Hi how you doing? Thank you very much for watching. So this is the River Soar and at this junction,
there's a lock here and it turns into a bit of a, a bit like a canal, but it's still the river
technically. And this is Zouch area. From here I'll carry on past some quite strong
floodgates and a weir and I will head south towards Loughborough today. Hopefully, fingers
crossed it stays nice and dry although it is a little bit windy so, we will see how
we get on. This stretch has loads and loads of moorings. The sides can be quite angled,
so you've got to either have some big fenders or allow your ropes to be a bit looser. Just
across the field, there's a car park. I've left my car there for a number of days, no
problems what so ever. Your'e quite a distance from anywhere, any sort of towns or villages
so theres no problems.
Theres both two weirs here as well as a mechanical one. And as you come around the corner you
can feel the sort of, pull of water, sort of trying to pull you towards the weir. So
my tip is just stay on the port side.
As the weirs here can get very powerful, this section has a flood mooring scheme. If you’re
heading north, one mile up stream there’s a warning board and if the red light is flashing
you must moor up at these emergency dolphins and wait it out.
For now though, the levels were fine.
Once I reached Bishop Meadow Lock, my route turns into a canal again, which is protected
through the town of Loughborough.
The large town has a wide range of supermarkets and facilities within a short distance from
the canal.
In the wharf, which is the closest boats can get to the town centre, there are
bins, a water point, elsan and well maintained and clean shower and toilets.
{This corner is like the Ashby Canal. Will I make it in one turn!}
I wanted a quieter location, so carried on south to just outside the town.
Good morning to a rather, wet and soggy River Soar. This is the canal part of the river
just south of Loughborough. Today's mission is to get to Leicester because the river section
of the River Soar is due to rise over the weekend and there's flooding predicted.
The canal section ends just south of Loughborough at Pillings Lock where it re-joins the River
Soar. The river winds its way between Quorn and Barrow upon Soar and to the east of Mountsorrel
to Sileby lock.
There’d been a lot of rain over the past few days and I was worried I wouldn’t be
able to get out onto the river but the water level was in the green so it was safe to travel.
There’s a small quay just north of Mountsorrel where five individually designed homes
have the style of a traditional 19th-century Dutch village. With open plan living and lots
of energy-saving features, they face the 32 birth inland harbour.
This impressive brick bridge was constructed in 1860 and is Grade II listed. However after
a series of inappropriate repair techniques, the condition of the landmark is cause for
concern. The recent repair work has accelerated the decay rather than reduced it.
Passing the bottom of the weir here, there was a real sense of the water rising as the
current against my narrowboat increased.
In the short period of time that I came down through Mountsorrel to Sileby, I've just got
some fuel here, and the water level has risen quite significantly. When I started, back
on the River Soar it was very much in the green. But I got to Mountsorrel and it was
very much in the red.
The weir here is overflowing like mad so I've got to make the choice of letting the boat
go, let it go across the canal and get up through the lock and them moor up on the lock landing,
because any further water rising, will affect down here more than up there.
To avoid the powerful swirls coming down from the flooded weir I reversed slightly and
then gave Alice a big burst of thrust which pushed her across the current to the lock
landing. The closer I got to the lock, the stronger the current got.
I passed through the lock ok though and moored up until the levels dropped, on a calmer stretch
just beyond the landing.
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