Monday 8 September 2008

The kindness of boaters

In my disappointment over veg oil, I forgot to post about meeting Peter from narrowboat Ehawee (think that's how it's spelt). We'd met once before on the Middlewich branch and seeing me struggling up the Wolverhampton 21, Peter stopped off on his bike and helped work me through the remaining 16 locks! I was so thankful as I was going so slowly. As any single handed boater will tell you, it's not that actual locking that takes time, it's the tying up to open and close lock gates. Peter cycled to and fro like a dervish.
I felt horribly lazy on the boat while he worked the locks and we talked about 'give and take' and how hard it is to sit back and take! I'm much happier doing the giving ;-)
I know I sometimes meet complete sods on the canals, but there are also some pretty lovely angels out there too. x

1 comment:

Simon said...

I was really grateful to have Brigid with me for those - her first locks, as well, we worked them together initially, then Brigid tried a few on her own - it's funny, being on the boat while someone else does the work, I know what you mean, even if it works out quicker that way...

The day we did it, a few people were walking down from Wolverhampton station to the IWA thingy, and stopped to help (including at least one who'd brought his windlass). There's lots of helpful people out there.

Lovely exchange this morning - a single handed boater stopped to work out how to do the lift bridge I was near, and about to come through too. he lifted it for me, then I lifted it for him... ;-)