 I
am sorry to be so smug but I feel I have to tell you how well our latest
bit of horseboating went. We had two day’s worth, bringing the restored
Shropshire Union boat Saturn from her winter moorings on the
Montgomery Canal up to Ellesmere, ready to start her season’s
commitments. We used ‘Buddy’ the good-natured and handsome boathorse
from
Bywater Horsedrawn Cruises at Welshpool
to help to settle him in to work again after a lazy winter.
The weather was cold and blustery, although not quite
as bad as the forecasts had predicted for us, and it remained dry, and
as it was so early in the boating season and we had the double bonus of
the canal virtually to ourselves. Why double? Because we had the
pleasure of the empty countryside unsullied by the roar of
schedule-chasing hireboats combined with the much-reduced problem of
getting the towline over moored boats on the towpath.
When a horse drawn canal boat is under way, without
impediment, it is a deeply satisfying and peaceful process. The pace is
steady and the quietness relaxing – nature’s soundscape embroidered with
the creak of the harness, the hoofbeats on the towpath and the hiss of
the bow-wave. One can easily be seduced into a sense of eternal
equilibrium by the gentle swaying of the cotton towline brushing the
tops of the reeds but it can be a dangerous delusion. That towline is a
tight hawser between ten ton of oak and iron and a ton of powerful
horseflesh, the whole caboodle tramping along at two or three miles an
hour. Any thing that gets between the two is in trouble whether it’s a
person or a bike on a boat roof. Thinking ahead, and keeping that
towline out of trouble is the main challenge for the horse boat crew.
In days of yore it was a two person job, one looking
after the horse and line whilst the other steered the boat. But the
canal was a different place in those historic days when everybody was
familiar with horses and the canal was maintained with that towline
always in mind. The towpath and canal edge was kept clear of
obstructions of any sort and boats were only allowed to moor on the
offside of the canal, except in designated places. The top of the boat
was kept clear and tidy, with the mop handle up on the watercan to bring
any passing boat’s line up to the steerer’s hand to lift it over the
chimney. Basically everybody in that insular commercial world knew what
they were doing, which is rather different to today’s leisure industry.
Today’s first time hirers have often done nothing but watch a video
before they get to their first lock. Now that is really dangerous.
So horseboating today requires a much bigger crew. We
have one person ahead to warn oncoming pedestrians and boats that we are
coming, and coming without instant brakes. Some boaters need reminding
that they need to pass on the offside, away from the towline – never
mind the ‘always-pass-on-the-right’ rule they have had drummed into
them. Some moored boats can be asked to take down their damned
television aerials before we get there but it is often simpler to
unhitch the line and drift past. So we need someone else on the boat by
the towing mast to pull in the line or reconnect it. The horse driver
needs to concentrate on the safety of the horse so ideally they need an
extra crewman with them to keep an eye on the line. They watch out for
untraditional obstructions and lift it over moored boats with the aid of
a short shaft with a pronged end, which can be a killer of a job after a
while. Hence my opening remark about the bonus of operating on an almost
deserted canal this early in the season.
The trip was not without its challenges of course, but
it wouldn’t be very satisfying canal boating without them would it?
Buddy is a big horse and Maesbury Marsh bridge is quite low so we
hand-hauled the boat into the bridge and pulled it against the towpath
whilst he delicately walked through on the coping stones. We were lucky
that all the vegetation on the towpath side has been recently cut down,
but unfortunately it hasn’t been done very well in places so one is left
with short tough thorny bushes instead of a clear bank, a real
line-catching hazard. But so long as the horse keeps going and the line
remains tight everything works well. The same vigilance was needed over
some appallingly installed steel piling where the tops stick up
unequally and untidily. Difficult to believe that the early B.W. piling
gangs took such pride in their work that they entered a national
competition each year, with the results proudly reported in the house
magazine. The bridge at Queens Head is a bit of a pain too because the
sharp angled approach and the high safety railings means you can’t get
the horse under the bridge, and he had to be walked over the main road
instead. A bit more forethought with historical hindsight would have
helped… And in line with the rest of the country each lock is growing a
crop of mooring bollards-cum-strapping posts. Unfortunately they are
almost universally in the wrong place as far as horseboating is
concerned -- on the offside of the lock and too close to the gates to
use to slow the boat in the traditional way. It is saddening that so
much traditional practical canal knowledge is so misinterpreted, or
simply ignored.
All in all however the trip was a pleasure, a
satisfying couple of days for a team of disparate people taking part in
little historical re-enactment to learn and ultimately demonstrate an
important piece of canal history. But the big problem remains – how can
we actually meaningfully demonstrate this history and pleasure to more
people, safely and accurately? We’ve got the rudiments of the knowledge
but finding or engineering situations to show it off to the public and a
younger generation becomes more difficult as the waterways change. This
is surely the biggest challenge that faces
the Saturn
Project and almost anyone passionate about the reality of canal
history.
©Tony
Lewery,
The Brow,
Ellesmere,
4th April 2009
All images courtesy Jez Inglis.
We've'
a full section on
Horse Drawn Boating written by Tony
Lewery.
Saturn
attends canal events and schools displays across the north west canal
system. There are full details of Saturn and her cruising
on the Saturn Project website. |
