London Canal Museum (Lee Navigation / Hertford Union / Regents Canal) – Friday 15th August

A nice peaceful night though it was raining when we woke up – it wasn’t forecast.  However by the time we set off the rain had stopped and the day was quite bright.

We were soon turning onto the Hertford Union Canal where we came across the first lock with water pouring over the bottom gates and then as I emptied it, the top gates too.  I wondered if the lock would every empty!

As I walked up to set the next lock I saw an interesting piece of wall art – I can’t really call it graffiti.  I wonder if someone stood on their head to paint it!

The cottage at the top lock is really pretty and looks so out of place in its surroundings.  In fact the whole lock is pretty and right at one of the entrances to Victoria Park.

We had planned to stop at Victoria Park last night but the rain scuppered that idea but thank goodness we did stop when we did as there wasn’t a square inch along the park – crazy! 

As we turned out of the Hertford Union and onto the Regents Canal we came to Old Ford Lock which was empty but someone turned it against us before we could get there – I was hopping but controlled myself until they passed me when I just had to say something!  The young lad said that he didn’t think we didn’t want to go into the lock!

After Acton’s Lock we came across this

Now I’m very particular about changing my stoppage preferences on the C&RT website and had not had notification about this.  When I looked on-line it was on there – closure until 5.00pm – it was 2.30pm!  I tried to phone C&RT and when put through to the local office I got the ansaphone.  I even tried to contact them on Twitter but all I got was ring us!  When I said I had – there was no response.  We finally got through the stoppage at 4.15pm.

We shared the next two locks with a motor cruiser which had also been stuck and we seemed to whizz through them but had to wait at Islington Tunnel for a boat to come through.  It was then only a hop, skip and a jump to the London Canal Museum where I had booked us an overnight mooring.

Back in 2010 we had moored on the canal here – spot the difference. 

 

We had a lovely mooring right outside the Canal Museum – well worth the £8 we paid.  We walked into King’s Cross which was heaving with it being a Friday evening.  The pubs were buzzing and the people overspilling onto the pavements having an after work drink.   We bought a Chinese take-away and took it back to the boat and sat outside on the bench conveniently provided.  It was then an early night as we have an early start in the morning.

    

I’ve included our route map from Navvygator today as I thought it was interesting to see where we have been. 

7.51 miles

7 locks