hello i'm just about to go through a swing bridge on this stretch of the aire and calder
it's actually the last bit of the aire and calder for me because then i'll be joining
the river calder itself and then i think afterwards the calder and hebble but it is
a route i've never done before so it's all new including this bridge itself which is right by
the facilities here so the other side from where i am there's water there's a pump out elsan
the rubbish facilities are where i've actually parked my truck by by the stanley ferry pub
so uh yeah it's i can see why there's so many boats here!
it's nearing the end of the day and well, for a winter day it's almost half three so the light
is starting to fade now - i'm just wondering about this next section of the navigation this
red light here by the lock blinking away at me tells me that i'm not allowed to go through
it's because the river level is too high and although that looks absolutely fine i'd be very
happy to go out on that my insurance company would say otherwise they'd say i wouldn't be covered if
something went wrong so i'm going to see what it's like the next morning there's always plenty to do
on a narrowboat and in this case i just want to get the fire going so i can warm up a bit
i've got some wood that i've been collecting it's usually had a bucket over the top to keep it dry
i'm just going to get inside and chill out but also warm up
who needs youtube when you could just look at a lovely fire blazing away please still keep
watching youtube otherwise i'm out of a job just before going to bed i checked the water levels
to see what they were doing it seemed like they were dropping so i reckon we're on for tomorrow
so that water level that needs to be on before i can open the gates so my first thing to do is to
open the sluices which is just up there
gates open water level lock ready
i've got to go back and get my keys
right there we go back to cranking it
so
this is quite something because i'm just passing under a bridge
whilst the train that supplies a power station is going over
that's great i mean i really do feel right in the middle of all the industry right now
dilapidated warehouses... the chimney there, that's no longer being used but then you've
got all this digging that's going along around the navigation here and that train that just went over
i just love that mix of yeah things not working are things working anyway now we're coming up to
Fall ing lock which is the second of our locks on this journey and if i just reach down and
reduce my revs a little bit there yeah it's um going to be another quite squat lock...
squat lock why does that sound weird i don't know i actually feel like i've
done this before i've done some of the calder and hebble before definitely but
i'm getting a sort of sense of deja vu in a way now we're probably all living in a
simulation anyway and uh you know i've been here before but i just have my mind erased
i've had the program reset so you know forgot and it's all just a computer game imagine that!!
there aren't any lights on this lock telling me whether i can go in or not because it's
completely manual so i'm going to do some hard work now which is good because it is freezing cold
and then just to warm up the extremities stop my hands freezing up this is great exercise
there's a sign just over there saying welcome to the aire and calder navigation so this must mean
that i'm just about to join the calder and hebble which goes on for 21 and a half miles to sowerby
bridge so this is exciting because i've never been on this bit before even though i do get that
deja vu feeling yeah i can't remember where i've been most days that's why i make these videos!
this lock is actually a lot longer than i was expecting... this gives me more time to slow down
but reversing is difficult i've done a lot of it i'll admit the design of a propeller
is not something that i would be able to recreate myself but as i understand it they are designed
for going forwards and not backwards and that is why it takes my boat certainly a long time
to slow down because there are no such thing as brakes on a narrow boat it's the reverse
sticking it into reverse that's how you slow down anyway for me i want to speed up and keep warm
but i can't pass this area without mentioning this little disused cut that i found and there's an old
cut lock there you can see and even better from the drone if we fly up high we can see the lock
i'm going through and the main river calder you can see here but next to it we can see another cut
that was made and i don't have much information on this but i can see an old lock there and the cut
itself seems to join up next to this 14th century chapel which we'll see a bit more of later on
from where my boat moored up before going into the lock this is all you can see
from the riverside itself we've got a lot of polish brothers and sisters living here
in the uk and on this lock there are some uh messages that they've kindly left for us
um i'm not sure exactly what that says as i don't speak any sort of eastern european languages
but i'm pretty sure that says 'we love the canals' yeah oh and uh 'we fully support the canal river
trust' and on this side it says 'we really really like the blue signs' well that is controversial
i much prefer these black and white signs um well let's not get into politics but uh it's
funny name innit Fall Ing Bridge and Fall Ing lock does that mean it's going to fall down on me or uh
that's a terrible joke robert um no it's actually an ancient language uh norse it's old nordic
Ing means meadow or a marsh
so that makes sense with us being on the river and fall as in rise and fall there we go!
i'm just being helped through this lock but yeah now on the calder and heavily navigation
that's bloody well crank it!
tell you what it doesn't pay to be shy because if you don't talk to local people like dave
here who's uh helping me not only help me through his lock but also telling me about
everything that's coming up for me um what to look out for where to moor
facilities wise what's going on so um yeah i keep saying it always talk to people
don't yeah don't shut yourself off because yeah you might be missing out FOMO!
loads and loads of rings here for mooring
but i have been advised not to leave my boat on its own here and i do now
need to leave my boat so i can go back and visit my family who do not live on my boat
72 hour max and i'm gonna stick it over the side there where i've been told it's a bit safer anyway
and so here i am leaving my boat right in the middle of wakefield itself and i actually
feel quite good about it it's overlooked by some houses i've got plenty of geese these canada geese
guarding the boat with their um droppings basically so ii think this is all good - so
i take my pick up and drive back and then return a week later on the train...
i'm just looking out the window this morning weather does not look great
it's rainy it's cold and it's yeah it's actually a bit windy as well
so i just have to see how i get on today i need to move the boat because i'm a continuous cruiser
i can't stay moored in one place for longer than well the maximum is normally two weeks
um last night it was pretty cold on board and i actually slept next to the fire
on my on my sofa bed which i didn't have to pull out because it's just me on board today
but i'm just glad my fire's roaring away today at least i've got that to fall back
on when it gets too cold outside just come back inside and warm warm up again
the first lock is a flood lock which means it should be open so i can just go straight
out and turn left not right but it's shut which means the water level's too high on the river
and i'm just going to have to stay put
so i thought well i'll change into me city clothes look at that it's like a male model look at him
um i'm going to explore wakefield there's the hepworth gallery and then there's the chantry
bridge this is a really incredibly old bridge built in 1200s and a tiny chapel there's only four
of these type of chapels in the country and this one was built in the 14th century and you can get
married here a couple of boaters i know of have actually tied the knot inside that very building
just across from an empty shop i see another piece of architecture and it's the cathedral here
this is the home of Noel Gay's 'doing the lambeth walk' and look at it look look i'm doing the
lambeth walk almost a little bit of an 'oi ok' cockney vibe going on there (i did live in london
for six years) lots of pigeons there if you're a geek or a nerd it looks like you're welcome in
wakefield as this little gaming cafe shows but also as it's home of britain's biggest model
railway on this thing it's quite impressive but i did feel like it was half finished so they've
got some uh yeah some extra bits to complete but for the most part i was blown away by the details
this all seems to be rooted in the 70s or 80s so yeah and i just loved seeing a train going over
same navigation that my boat is on and that's where i'm gonna have to leave you moored outside
the ruddy duck which looks a little bit like this it is some wicked food in here as displayed by my
friends angie john and scott who's having a jam roly-poly lovely stuff thanks for watching bye