On to historic Leicester - it's not so bad after all!!

Sunday morning we crossed the river/canal (I'm not sure anymore which it is!) and visited a very small part of Watermead Country Park, a vast expanse of rivers, meadows, lakes and woodlands open to the public in the north of Leicester.  It was buzzing with families and activity groups walking and cycling which was good to see.

A life-sized representation of a prehistoric riverside resident - the mammoth - in Watermead Country Park

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

An assortment of birdlife at the park

Leaving Birstall, we headed south towards Leicester and continued to be accompanied by greenery until just before Belgrave Lock.  Belgrave is the predominantly Asian part of the city and sounds fascinating, but we didn't see any moorings that looked 'secure' enough to moor up and walk to the 'Golden Mile' where the focus is on all things Asian - restaurants, shops, Mosques, etc.

Leaving  Birstall - an affluent area north of the city

The National Space Centre, across the river from Belgrave

 

 

 

 

 

From here to the city centre the canal/river sadly went a little downhill with an abundance of litter floating on the surface as well as some unidentified objects under the water which we felt occasionally with a 'thud' - we dragged something along for a few yards before it let us out of its grip, heaven knows what it was!  But it was still nowhere near the disgusting state of the canal in Blackburn that we visited in August 2009 and posted a blog titled 'What a load of rubbish!'.  Reading the book 'Kiwi Afloat' of a New Zealand woman's journey's on the canals in the late 1970's, I was interested to read that her impression of the canal there mirrored ours - isn't that awful that Blackburn appear to have no pride in their waterway whatsoever and obviously haven't for many a year?

Anyway, I digress, back to Leicester ...

The waterside becomes more urban as we enter Leicester

North Lock - not looking so flash around here! 

Despite the graffiti and dereliction, it's still mostly a pretty journey if you concentrate on the positive aspects!

Old mill buildings apparent & the ornate bridge just before the moorings at Castle Gardens

Pulling up at Castle Gardens wasn't the most pleasant experience as the rubbish bins were overflowing on the landing stage; must've been a busy weekend!  Otherwise they're a fine place to stop, though really only sufficient space for about four average length narrowboats.  They're fairly secure as you need a BW key to access the Castle Gardens which are all locked at 2000hrs - there's a BW padlock at one entrance that's accessible after hours for boaters.

We walked into the city centre to watch the second half of the England/Germany match - I have to admit that the atmosphere in the places that we've watched the football at in the past couple of weeks has been enjoyable, people really do get right into the spirit of it and it's such a shame that England lost (miserably!) as the streets would've then been lined with happy revellers rather than idiots shouting and swearing and calling Germans nasty names.  Why can't the English be pragmatic sportsmen - England played appallingly bad football (from what we know about the game) and Germany played very well, grasped all opportunities and deserved to win!

 

 

A tense crowd bite their nails in the Weatherspoon's pub in Leicester City Centre ...

 

 

What we hadn't realised was that they were televising the match on a large outdoor screen a short distance from the pub we'd been in, so when we emerged into the sunshine we couldn't believe how many people were wandering the streets - there was a strong police presence in readiness for any hot under the collar aggressive fans.  There was definitely a different mood from last week when England won their game, and later in the evening we did witness some heated debate between two idiots which became violent for a short time but soon dissipated thank goodness; I abhor violence of any kind.  Let's hope that those pathetic low-lifes who pick on their wives and girlfriends (and bless them children too) when their team lose in football, were too tired to take it out on them when they got home.

Hoards of people in the centre of Leicester on what would normally be a quiet Sunday afternoon

There's some eye catching buildings around

Shame about the signs!

 

 

 

People dressed in various red and white outfits wander around in a morose mood

 

 

 

Castle Garden moorings on the right

After dinner, as it's still light until around 2200hrs currently, we had another stroll through the Castle Gardens and checked out the old castle and University buildings nearby ... 

St Mary De Castro Church

 

 

The Rectory house and castle walls

Castle Garden mooring from the opposite direction

Leicester was honoured to have two Kings pass through in August 1485 - Richard III was greeted on the 21st as he travelled to do battle for his Kingdom in the penultimate battle of the War of the Roses, otherwise known as the Battle of Bosworth.  His body was returned the following evening by the victorious King Henry VII, who became the first English monarch of the Tudor dynasty due to his conquest and subsequent marriage to a Yorkist princess.  The occasion of the 500th anniversary of this was marked in Leicester in 1985.

 

 

 

 

 

Statue of Richard III in Castle Gardens

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm sure I've previously said how I wasn't terribly interested in history when I was at school, but visiting so many places in England I've become fascinated to discover more as it all comes to life when you've experienced their ambience.  Leicester has so many fascinating facts that it was a challenge to get it down to the five most fascinating ones, but here's my choice:

1. In the 19th century, the newly constructed rail and canal network routed through the area stimulated industrial growth, and Leicester became a major economic centre with a variety of manufacturers engaged in engineering, shoemaking and hosiery production;
2. It is said that the mythical king of the Britons, King Leir, founded the city of Kaerleir ('Leir's chester' – i.e. fortified town). In Welsh, the city is named Caerlŷr. Leir was supposedly buried by Queen Cordelia in a chamber beneath the River Soar near the city dedicated to the Roman god Janus, and people celebrated his feast-day near Leir's tomb annually.  William Shakespeare's play King Lear is loosely based on this story and there is a statue of Lear in Watermead Country Park (we didn't realise this before or we'd have searched it out!).
3. Leicester played a significant role in the history of England when, in 1265, Simon de Montfort forced King Henry III to hold the first Parliament of England at the now-ruined Leicester Castle and this building still stands today opposite St Mary De Castro Church, and is known as The Great Hall.
4. Since the war Leicester has experienced large scale immigration from across the world. Immigrant groups today make up around 40% of Leicester's population, making Leicester one of the most ethnically diverse cities in the United Kingdom.   The Commission for Racial Equality estimated that by 2011 Leicester is likely to have approximately a 50% ethnic minority population, making it the first city in Britain not to have a white British majority.  It comes as no surprise then that in primary schools in Leicester, English is not the ‘preferred’ language of 45% of pupils and the proportion of children whose first language is known, or believed to be, other than English, is significantly higher than other cities within the region, or within the UK.
5. Leicester Market is the largest outdoor covered marketplace in Europe, selling such things as fruit and vegetables sold by enthusiastic market stallholders who shout out their prices, and fresh fish and meat in the Indoor Market.

If you want to find out more, click here.  There are some (dare I say bigoted) people, who feel that the influx of 'foreigners' into Britain is a problem, but we didn't see any sense of racial tension during our short visit, and from what I've read and heard Leicester is proud of it's cultural diversity holding many festivals and celebrations to rejoice rather than deny it, which I for one think is wonderful.

Back onto the water and we've discovered that facilities on the River Soar/Grand Union Canal Leicester are sparse, so we found ourselves running low on water once more, with a red light on our toilet and probably needing diesel in the not too distant future also!  So on Monday we'll be motoring to the nearest place for water and pump out - 10 miles and 15 locks away! No excuses this time, we have to travel that distance or we'll be in a spot of bother!

 Purple - Sandra's favourite colour - are they petunias?

Trouble afloat - Northern Pride to the rescue before encountering her own problems!

We left Barrow-Upon-Soar late Saturday morning (we never seem to leave anywhere early, as we're always finishing the previous day's blog - we really must get a life!) and found that there's some gorgeous houses backing onto the river here also.  I wonder if these people appreciate how lucky they are to reside in such picturesque surroundings, I would suspect they do, but rather like living close to the beach in Gisborne I imagine that after a while you'd take it for granted.  Anyway, it's all very pleasing to see as we cruised on by.

 Leaving Barrow-Upon-Soar

 

 

 A party of all ages of canoeists tentatively leaving the canal for the River Soar 

 

 

 

A very well preened riverside house and garden in Barrow-Upon-Soar

The waterway changes from the River Soar to the Grand Union Canal (Leicester section) and back again four times before Leicester, so you're never quite sure which one you're on!

We passed quite a few wide beam narrowboats (that's such anathema in terms isn't it?!) which are also pretty spectacular looking inside, terribly luxurious compared to our cute and cosy Northern Pride. There would certainly be many more home comforts and you could travel to Europe if you so wish to 'do' their canals, but you'd be restricted as to which waterways you could navigate in the Britain.  At least in our compact forty five footer we can go to all the canals and rivers.

As we drifted lazily along the Soar, I was reminded of the song lyrics 'England's green and pleasant land'; these are such pleasant surroundings that you can't help but feel a certain nostalgia for the England that didn't contain so many cars containing people rushing around everywhere.

 Relaxing river scenes

 Grand old red-brick railway bridge from 1860 just before Mount Sorrel Lock

 

Approaching Mount Sorrel Lock - a busy place with a lovely pub at the summit 'The Waterside Inn'

 

 Leaving Mount Sorrel Lock

Just before Sileby Lock

We moored for lunch shortly after Cossington Lock and walked a mile or so into Rothley.  Last year, when I was stranded in Evesham, I bought Barry a book from one of the charity shops called 'AA Book of British Villages' for a couple of pounds.  It was published in 1981 and is 'A guide to 700 of the most interesting and attractive villages in Britain'.  As we travel around we often check it out to see if any of the places we're close to have an entry, but more often than not they don't.  Today however, we found an entry for a place called Rothley.  This is a very interesting place, and although only small (just over 3,500 inhabitants) - here's five fascinating facts about the village:

1. It's one of Leicestershire's most affluent areas based on number of houses worth over GB£1million, identified in the Sunday Times newspaper as the most expensive place to live in the East Midlands;
2. Whilst on a visit to a family friend, William Wilberforce drafted his bill for the abolition of slavery while on a visit in 1791 (Barry and I watched the film about this a couple of years ago called 'Amazing Grace', highly recommended);
3. In 1988 Rothley was involved in a cricketing controversy, when then-captain Mike Gatting was accused by The Sun and Today newspapers of improprieties with a barmaid at the Rothley Court Hotel.  These accusations led to the sacking of Gatting as captain, despite his protestations of innocence.
4. Town Green lies on the edge of Rothley Park, the site of Rothley Temple which was built in the thirteenth century by the Knights Templars and the original Templar Chapel is still used for occasional services.
5. Kate and Gerry McCann are from Rothley, their four year old daughter Madeline disappeared whilst on holiday in Portugal in April 2007 when Barry and I were holidaying in England.  Bless them, it's unimaginable how tortuous it must be not to know what's happened to your child.  I hope one day she is found.

After our wander around we stopped for a drink at a rather up-market establishment called 'The Woodman's Stroke' also known as 'The Woodie' (!).  We know it's upmarket because of the price of the drinks!  Either that or the barmaid couldn't add up!  Seven pounds forty for a pint of Bishop's Finger (no quips about the actress please!), a  Pimms and Lemonade and  a packet of Twiglets - or maybe that's normal? A very pleasant place to drink outside in the courtyard and obviously popular with the locals.

One of Rothley's two greens - Town Green - has some of the finest timber-framed houses in the country - cruck-built using joined curved tree trunks which form the framework of the house 

The parish church of St Mary the Virgin which has the shaft of a Saxon cross of the 8th or 9th century (Barry didn't take a photo because the 'cross' part was missing, doh!) - and a very friendly black cat who kindly crossed our paths and let us stroke him

 More Rothley architecture

 Fabulous pub, 'The Woodman's Stroke' - you can see how affluent it is here, the patrons even get the mobile car valet service to clean their Mercedes while they have a drink! 

 Northern Pride moored at Cossington Lock

Shortly after leaving the mooring, we came across a cruiser called 'Duett II' marooned at the side of the river - they'd either ran out of diesel or broken their fan-belt but they weren't too sure - either way their boat wasn't going anywhere without a helping hand so we towed them to the nearest boatyard just after Junction Lock.  There were a few hair raising moments, especially when sharing a lock while still tied up together, but we managed to get them safely to their destination with time for a beer on the way!

 

 

 

 

 

 Towing the cruiser carefully - and cautiously carrying the Carlsberg across the water!

Spookily, as we left Thurmaston Lock, on the outskirts of Leicester, an alarm sounded on OUR boat, and an orange light flashed ominously, suggesting there was a problem with a battery.  We were rather concerned to say the least, but it turned out alright as we managed to get securely moored up before Birstall Lock, where Barry got down and dirty in the engine compartment and found the offending broken fan belt - fortuitously we had a spare on the boat so it was easily fixable - well it was if you knew what you were doing which Barry luckily did!

After fixing the boat, Barry became surrounded by families from the pub above the river - 'The White Horse' - who were celebrating someone's 90th birthday.  As I was sitting writing the blog I found myself inundated with giggling children who came on board to check out our home and rang the bell at the front a few times bless their cotton socks!  How lovely, what a friendly place and a cool mooring spot, so pleased we had to stay here!

Later on we sauntered up the bank to the pub and sat outside in the sultry summer air, chatting to a couple of local ladies one of whom came back to the boat for a Baileys night-cap and stayed until the early hours - so it was a late finish to the day!

Still Soar'ing along slowly

We discovered this morning that we could've moored up in Normanton-upon-Soar last night after all - there was a very attractive riverside pub with moorings - it just goes to show that you shouldn't rely on everything the Nicholson's Guide says, and I quote "...the inhabitants of Normanton guard their waterfront jealously, making it extremely difficult to get ashore".

Permanent moorings just before Normanton-Upon-Soar

 Even the cows are well washed and turned out here!

There were certainly some very exclusive waterside properties; I've always been astounded that there's so much wealth around in England and occasionally wonder where they get all their riches from to be able to afford such opulence?  But it doesn't keep me awake at night, good on them, so long as it makes them happy.  Maybe they're all football players and their WAGs?!

 

 

The Church at Normanton-Upon-Soar dominates the skyline as you approach the village from either end

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Only three locks to negotiate today.  At the first one, Bishop's Meadow Lock, we encountered a wide beam narrowboat full of elderly folk on 'Symphony', owned by the Peter Le Marchant Trust, which can take up to 26 disabled or seriously ill people and their carers out for the day from 1000 to 1500hrs.  How wonderful to know that there are such charitable bodies around, it sort of makes up for the extravagances of the upper classes.  The gentleman in charge was chatting to Barry and proudly informed him that he'd been instrumental in starting up the magazine 'Canals and Rivers' in 1978 (then called 'Canals and Riverboats'), which is still published today.

Symphony and the darling gentleman who drives the boat and says he'll keep doing so until he's 80 if possible - another six years to go!

Loughborough Lock and a helpful passing young man who closed the gate for us

We moored at lunchtime not far from Loughborough Wharf, an attractive newly built area along with some good looking apartments.  A short walk away was a large Tesco's so we could stock up on provisions. I know that we could shop with them on-line and get them to deliver to the boat, but we're never quite certain where we're going to be from one day to the next, so although it sounds great in theory we've yet to be organised sufficiently to put it into practice!

Loughborough Wharf - very colourful with some handy visitors moorings close to shops and Tesco's

Old mill buildings by Nottingham Road Bridge

Barry had seen that there was a 'Bell Foundry Museum' in Loughborough, which made the largest bell in Britain, "Great Paul", the massive Bourdon bell at St Paul's Cathedral in London in 1881, weighing an incredible 17,002 kgs/37,483 pounds.   The foundry also made the bells for the Carillon War Memorial, a landmark within the Queens Park in the town, and  York Minster.  However, by the time we'd moored up closer to the factory and ate lunch it was after 1500hrs so we decided not to visit but to continue our journey to Barrow-Upon-Soar.  We're not sure if we missed anything exciting - it certainly didn't appeal to me I have to say, interesting as it is!

I found it very amusing to find that there are apparently a high proportion of Australians in Loughborough, as students and alumni of the University, and so the town occasionally gets named 'Loogabarooga', both purposely for comic effect by Australians in the town and accidentally by visiting Australians unaware of its correct pronunciation - hilarious!

More converted canalside dwellings

An old Mill now made into desirable apartments

    A very pretty river

 More weirs and flood gates at the ready for the next deluge

We arrived in Barrow-Upon-soar in the early evening and had a walk around the village before dinner.  There's a huge caravan/camping ground over the bridge from the village which appeared to be filling up with weekend revellers - but only mixed sex groups (over 18) or families allowed here thank you very much.

Late in the evening we sat out on the tow path with our neighbours beside their new boat 'Pilgrim's Progress', only ten months old and looking polished and pristine, discussing many interesting topics, including New Zealand, as one of the couples has a daughter who lives and works in Rotorua (in the centre of the North Island, famous for it's boiling mud and steaming fumaroles) - it's a small world!

Young canoeists enjoying in the River a short way from our mooring - much better than hanging around the streets

 Some of the photogenic properties in Barrow-Upon-Soar ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Barrow Deep Lock

A beautiful begonia (I think!)