Of Braving The Hundred Foot

Today’s date is actually 30th July 2025 and it has been two years since I added anything to this blog. I hope no one has been waiting! Of course, I shall alter the date to make it appear in some kind of proper sequence and it should appear as though it was written at the time of the events I intend to describe. This will be the first of several, I hope, memories of some of the amazing things I have experienced during the time I have not been active in this dusty corner of the web. I have been wondering if I should migrate to Substack, but it all seems a little earnest over there, even if it does have the advantage of not being Google …

After my weeks on the Ouse, the Cam and the Lark, I arrived at Denver in the afternoon of Thursday, 8th June and moored up on the sunny side to await the next day’s tide. On the Friday morning I crossed the river to the lock landing. I was greeted by Ben, the lockie, informing me I would not get through the lock that day. The gear operating Denver Sluice was not working and there was no indication as to when it would be fixed. I would just have to sit it out. I was still stuck there on Monday with no idea of when the gate would be operational. 

Stuck in front of the lock at Denver for four days

Drone photo taken by the man in the car park near the top of the picture!

E.A. could not even tell me whether it would be a matter of hours, days or weeks!  Normally I’d have just waited, but since I had a ticket for a concert on the 17th to see Peter Gabriel in Birmingham that I certainly didn’t want to miss I had to make a decision. I decided that being pro-active was the best course of action. I turned the boat round, went back past Ely, along the Old West, and moored up under  Streatham Old Engine that night. 

I figured that I would be too late at Hermitage Lock in Earith to catch the next day’s tide, so I didn’t hurry to the lock. I planned on having plenty of time to prepare for the twenty-mile journey down the tidal New Bedford River a.k.a The Hundred Foot River. Twenty miles in my narrowboat was going to be a journey of several hours, so part of the preparation would involve making sure I had plenty of food to eat and water to drink, some extra clothing in case it turned chillier in the wind and that essential item of comfort used by lorry drivers everywhere, an empty plastic bottle. 

What I was not expecting at all was to ushered straight into Hermitage Lock. I was going to be sent down the Hundred Foot a day earlier than I expected with no time to prepare for the journey. I exited the lock and had to turn right on to the Hundred Foot.  I would have tied up on the lock landing and taken five minutes to sort myself out for this trip, but those moorings were already taken up by a couple of GRP cruisers leaving no space for a fifty-foot narrowboat.

Although I was dealing with a fairly stiff headwind, it hardly affected my speed because I was hurtling along on an ebbing tide. It was actually quite exhilarating as long as I didn’t let my concentration wander for even a second. The slightest distraction might see me hitting the bank and maybe bottoming out, which I didn't want to risk. Between Pymoor and Welney something strange happened. The river narrowed to a trickle barely wider than the boat. Then without warning I was lungeing for the steep muddy bank off the starboard side with no apparent control of the boat at all. I could alter neither speed nor heading. Try as I might the boat did not respond. Before I had time to resign myself to being grounded the bow of the boat mounted the bank and I really thought the stern was going to be forced under and the engine room filled with water. The consequences of that did not bear thinking about. Fortunately that didn’t happen, but what followed was even scarier. As the boat climbed the steep, black, sticky, muddy bank it tipped sideways and gently slid sideways back into what was left of a channel. For the second time in as many seconds I thought I was going to tip and take on water, this time through drain exits on the port side. My heart was pounding as I was still struggling to encourage any response to some frantic tiller-wiggling and slamming into reverse gear. Miraculously the boat righted itself once back in the water. I stopped noticing my lack of food, water and clothing after that and kept the speed down to prevent sheer momentum taking me to places I’d no wish to be. 

For the next few minutes all was pretty calm (apart from the headwind, of course). The channel continued to narrow as the tide ebbed. The boat was also getting worryingly close to the bottom of the river. Is it possible I could actually ground myself in the middle of the river? Then I had a dawning realisation that I was barely moving forward at all, maybe making about half a mile an hour. Not only that, but the river was widening. The lock-keeper at Hermitage must have realised I was going to be on the river on a turning tide … surely?! So not only was I battling this stiff headwind, but also now an incoming tide attempting to return me from whence I had come. No wonder I was making such little progress. Oh well, no choice but to keep going; at least I was still going forward, if just barely, until of course I wasn’t. Denver Sluice loomed into view. It had taken two days to get to the other side of the lock the long way round and with the engine still running the boat stopped moving altogether. I had no idea what was happening now. To be honest I was a bit rattled from how this trip had panned out so far. I was hungry, thirsty, cold, tired and nursing an increasingly insistent bladder. I couldn’t do much about any of this. All I could do was to wait for the wind and water to be kind and let me settle among the reeds. Thankfully the elements did exactly that and I came to rest in the reeds just shy of the eyes of Denver Sluice. Once again I was relieved that the big and little eyes at this amazing water management system were not allowing the passage of water, because I’m sure the extra flow would have created further currents. Once settled in the reeds I saw to my immediate needs and phoned the lock-keeper at Salter’s Lode. I knew he would have been expecting me to come through on the tide. Here I was, so near and yet so far - very frustrating!

By the time I’d worked out that my engine issue was only that the throttle linkage had rattled itself loose and needed to be bolted back in place (fortunately I carry a healthy variety of spare fixings) I’d missed the tide. I managed to limp across the tidal Ouse to the floating pontoon where I tied up for the night to await the next day’s tide and check my repairs once daylight returned. I learned a lot on that trip, but I’m not sure if I fancy doing it again. 

Safe for the night on the floating pontoon between Denver Sluice and Salters Lode

Back on the Middle Level again