Singing out loud.

One of my winter pastimes, when I am let off painting and decorating and gardening (when weather allows) is to go singing in a choir. This year since being home I have joined a second one too. I am not known in the family as a singer, I don't even sing in the shower so I didn't even think of my self as one either but a few years ago, when free of work, I just decided that I fancied a try. I had sung in Gang Shows with the scouts and auditioned for a part in a local production of 'Oliver' for which I achieved the dizzy accolade of second reserve boy! Does anybody else remember Ralph Reader? I have just looked him up and it seems that  he had a life long passion for the Scout Movement and produced Gang Shows from the mid 1930's to the mid 1970's, and even found time for a bit of 'spying' during the war years,

I found a choir that allowed you to just turn up and pay weekly rather than by the term as I knew that we would be on the boat for much of the year. This choir, Hull Community Voices, is a natural voice singing group and luckily takes all standards of singing. Few of the songs are in English and there is no music, everything is acapella. The  words are learned line by line with often no words written down and just picked up by repetition. I find it truly amazing that after about 30 mins there can be some beautiful four part harmonies that sound lovely. Some of the trainers just push you to just go for it after hearing the words and tune a couple of times. Being brave and trying it with no real preparation certainly means that you become more blase about making mistakes but certainly means that you have a great sense of achievement when it goes well.

http://hullcommunityvoices.org.uk/

This year when we came home from the boat Helen saw that another local choir (that I didn't know existed) were looking for male singers. This seems to be a bit of a problem to lots of choirs. A shortage of males means that a certain depth to the sound of mixed choirs is missing. In Hull Community Voices there are about 3 or 4 men regularly attend. My new choir is the Holderness Grange Choir. Holderness Grange is one of those 'Lifestyle' (retirement) places that is just round the corner so is very handy. I called them up and I was invited to go along before the next meeting for a chat. The chat turned in to an audition! She then asked what my prepared tune was!!! I umm'd and ah'd a little and then started out on 'We are Riding Along on the Crest of a Wave', a song I remembered from my Gang Show days. I could have still done the actions if they had wanted me to it was that well ingrained. Anyway they let me stay despite me saying that I would only be around until April. They told me that I would be singing the bass parts and would stand on the end. This choir have two series of concerts each year. Christmas and Summer. Once one has finished they start on learning for the next concerts. I had come in more than half way through the practices for the Christmas concerts. This choir have the words and music. I found this confusing at first as there were lines and lines of stuff, most of which I didn't need. I had come in too late to be taught the bass part so I had to pick it up where I could. John, who I stand next to, was easy to follow so it wasn't too bad and soon I was in the swing of it. Our last concert is tonight. I have to wear a black shirt and trousers and a cream tie and I must say we look quite smart.

It is no good looking for me as I'm not on this one. There are some of the choirs songs on You Tube if you are that interested. (not with my dulcet tones adding weight though).

It seems that singing is good for you in many ways. The controlled breathing is much the  same as the techniques used in yoga. This makes you relax and has benefits for the heart. There are obvious cardiovascular benefits of expanding your lung capacity as more oxygen in means that your heart doesn't have to work so hard. Being in a choir is much better than singing alone as you have to listen to the rest to make sure that you are in time. It will tone up any sagging facial muscles as you will be using them more. Emotionally it reduces stress, increases feelings of well being and gets you mixing socially with its benefits.

In South Yorkshire and North Derbyshire there is a tradition of carol singing in pubs from mid November. It seems that this came about in the puritan times when the rousing and joyful hymns and carols were banned from the churches. These are of course the songs that most like to singing. The voices migrated to the pubs where, after suitable lubrication they belted forth the banned tunes. This tradition is still going on and if you check on http://www.localcarols.org.uk/index.php you will be able to find out where they are singing now. There is often a brass band in attendance too making it a great reason to go and find them.

We are off to Holy Trinity Church in Hull for their Nine lessons and Carols service, but I'm pretty sure we will find a pint somewhere afterwards.

The Pictures.

Over the last couple of weeks we have been to the 'pictures' quite a bit. I'm not sure whether that is a term used all over the country but here in East Yorkshire it seems to be the term used for the cinema. The term flea pit seems to have gone out of fashion and I haven't heard many call it the flicks, but that was often used in the Midlands.

Our first film was the 'Lady in the Van'. It is the story of a lady in a van on Alan Bennett's front yard. There is something about a British Film that I like. I think they are all a much slower pace than American films and maybe As being British I find I am more able to fill in around the characters giving them more depth. However Maggie Smith as the old lady in the van played the part as if she was still in Downton Abbey but in rags! It was a lovely film with the device of two Alan Bennetts making it interesting.

I wasn't that keen to go and see this next one but I am very glad that I did in the end. It was very poignant for people of our age with parents still alive and the love story and difficult decisions that had to be made kept you guessing right up to the end. Nick Hornby wrote the screen play and it was unhurried and not jammed with dialogue either. It was based in the 1950's and follows an Irish Immigrant going over to Brooklyn. The girl was well played by Saoirise Ronan and the sets really made me feel back to my youth. It was grey and wet in Ireland and bright and busy in New York. The girls housekeeper in Brooklyn was played well by Julie Walters. I confess to having tears in my eyes when we came out.

Our next visit was to see The Dressmaker. This is an Australian film about a woman, played by Kate Winslet, who has left a very small town in the outback and made across Europe and has worked in Haute Couture in Paris. She has left under a cloud and nobody really knows why she has come back. At first you think that this is going to be a rags to riches comedy romp as the town is a generic representation of an outback town with all the expected characters. It soon turns much darker, but still with a hint of comedy running through. There were several places where you never saw the events happening and it all made for a very good yarn. The Dressmakers Mum is well played and in the end revenge is  sweet.

We have been to see 'Bridge of Spies' this evening as I don't suppose it will be long before it is taken of screenings. It is another 'Apollo 13' where despite knowing how it ends it keeps your interest right to the end. It is a typical Steven Spielberg film that is very well crafted and filmed and is very typically American. Mark Rylance as the Soviet Spy was extremely eye catching as he seems to be able to say very little, move very little and still transmit masses of information about is character. I hope that we see him in many more films. The first part of the film is the capture of the Soviet spy and the downing of Gary Powers and his spy plane in the 1960's and then the rial of the soviet by an American lawyer and then the same lawyer negotiating the exchange of the two, and managing to get an extra American student thrown in too. The Lawyer is plated by Tom Hanks and there is something about him that in every film he plays in you just have to trust his character and he makes you believe in him. I would like to think that in his situation I too would have done the very best job I could as the rules were plain for all to see. The part when there were documentaries at school about the atomic bomb made remember just how we used to think about the 4 minute warning and how much it did colour our life. The world is not the same since the Cold War and the certainties of only one enemy. I wonder if could be argued that it was happier and less stressful than today. It was a very good film and well worth the £6 to see it.

I actually think my favourite out of the four was probably 'Brooklyn' as the era took me back to my youth and there were certain situations that were familiar and I love to have a weep as I leave the cinema. Mind you the other  three were not far behind at all. Some great films to recommend.

Christmas party season.

I don't really get invited to many Christmas parties as having spent a working life at sea it is always hit and miss as to whether you are at home or not. Having said that I am attending one next week. Mind you that is as the other half! Helen still meets up regularly with a group of girls that she worked with twenty odd years ago. A few years ago there would be never a thought that fellers would be invited, however time marches on. Now as the men are also retired, rather than leaves us at home to get up to mischief, the men folk are invited along too. As far as I know that is the only party I have been invited to this year.

www.absoluteltlucy.com

I'm sure it wont be anything like this though. I wonder who is driving?

The best party that I have ever been too was whilst I was at sea. Or more accurately, alongside in Singapore. My last few years were working with the Singapore Navy on a submarine rescue ship. The submarine rescue side of it was run by James Fisher Defence, a British Company and we were actually running the ship and we got on very well. Also in the mix were the Singapore Navy but they went home every night. J. F. Defence had a good budget for entertainment etc but as is usual we, as the people on the ship, had no funds. When I was there over Christmas senior Officers from the ship were invited to the JFD Christmas Bash. It was held every year at the Ritz Carlton over looking Marina Bay in Singapore. It is what they call a 'free flow' event. That means that the alcohol just kept on coming. In this case it was champagne! It was lovely as the family's of the guys we worked with every day were there and it was lovely to see them in mufti so to speak. The food was also 'free flow' so you could eat lobster all day if you wanted but the food was superb right through the range.

From Ritz Carlton website.

I was working on the 'Swift Rescue'. We were designated as the rescue vessel in case any of their subs got in to difficulties. We would get them to the target area and then do the search patterns to find what ever we were looking for. The ship was mobilised after my time to search for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane and the Air Asia aircraft. 'Swift Rescue' actually found the Air Asia wreckage. If you want to see more of what it was all about follow the link below. 

http://jfdefence.com/casestudies/swiftrescue/index.php

You wont see me or the rest of the crew of the ship Swift Rescue as we were kept in the background and did not appear in the movies. We just got them to where they wanted to go, keep them there and do everything else other than the rescue.

My last sea going ship, (if the Severn Estuary doesn't count) 'Swift Rescue'.

My other most memorable Christmas party was one I missed in 1989. I was at the time a pilot on the River Humber and belonged to the local Round Table. It was their Christmas Bash that was in Hull and bound to be a little bit boozy. I didn't really want to go, mainly as Helen was due to deliver our second born at any time. She said that it would be okay to go and enjoy myself as it didn't feel imminent. I stayed at home. It was just as well as we had a new daughter at the time I would have been on the pudding course. I actually saw the guys heading homewards when I left the hospital to come home!

I can't believe how quickly the time is speeding towards the big day and we haven't got any decorations up yet. That is the job this weekend.

Well I never knew that!

The was another structure that you see on your travels around the canal network, even more than WWII fortifications, and that is electricity pylons. As with roads and railways pylons often follow the same routes as the canals as lines of least resistance across the landscapes. It is only when you see a 'strange' on that you even notice that there are different types at all! The first High voltage pylon was installed in 1928 near Edinburgh. There are 88000 pylons in the UK 22000 on the National Grid network. When the Central Electricity Generating Board took mover the transmission of electricity in 1925 they decided that they needed to standardise the pylons in use and also to standardise the method and power that was to be transmitted. This was set at 132kV and a competition for the design of pylons took place under the directorship of Sir Reginald Blomfield who was a well known architect of the day. The winner were Milliken Brothers, a design company from Watford. Very few of these original pylons, designated PL1 and PL1b are still erect so if you spot one it would be a rare treat! After WWII the need for power increased hugely and also the need to get it to where it was needed. Using a 132kV system would be impractical so a new standard of  275 kV was unrolled from the 1950's. The realisation that still ore power was needed so pylons were designed to be up rated to carry 400kV.

North of Hinkley on the Ashby Canal you pass under this line of pylons. I think this one is a quite rare L3C pylon. The c denotes that it has the modification of a longer middle arm to reduce the chance of insulators clashing in high winds and that the structure was made using metric steel sizes. I bet you never knew that. It was only designed to carry the 275kV lines.

This was the moment that I actually started thinking about pylons when we passed this mini pylon where a one off design was used to have one power transmission line duck under the cables of another crossing one. The taller pylon is an L6.

This pylon is at Sneyd Junction on just where the closed section of the Wyrley and Essington Canal would have risen up the locks to Wyrley. I think the pylon is a L8 D30.

This beauty is near to Eggborough on the Aire and Calder Navigation and is a L6 D60.

This is in the same location and I think is a L6 D. I haven't got to grips with why some of the conductors hang vertically and some are horizontal as in the previous photograph. I suspect that if there is a change of direction then they will have to be horizontal, but they seem to alternate so i expect it is something to do with the dynamics of the forces on the wires.

The alternate nature of the fixing of the conductors can be seen on this photograph taken on the Trent.

I hope that this blog has made you a little more aware of the mundane things that are around you and realise that there is 'beauty and interest in even the most intrusive objects. However there has been another design competition for the pylons to link up the new Hinkley Point C nuclear power station in Somerset. The competition was won by the Danish company Bytsrup. Their design is lower in height and in the amount of steel used so will lessen the impact on the environment visually and ecologically.

These wont be used everywhere how ever.

You may ask why cables can't be just buried and then there would be no need for pylons to march across the land. These new towers will be able to follow the contours better rather than having to make large deviations but to bury cable is actually, according to figures given by the National Grid, £16 million  per kilometre more expensive than using pylons.

www.bbc.co.uk
These were other designs for the competition from Iceland. I think they may have become a little weird if they were all over the country though.

Scottish Canals on St Andrew's Day.

In honour of St. Andrew's Day I thought I would share some photos of our boating Holiday we had up there in March 2011. Firstly though it seems to be quite a coincidence that St. Andrew was actually  that to have been born in Syria. He wouldn't have stood a chance today would he! He is the Patron Saint of Cyprus, Scotland, Russia, Greece, Romania, Ukraine and Bulgaria. He offers protection to fishermen, rope makers, fishmongers, textile workers, singers, miners pregnant  women, butchers and farm workers. He is also well known to guard against sore throats, convulsions, fever and whooping cough. All in all a good bloke to have as your Saint. The St. Andrew's cross, the X is said to represent the cross that he was crucified on as he didn't think himself worthy to be killed on the same sort as Jesus. Research has found that it isn't until the Middle Ages that this story gains currency so I'm not sure how the Scottish flag may have looked, or indeed the Union flag.

On our holiday we had mixed whether it is fair to say, but it didn't rain all the time. One of my brothers came with us, with his dog, and daughter Amy also attended. We picked the boat up at the foot of the Falkirk wheel and then headed towards Glasgow. I'm not sure how it is these days but all the locks and bridges had to be worked by C&RT employees and this made it awkward  as you had to give a definite time that you would be at the locks and bridges so that they weren't waiting around. If we had been on our own I reckon we would have had no trouble getting down to Bowling and Glasgow, back up to the Falkirk Wheel and into Edinburgh and back to Falkirk in the week. As it is there were few locks between Glasgow and Edinburgh but there are plenty from Glasgow to Bowling, so we missed that bit out in the end. We completed the entire length of the Union Canal from Edinburgh to Falkirk but not all the Forth and Clyde Canal.

The canal has some wide bits and some normal canal sized bits. A big draw back to the Forth and Clyde Canal is the fact that it is stoned at the sides so there are very few places that you can actually tie up.

The locks are wide beam and longer than the English canals as the canal was built to take seagoing vessels from the Forth and Clyde Rivers. Hence the name! C&RT said that lock keepers had to be used because of the volume of water but I don't think that they are too much bigger than the wide beam canals down south.

A more normal sized bit of canal.

We couldn't get to the end of the Union Canal as they were working on the bridge that guards the end of the navigation so it was a little further to walk to the city but it is still great to be on a boat this close to Edinbugh Castle.

At the other end of our trip on the outskirts of Glasgow we couldn't moor at the end of the navigation either. This time I think it was because the bloke couldn't be bothered to come and open the small bridge that allowed you in to this massive basin, with two boats in. Still you are very close to the centre. I seem to remember it was about as far as the Coventry Basin is from the centre of that town.

Despite Edinburgh and Glasgow at either extremity of the route it is the bit in the middle that is the highlight. The Falkirk wheel attracts many visitors and is a beautiful thing to look at as well as a marvel of engineering.

There is no juddering or jerking in the movement of the wheel as it effortlessly raises you up and down from the Forth and Clyde to the Union Canal.

As you enter the Wheel from the top you really do get a feeling that you are going to just drop off the end. Almost an 'infinity canal'. The views are great too.

This was the conceptual model of the 'Shelties' that was on show at the Falkirk Wheel. Of course they are built and in situe now and must make a glorious sight. They are on the Forth and Clyde arm that goes down past the Falkirk Wheel and meets up with the River Forth.

These are the two guys that did most of the lock and bridge work when we were on the Forth and Clyde. I must say they were pretty unhelpful and grumpy the whole time and were quite awkward about things most of the time. I was accused of being late at rendezvous etc and the fact of having to run to a time table and deal with these guys ruined the holiday much more than the weather did.

This is the staircase lock just up from the Wheel. The wheel and staircase were to replace the lost locks that raised the canal up originally. The Union Canal is much more canal like as it wasn't built to take the large sea going vessels. The girls that were on duty at the Falkirk Locks were much more pleasant too.

I think that this is the Avon Aqueduct on the Union Canal.

Just outside Falkirk is the Falkirk Tunnel. As you can see there is a little bit of everything on the small number of miles of canal in Scotland. We were really glad that we went but if we went and hired abroad again it would be to the canals of Ireland I think.

HAPPY ST. ANDREW'S DAY

A bitter pill to swallow.

In our travels round the system we see quite a few old WWII defence installations. I have always threatened to look them up to see what I could find out. And now I have. Only in 1940 did they set up the Directorate of Fortifications and Works (FW3) to design a range of pillboxes that could easily and quickly be erected by soldiers or local labour. They were mainly just bullet proof as it was found that the shell of a 2lb anti tank gun could find its way through 2 feet of reinforced concrete.

They were mainly formed by pouring concrete between wooden shuttering with reinforcing bars in the middle. Some have been found to contain scrap steel. This may be where all the church railings etc  went to! There was inevitably a degree of making it up on the spot and designing them to fit the location, or using the materials at hand so they are not all standard.

The photos below are just the ones I have taken photos of this year but hopefully seeing these will open your eyes to the complexity of the topic and also realise that despite the numbers that may have been constructed their numbers are dwindling year by year. So much so that many are now becoming Listed Buildings.

This is a Type 24 which is hexagonal. The walls were usualy on bullet proof at 12" thick but other versions were made shell proof with thicker walls, sometimes known as a Type 29! Inside was a room divider like a 'Y' that prevented ricochets in the interior. The embrasures were for rifles or light machine guns. This one is on the Trent and Mersey Canal near the River Dove Aqueducts.

The rear of the Type 24 has the longest wall at 14' with an embrasure each side. These are actually the most numerous still existing as there are 1724 recorded. This is the back of the One above.

This one is on the Coventry Canal guarding the Tame Aqueduct. I can not fit this into any category as it it has only two small embrasures to the north and one to the east. 

It is a listed a Grade II Listed building and all it says in the listing is that it was built in 1940!

This is a a Type 26, about 10' square with a gun port in each wall. This is actually the prefabricated variant where concrete was poured between shuttering but it wasn't reinforced and then just slotted into concrete posts. Their other name was the 'Stent' after the Stent Precast Concrete Company and as only about 140 of the Type 26 exist, including the Stent, they are quite rare but two or three can be seen from the Oxford canal south of Napton.

This is a Type 28A pill box and is found near to Day's Lock on the Thames. This is the largest pill box as the 28A was enlarged in length to allow extra room for an infantry chamber and another forward facing embrasure. This was supposed to make it less vulnerable to a frontal attack. and is the only one that was specifically designed to withstand shells as the walls are about 42" thick. The main embrasure was able to take a 2lb anti tank gun. There are only 209 Type 28A boxes still surviving.

2015 costs for boating summary

For the sake of completeness and for easy reference for others her is the breakdown of our costs for running our 58' 8" narrow boat for the past two years.

                                        2014                2015
Fixed costs   ..............   1157-57          1504-09
Mooring cost   ..........   1298-48           1524-55
Fuel costs   ...............   1156-66             824-94
Repair costs   ...........     790-84             321-63
Equipment costs   ....     678-22             164-22
Consumables   .........     257-22             454-58
Total for year               5338-99           4794-01

To find out what each category includes you will have to read my previous posts but it is pretty comprehensive. Of course it doesn't include food and drink and other stuff like at you would be eating and drinking where ever you were and how much you spend is entirely down to the individual. I haven't included travel to and from the boat as that is all a matter of choice. I have put in those things that a person will need to keep the boat up to scratch and liveable.

The only thing that could be included in the total amount is depreciation. When we were thinking of buying a boat we looked at this and the price of boats etc. I thought it would be fair to factor in a 50% depreciation in 10 years as we had a nearly new boat. In that case we should add another £3200 each year for ten years. For us we live on the boat for at least six months of the year so it is getting generous use. If you thought that if we hired a boat for only three months of the year then you would be looking at double that costs so  six months would be horrendous. Obviously hiring for that length of time is not practicable and so I haven't added in depreciation as really it is a life style choice for the time we have the boat.

The big difference this year are the lower fuel costs due to the price of diesel being much lower this year. Although we only bought 100 litres less this year the average price last year was 92.8p and this year 75.7p!
Fixed costs were higher this year due to the costs incurred by transiting the Bristol Channel, pilot, insurance and dock dues.
Repair costs are less as last year we relocated the batteries, tiled the bathroom, fitted a locking system to the diesel filler and had a dry dock. (Mind you after insurance paid out that only cost £100).
Last years equipment costs were high due to us need to purchase 4 life jackets and a VHF radio but we have them for the future now.
Consumables were high this year due to buying new batteries.

The grand average is therefore £4566-50 over the two years. Not bad for six months holiday to my mind.

The Humber Princess passing into the mist on the New Junction Canal near Sykehouse Lock this April. The cargo of lubricating oil to Rotherham has since then stopped and no more commercial traffic is running. Lets hope somebody gives them a cargo soon.

Beautiful May weather with the bluebells out in Hopwas Wood.

June found us in the deep south having passed down the Severn Estuary and up the Avon to Bristol. We had a great stay in Bristol and loved the city. Mind you I wouldn't trade my boat in for this one!

We had some beautiful walks in the countryside around the Kennet and Avon Canal in July. We found this windmill near Wilton and the Crofton Pumping Station during a walk from Great Bedwyn.

It was great to see these mink cubs who showed no fear at Slats Mill Lock on the South Oxford in August. I know that they are vermin and killers of our native fauna but they were so cute and it was a privileged to get so close to them.

We had a first visit up the Ashby Canal in September, but it wont be our last. Again we had some lovely walks in mixed weather and seeing a visit to Shakerstone was capped with a steam train on the Battlefield Line.