Leeds - city of flats

Boating through the centre of Leeds is an extraordinary experience. The whole place appears to be brand new. Of what was there before (and I have no idea what it was) nothing remains - it's like a lost civilisation.
The centre is now a series of extravagantly styled high rise blocks of flats. They look dramatic and exciting but there are just so many of them. Enough you'd think for virtually every inhabitant of Leeds to have one.
No wonder they've suffered some of the biggest nosedives in value in the recession. Didn't any of these developers stop to think that demand must surely be far exceeding supply?
Still at least lucky Leeds got its centre rebuilt before the recession - empty flats are better than half built ones.

Caption competition

9.15 a.m. in the British Waterways lock building workshops at Stanley Ferry and not a soul in sight. Why? "Perhaps they're on a tea break" I suggested. "Humph! Judging by BW employees we've seen in action elsewhere they're probably skiving off somewhere" was Starwoman's less charitable suggestion.
Or maybe they've just been made redundant in the latest round of BW cuts? What do you think?

Big rivers mean big locks

The first time you're shut inside an Aire & Calder lock you feel like a plastic duck in a giant's bath-tub. They're long, wide and, sometimes, deep too. After the initial shock wears off you realise that this is a gentle giant who empties and fills his bath-tubs with care and doesn't try to wash you down the plug hole.
The locks work electrically - push buttons to fill and empty; open and shut gates. Cleverly, however, they've been designed with utterly invisible warning lights to tell you when the lock is suitably full or empty. No matter; you just keep your finger on the button until something happens! After a day of standing around pressing buttons you do long for some windlass action, however strenuous.
After another long, hot day we're now sitting in the centre of Leeds just one lock short of leaving the Aire & Calder and joining the Leeds & Liverpool Canal.

Rivers or canals?

Following another boat on the Calder & Hebble

One of the back page Q&A questions in Canal Boat mag and a bit of a tough one to answer. After the grind of the lock-a-minute Huddersfield Narrow with its stiff paddles and shallow sides the sudden sense of space and freedom on the Calder & Hebble came as a huge and largely welcome change.
Alright so it's not as easy to moor up but you've got depth, width, big skies, scenery in exchange. It helped that the weather was warm and sunny just for a change.
The locks, though, were big, deep and heavy to match the waterway. We eventually teamed up with another narrowboat (one of only two boats we saw on these eerily empty navigations) and shared the burden. They were a couple heading for Castleford - or "Car-stleford" to us southerners. He steered; she worked the locks. He had a beer gut that was all bought and paid for; she was as fit as a butcher's dog. Surprise!
We left them and the Calder & Hebble behind just after the start of the Aire & Calder where we moored for the night at a vast stretch of moorings. Here was every sort of boat from tiny cruiser to vast converted commercial barge. Another reminder that these are big waterways for big boats.

Able seadog Brian

Gradually coming to terms with life afloat, Stardog Brian tops up his suntan on the rear hatch -- but note the chain as he is prone to moments of panic when he sees one of his crew disappear off the boat with windlass or rope.
So far he's only fallen in once -- but then he's only been on the boat three days!

Sorry Huddersfield

Soup of the day?
The canal takes you out of Huddersfield past the relics of old industry; decrepit mills, old factories, demolition sites and wasteland. It seems to symbolise the death of our traditional northern England industrial powerhouse. Sad.
We floated into the final lock on the Huddersfield Broad Canal on a sea of green sludge and old plastic bottles, collecting some plastic bag rubbish round our prop on the way.
Now we're heading west on the Calder & Hebble, armed and ready for its unique locks with our own handspike - a piece of 3x2 bought this morning from Huddersfield's Homebase.

PS The eagle eyed will spot the new addition to the crew – Stardog Brian complete with fetching canine lifejacket.

Train strain

The internet is supposed to make things easier but the railways don't seem to have caught on.
Trying to find the cheapest train fare to get from Huddersfield to the general direction of Cambridgeshire all but wore my Macbook out. And deep fried my brain.
If your after saving money, all you want a train travel website to tell you is the days and times of the cheapest fares. That takes multiple clicking around every site AND you need to discover that (for example) Huddersfield to Peterborough will probably cost you more than buying Huddersfield to Leeds and Leeds to Peterborough tickets -- even though you're on the same train. Crazy!
But we got there and back cheaply in the end, the journeys were fine, the booked seats were booked and, above all the house was still where we left it.
And now we're back!