Dewsbury
The marina at Dewsbury lies tucked away in a corner of Savile Town and boasts the Leggers Inn and the Old Stables Cafe, between them they provide a great service with the former supplying a good range of real ales and the latter one of the largest breakfasts we have eaten in a long while.
Dewsbury itself has suffered the neglect of many towns of this type and is now a faded shadow of its former, wealthy self. It does provide all the services one requires with two large supermarkets and a railway station within walking distance of the marina. Dewsbury was once famous for its large market, we had never visited it during its heyday but quite enjoyed exploring it in its current guise.
During our time here we decided to explore the local area, we found Ossett to have quite a nice town center, with quite a few traditional and local shops huddled around the marketplace.
We have family living in Dewsbury, Tony and Margaret, and they had suggested a lovely old pub in the valley below Ossett, The Brewers Pride, this is an Ossett Brewery establishment and supplies great beer and food, the four of us visited a couple times and I particularly enjoyed their home made pies, another great pub and thoroughly recommended.
During our time here we had visits from many of our friends and family often partaking in the breakfast or lunches in the Old Stables.
As the New Year unfolded we decided to take a weeks holiday in Tenerife towards the end of January, during our time abroad news began filtering through about a virus that had been detected in China and that they were desperately trying to contain its spread. Who could have believed what was about to unfold.
On our arrival home and having spent a great weekend with friends Pat and Ian, who came over in their motorhome to stay on the caravan site adjacent to the marina, we began to plan our departure and commence our travels for the year.
Finally seeing a gap in the continuing wind and rain we decided to leave on the Sunday morning, it was great to get underway again and we travelled down to the Navigation in bellow Horbury passing through the locks, including the Figure of Three Locks that were soon to hit the headlines. We tied up below Broad Cut top lock on a pleasant early February afternoon.
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| Looking back along the Dewsbury Arm |
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We had to stay put here the following day due to high winds and heavy rain, the wind became so strong during the night that Scruff could not settle with the boat rocking in the wind, thunder and lashing rain.
Tuesday brought a quieter spell in the weather so I walked down to check the river level below Broad Cut low lock, here the canal drops onto the river Calder, and thankfully the level had dropped to amber, having checked that the flood gates at Thornes cut were open, we decided to move onto Stanley Ferry.
We spent the night here, moving on the next morning to Woodlesford, travelling along the Calder to its confluence with the Aire at Castleford. We turned left here turning into the winter flow of the Aire and battled our way up to the large lock at Lemonroyd and onto the relative safety of the Aire and Calder canal. Quickly reaching Woodlesford we tied up and settled down for a quieter night.
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| Entering the cavernous lock at Lemonroyd |
We had originally intended to spend a bit of time here but the forecast was for more bad weather and a severe storm for the weekend so, with another short section of river between us and the sanctuary of the Leeds Liverpool canal, we decided to head for the basin at Granary Wharf just above the river in the city centre.
On the approach to river lock we caught the tiller arm on a chain that had been secured top and bottom, the flow of the river was pushing the boat into the lock so I put the boat into reverse, unfortunately I was unable to prevent the tiller from being bent.
It turned out to be a wise decision as Storm Ciara blasted its way into the country that weekend, the wind was horrendous, not helped by the tall buildings surrounding us, the wind here swirls around in all directions. The wind was accompanied by torrential rain with severe flooding hitting the county, the river in Leeds reached its highest level since the catastrophic floods of 2015, thankfully the new flood alleviation scheme protected the city centre but others further downstream were not so lucky.
The wind continued and we decided to change our booked passage upto Rodley to try and avoid the worst of the weather. We had originally planned to travel on the Wednesday but the forecast was bad so we delayed it until the Thursday. The weather improved enough for us to make the trip up to Kirkstall to await passage the following lunchtime.
The locks were opened on time and we were soon on our way passing through the triple staircase locks at Kirkstall Forge and Newlay to arrive at Rodley mid afternoon.
During our trip up the lock keepers told us about damage that had occurred at the Figure of Three locks that we had passed through a couple of weeks ago. The river Calder had flooded and breached the river banks bursting through into the pound between the two locks. The inrush destroyed the pound and lower lock closing the canal for the next twelve months.
The extent of the damage can be seen here
We were aware that the canal was closed between at Calverley for repairs to a leak, this was scheduled to be complete a couple of weeks after our arrival here.
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| Repairs underway at Calverley |
Further rain and storms arrived and the works to the canal were extended for a couple of weeks until the middle of March.
We enjoyed our time here and caught up with friends and family, spending some good nights in the nearby Railway Hotel and The Fleece up in Horsforth.
As the middle of March approached the seriousness of the outbreak of the Covid virus was beginning to strike home with several countries entering lockdown, we decided to avoid pubs and other places attracting close contact. Our final pub visit was a Sunday Lunch at the Railway with all our close family. The following Monday we were joined by Lucia's friend, Angela, who travelled up to Apperley Bridge with us. We had called the marina to see if we could get a mooring for a spell at least until the effect of the virus became apparent. Thankfully they were able to accomodate us so we settled in to see where we were all heading. It was during a short trip to Bristol that the full lockdown was announced so we quickly returned to the boat, eleven weeks later we are still here.
It was with great sadness that we had to say bye to Scruff who had become more unable to walk and had developed a bad cough, the vet told us that she had fluid around her heart and lungs and was struggling to breathe.
Following the damage to the boat in Leeds we arranged to go up to Skipton for repairs, however we were unable to do this as Canals and Rivers Trust have closed the locks between Bingley and Wigan to preserve water. We were anxious to get the boat out of the water to establish the extent of the damage to the tiller so we rearranged a lift out at Gallows Bridge Boatyard.
We had emailed, phoned and discussed our intention to travel from the marina to Shipley with Canals and Rivers, pointing out that we needed to get the tiller checked as we were concerned that it could fail.
The locks that we were required to pass through were all open to we decided to set off on monday 4th May, all went well until we reached the new electric swing bridge at Dockfield Road. The bridge would not operate so we called CRT for assistance, this resulted in a plethora of calls back questioning why we were moving the boat against the lockdown rules, eventually they decided to come and help us through.
We reached the boatyard just in time to be able to be lifted out, I have produced a short video of our time here. We were delighted with the service we received at the yard, the team here made us welcome and were very accomodating, they also provide a full engineering services with all resources on site.
The following is a link to a video I made of our time in the yard https://youtu.be/I9ruwL3m5-Q
Once back in the water we returned to continue lockdown, we have also made the decision to keep our mooring here until next spring just in case the impact of the virus continues, we will of course get out and about on the boat when conditions allow.
Take care everyone and keep safe.
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| Scruff enjoying one of the many adventures we have been on together |
