-isolated charter marina.

We’re experienced boaters, but were still given a brief introduction to the boat and her systems then sent on our Merry-Olde-English way. Narrowboats are generally heated, but NOT air-conditioned. Hull-wise, they’re flat-bottomed with a shallow draft (usually a little over 2 feet), but their slow speeds don’t make this much of an issue. The standard canal boat engine is diesel, typically 20 to 40 horespower. As the boats are steel-hulled, they’re exceptionally heavy (up to 20 tons or more), especially aft, so the judicious use of additional power is sometimes required to get them to round sharper corners.

The canals often have lots of weed growth, so the boats have a weed hatch, which must be checked periodically for buildup around the propeller. And the stuffing box needs to be greased manually (just a few easy turns on the built-in unit) every night to stem the constant leak which develops daily. But don’t let all this deter you: No specific mechanical knowledge or experience is needed to run a narrowboat.

Our initial plan was to head west into Wales, crossing the spectacular aqueducts of Chirk and Pontcysyllte. We motored “uphill,” gaining about 100 feet of elevation over several miles, through a canal of ever-decreasing width and increasing current. We also transited two single-width tunnels (600 feet and 1,500 feet), where care must be taken not to run into traffic. As this line was a dead end at the town of Llangollen (you can also take a steam train ride from here). We spent the night in the local mooring facility and availed ourselves of a fine local establishment called The Corn Mill for supper. Views of this typical Welsh valley were beautiful and quaint.

Heading back “downhill” the next morning, we stopped briefly at the town of Ellesmere to re-provision, then began motoring east along the full length of the Llangollen Canal, with the end goal of getting up the Shropshire Union Canal to the old town of Chester. As we began encountering locks and manual-lift bridges, this slowed our progress somewhat. Views along our route were pleasantly quiet and pastoral, with plenty of farms and their related livestock (mainly cows and sheep). The days passed leisurely as we idled down the canals. It was impossible to overlook the incredible sense of history we found everywhere. Many of the smallest villages have churches dating back almost 800 years.

While our research (and the materials provided by the charter company) had indicated we would easily be able to manage this full out-and-back itinerary in two weeks, we quickly realized that this would require motoring from 8 a.m. to about 6 p.m. every single day—more work than vacation, in our eyes. And so we decided to punt. We made it about 5 miles up the Shropshire Union Canal and found a perfect mooring spot right beside the Barbridge Inn, with a gourmet dining room that served the best meat pie I’d ever eaten. The next morning, we walked about 300 yards to catch the bus into Chester, a ride of about 45 minutes.

Chester is a walled city renowned for its preponderance of Tudor-era wood-frame and stucco buildings in the downtown core, and we were not disappointed. We soon took note of, and began questioning the reason for, the large crowd of people in fancy dress. It was about noon on a Saturday, so I ventured that there might be a wedding or two on offer. But we soon realized it had to be something much larger, as the well-dressed throng literally grew into the thousands. A local constable provided the answer: An important day of racing was scheduled at the horse track just across the river. We ate pastries, drank the local ale, and eventually took the bus back to our boat for another great meal at the Barbridge Inn.

Some canals pass right through the center of main towns, including London and Manchester.

The next day, we moved the boat about 10 miles southward, to the old Cheshire town of Nantwich. More provisioning was followed by a tasty dinner at the wood-framed Crown Hotel. We then spent our final three days slowly working our way back to our starting point, the Anglo Welsh base back at Whixall’s large marina.

After returning the boat, we headed into Manchester for a couple of days of sightseeing. Being of a certain age, we made sure to include a tour of the outdoor sets belonging to Coronation Street, one of our favorite British television series, before flying back home from Manchester Airport.

What did we learn, and what advice would we give to those considering a narrowboat charter in the U.K.? Research available routes, and after you’ve chosen one, order the requisite Collins/Nicholson Waterways Guidebook covering that route. Ours provided exceptionally detailed information on our itinerary, and maps on a scale that made it easy to see (and plan for) upcoming landmarks and features. It also offered excellent advice on restaurants, pubs and shopping locations for our route, as well as freshwater access points and pump-out facilities. Get a good map of the area you want to traverse, and make a plan—either before the trip, or at least the night before—of a reasonable distance to cover on each day. Good mooring locations can go quickly, especially during the high season when children are out of school. We were also told that wait times to traverse flights of locks during the busy season can be as long as four to five hours. We chartered during the middle two weeks of September when the crowds were fewer and the weather milder, and we generally got moving by 9 or 10 a.m., settling in for the evening by 3 or 4 p.m.

Flights of locks required planning and diplomacy, working with other boaters traveling in both directions. Thankfully, the larger flights (four or more locks linked together) often have volunteers on hand to help newbies and old salts alike. In the end, we traveled somewhere around 80 miles during our two weeks and transited 42 locks. The fastest speed the boat is allowed to travel might best be described as that of a military march. Even though the canal speed limit was 4 mph, we found we typically were able to average only about 2 mph because of the many narrow bridges, sharp (and often blind) bends and the hundreds of locks on the canal system.

The locks are of exactly the same sort as we have in North America (think the Erie, Trent-Severn, or Rideau Canals), but are all self-operated. If a lock is empty when you arrive, two crew are dropped off just before it to manage the passage. If the water in the lock is already at the appropriate level, the gates are opened, the boat enters and the entry door is closed. Sluice gates are opened (again using hand-cranked mechanisms), and the water level is matched (up or down) to the exit side of the lock. The exit gates are opened, the sluices are closed and the boat leaves, picking up its crew a short distance away.

With boats traveling at very slow horse-drawn speeds, the canals always follow a towpath on land, so it’s easy for one or more crew to jump ashore anytime and walk alongside to get some exercise.

The boats are all equipped with a real marine galley, ours having what we would call a bar fridge (with small freezer), and a four-burner gas stove with oven. Cooking and cleaning up were shared amongst all of us, but it is incumbent on everyone to do their proper part of the work. For overseas clients, Anglo Welsh provided both bedding and towels. Water for drinking and cooking was a constant issue and had to be replenished often. We have always been wary of drinking out of a boat’s freshwater tanks, and only consume bottled water when we are on any boat (especially including cruise ships). So every visit to a grocery store ended with several of us lugging at least one gallon jug of water back to the boat. The freshwater tank was large enough to last the four of us a few days, with (marine) showers severely rationed. Our full fuel tank was more than enough to last a week, as were the separate holding tanks (one for each head). But on our two-week charter, these were issues that had to be addressed. We refueled once, filled the water tank every few days and pumped-out twice. Public water and pump-out stations are found along the main canals, and marinas also provide these services.

When mooring up for the night in open country, try to stay out from under trees and away from farm animal watering holes (they attract vast numbers of insects, and the odors can be…interesting).

Our charter company, Anglo Welsh, will rent any of their boats to any responsible adult, regardless of their boating experience and they will provide a bit of basic instruction in boat handling before letting you loose on other unsuspecting boaters. We were genuinely surprised by this, given the tiny canal width available. It was not an uncommon occurrence to scrape the hull on stone walls while traversing extra-narrow bits, something which we intensely disliked but came to expect at certain points. The charter company overlooked all minor scrapes and paint scratches, thankfully. And given the extent of weed growth in many canals (which often narrowed them to single-lane travel), we found it wise to post a lookout on the bow, as they would see around bends before the helmsman could, and provide advance warning of oncoming traffic. The technique of pumping the tiller improved the turning performance at sharp bends.

Consider spending time looking online at the various charter companies and their offerings, giving special consideration to the layout of each boat and how it compares to your needs. We give Anglo Welsh our highest possible recommendation for customer service. Each time we stopped at one of their locations, we were provided with everything that we asked for; no request was considered too small for their staff to accommodate. Even when it came to simply berthing or doing a U-turn (neither of which was insignificant, in such a long and narrow craft).

There are ample narrowboat videos available on YouTube, and that’s a great way to better understand how they handle and what they’re like to charter. So, after three weeks in the U.K., did I actually find the world’s best sausage roll? Let’s just say that I ate some very good ones—and one really BAD one, and that my search continues. Would we do it all again? Unequivocally, yes.

This article originally appeared in the January 2025 issue of Power & Motoryacht magazine.

View the original article to see embedded media.

Source: https://www.powerandmotoryacht.com/voyaging/narrowboat-chartering-in-england-and-wales

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