Gallows Hill

Today's Canal : Market Harborough Arm

With uncertainty over a mobile signal for Christine's Zoom meeting after lunch and with a fair reception at our overnight mooring, we opted to stay at the bottom of Foxton Locks for the moment.

We opted to explore the visitor site around the locks - something we have not fully done before. We walked across the swing bridge (to utilise the food waste bin in the lower car park to the left of the brick bridge in the background.

The walk starts with crossing the road bridge - just an access for vehicles delivering to the pubs and cafes by the locks. 

Alongside the footpath are a couple of old ice breaker boats that were invaluable in the winter to reduce the  amount of time lost when the canal froze over.

From the top of the bridge there is a good view of the lower basin for the one time inclined plane. At the turn of the 20C the canal company tried a new technique for speeding up the transit times through the locks. With everything going in favour, the best time for the 10 locks would be around 45 minutes but, as with us yesterday, the inability to pass by boats in the opposite direction other than in the middle crossing pound, meant that at times it takes a lot longer.

The answer was to construct what is usually called an incline plane. The idea was to have two caissons full of water with gates at one end to allow boats to move directly into the 'box' which would then be lowered on rails whilst a similar one was raised, each acting as a counterbalance to the other. This significantly reduced the amount of energy needed to transfer boats around the lock flight.

The lower basin is just at the bottom of this incline.

Boats entered at the top from a short arm that connects with the original canal a short distance above the top lock.

Although counterbalanced it was still necessary to provide some energy input to overcome the friction forces in the track mechanism, and an differences in the loads in the  boats. This came from a large steam engine in a brick building that now houses a small canal museum. Alas it was only today that we discovered it is only open at the bank holidays in May - the current notice and web site say nothing about other months!

Although in theory the idea behind inclined planes should have been a good one, and in others places they were made to work - such as on the Bude Canal in North Cornwall - the ambitions at Foxton just simply outstripped the technology of the day and it was both unreliable and inefficient. After just ten years it was abandoned and the locks rebuilt once again.

We continued on the visitor trail, coming across several amusing features offering resting spots along the way.

After we made our way to the top of the flight, Christine opted to return the way she had come in order to prepare for her meeting, leaving Mike to take more photos of the locks. The volunteers on today had a different plan from those yesterday - as a result we did a lot better! The was just one boat in the whole flight - the crew member (far right in the photo) said that, like us, they had no wait at the top but were not expecting to pass any boats in the middle.

The two boats on the right hand towpath were held waiting until the flight was clear of all descending boats even though at the time the one coming down was still in the upper staircase.

We returned to the boat for lunch and after a worrying hiccup we found a place for a phone where it could pick up sufficient signal to support the Zoom call - but only just in time! The meeting ran very efficiently and all decisions were made speedily and ended after about 80 minutes. Our plan this morning had been to stay put for the night as Christine's meeting can sometimes last much longer. So now we returned to an earlier plan in which we cruised for about an hour, half way into Market Harborough.

The first challenge was Foxton Swing Bridge - a manually operated bridge that carries local traffic from one part of the village to another. It has a sometimes troubled past but today behaved itself. The  main issues had been with an interlocking mechanism that protects the traffic and ensures that the barriers are [properly in place before allowing the bridge deck to be unlocked. From then on it is down to manual labour! It took Mike all his available energy to get the bridge to move although after that whilst still heavy it swung steadily. Only one car was held up whilst Christine  brought the boat through, A similar effort was then required to return bridge deck and barriers to their normal positions!

Long stretches of this arm have a much reduced navigable width with rampant reeds blocking the way. At some points the boat was several metres away from the actual bank! As this is technically a canal built for wide beam boats, it would be interesting to see two attempt to pass each other,

The bridge at Gallows Hill carries a B road from the A6 (now a bypass to Market Harborough) into the centre of town. We wondered what this narrow section had once been - noting visible now. looking at old maps revealed that at one stage the road over the bridge was improved and involved building a new crossing. The narrows is the location of the earlier bridge 0 the newer one is in the background of the photo.

Just beyond the canal bridge is am industrial plant. It appears that this is now owned by a company called J G Pears. Founded by a farmer in Penistone, it operates from several sites, processing animal and food waste (both from farmers and supermarkets) in an environmentally acceptable manner. Their web site indicates that one of their main products is now biodiesel.

We found the mooring location shown on our maps and, as it looked a very pleasant place to stop, we went no further towards the town. However, we have booked a slot in the basin for tomorrow night. Although we had a good internet signal when we stopped, a little later it all but melted away and so we shall have to wait and see when we will have an opportunity to upload this blog.

As you can now see, the signal eventually returned very effectively!

LATE EXTRA!!

Nearly dinner time, Christine took this photo of the blossom all around our mooring spot.

She also noticed this newly shorn sheep, looking a little chilly!

3.1 Miles - 0 Locks