What a day - Saved two lives - potentially

There's no photos of today to publish, so I'll post some others later, but first, this:- the (allegedly) unlicensed boat in the photo of yesterdays post, behind TQ, was running his engine quite late in the evening last night. I switched off my engine at 20:oohrs and later during the night I could still hear his engine. During the small hours I woke two or three times and I'm sure I could still hear it running. Sure enough when I opened the back doors there was a tell tale cloud of diesel around the stern of his boat. I thought that engine has definitely been running all night, which worried me. So I strolled up to see if I could see anyone around. Nobody. So I strolled down to Broad Street Tunnel hoping to meet the BW lengths man aboard Aquarius. Luckily enough I did, and explained to him that I was worried about this boaters welfare. We investigated and couldn't find anyone on board. We tried to stop the engine but couldn't hoping this would bring him out wondering why the engine had stopped. The BW guy said he would contact the duty supervisor before taking further action. About an hour later he returned and as he passed TQ someone appeared from the boat. What a relief.

While all this was going on Lin went to visit Brenda and David aboard N B Mr. David moored in Gas Street Basin and having followed their blog for some time she was pleased to finally meet them. Next time we're passing we'll pop in again and say hello. As an aside, whilst chatting to Brenda and David, Lin learned that they had entertained Nigel Kennedy the acclaimed violinist, on their boat. Funny that... we saw him last Monday walking the towpath near Birmingham University. He did speak to us saying we are very lucky to be boat owners.

It didn't stop there, next we came across a narrow boat and a cruiser close to Birmingham University and the cruiser was straddling the cut. We thought a chin wag was going on but it was a lot more serious than that. The cruiser had broken down and the steerer had been in the water. Later we learned he only had one arm (no this is not a joke) and because of this he couldn't get out of the cut. Some passers by David and Maureen were assisting him and managed to get him out of the cut. The poor guy was freezing and may have been suffering from mild shock. David and Maureen organised a change of clothes for him and we towed his boat about quarter of a mile to a place where it could be moored to the pilings. His mate caught up with him at this point and helped him fix his engine, and this is where we had to leave. We offered David and Maureen a lift back to Alvechurch and we stowed their bikes in the cratch and made our way back through Wast Hill Tunnel, and moored right out side their house near the boat yard.

What a day. Chicken curry and a beer beckons. Cheers for now.




Over Stewart Aqueduct BCN Old Main Line

Inside the Black Country Living Museum, new Classic Car Museum

Factory Locks and Lin is struggling with the handcuff key