Marina dropped the Go Pro in the canal
Welcome to Cruising Alba
We invite you to join us on our adventure
living off-grid and travelling the UK canal network
I'm Myles and I'm Marina
In the last episode, we hit another bridge
almost had a fire,
arrived into deserted Oxford
and visited the first narrowboat that we stayed on before buying Alba
Today we're leaving canals behind and going on the Thames
Originally we were meant to do a loop with London being the final destination
but after speaking with Ed we were recommended to check out Lechlade
It is the furthest navigable point on the Thames and only a few days away
Going there means ending up in Gloucestershire and checking out more of
the river that we thought would see
And the main reason We're able to do
this is the recent news that Myiles doesn't need to go back into
the office at least until October
(music)
This is our first time in a river lock
We were greeted by a self-service sign
so had to work out how everything works by ourselves
Lucky this lock is electro-hydraulic
All we need to do
is to press a few buttons
The surface of the water was almost
still
perfectly reflecting and doubling up the
gorgeous sky above us
There are 45 locks from the river Thames each is coupled with a wear
these lock and wear combinations are used for controlling the flow of water
Most notably when there is a risk of flooding and provide for navigation
above the tideway
The weirs were built on the Thames in the Middle Ages
to catch fish and to drive water mills
These weirs were an opsticle to
navigation and that's the reason the locks were
built alongside them so the boats could be moved between levels
The next lock was manual the operation principle is the same
but you need to spin the wheel here
We're on our third lock today and but we just found that there is water and
recycling facilities so we're going to use that before going into the third
lock
I made a mistake of putting the camera on the roof of the boat
by the side without attaching it to anything
Well marina dropped the Go Pro in the canal
and had to go and get it
I was trying to moor up and
kind of grabbed the rope and the GoPro was by the side of the rope and it
ended up in the lock
Did you offer to go into the canal?
No
And how did you find that?
Embarrassing because we had an audience
it was cold, it was quite deep, it was hard to get out really hard to
get out of
How did you find it?
well it was where
sort of you said and I thought i'd felt something but i wasn't
sure so I just thought I'd just go down there and
just feel as much as I can because I don't want to kick it all around
So we just arrived and
we left around two o'clock and been cruising for about
three and a half hours and we've done three locks
The river is barely
flowing we can't really feel the current so it
feels really safe and easy
it's just really stunning
also amazing to see people are swimming in it
I went swimming in it today
Myles went swimming as you've seen
previously He's the hero of the day
what we're having for dinner?
We have got tofu korma, smoked tofu korma
with aubergine, mushrooms and cauliflower
Our first sunset on the river ,it's been an eventful day
So far the Thames feels very calm and not much different to being on a canal
It takes a little longer to find mooring spots but nothing like what we imagined
Sweet early mornings on the river it's impossible to be surrounded by such
stillness and not get positively affected by it
If I ever get tired of the sound of our engine on the move
I think of this and that every morning and every night we get to experience
this serenity
First of all, try and hold your mallet properly, you are a bit like
you want to push it away from itself so this way and have some wiggle room at
the front and then a bit sideways and then
it should just pop up
yes yesof course
it's was ready to go! yeah we'll let the viewers decide
i'll do the next one
Yeah there you go High five
Let's get going
(music)
It's really really hot
After this look we're going to try
and more up somewhere and go for a swim
Because it might rain later
(music)
I think i've done it perfectly
(music)
This is the time
It's cold!
Okay, is it easy to come out?
Yeah dead easy
How's that?
Refreshing Yeah?
Yeah loved it! It's not cold!
I like that, good temperature.
You've had lunch!
I've had kind of a had lunch yeah
What do you mean you kind of had a lunch?
You've had a lunch, I've not had a lunch
Right I am always up for lunch I'm up for the second lunch
So it's just started raining outside so we've come inside
We're not moving now we're going to flip the sofa around
into comfort mode
This is entertaining mode where you
friends and family over but
don't like this we need comfort mode
When the rain stopped we continued our
journey
(music)
And these were our first two days in the Thames
So we've done cruising today in two stages
We've got diesel, gas and water so we're all topped up with everything now
Really expensive because we've got it from a marina as well
I've seen no one
on the river apart from one guy who just
said, 'Where is everyone?'
Got the whole place to ourselves
There is about six or seven hours left to Lechlade
which means we're gonna get there either tomorrow or the day after tomorrow
depending on how much cruising we'll do tomorrow
In the next episode, Myles wires up the 12-volt socket
we cruise past some stunning bridges travel in the rain get help in a lock
and arrive in the land of rainbows
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comment if you've done the Thames already
or if you would like to
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See in the next one!