The Water Road - A narrowboat odyssey through England

Publisher:Robson Books, 2002 £ 17.95

“In India travellers talk of bowel movements and brag about getting through the day on half a shoestring.  On the Cut, conversation and thoughts tend to be preoccupied with locks: how many, how big, how long they take, and what surprises they may throw your way.”  Paul Gogarty spent four months on a narrowboat exploring ‘backdoor England’; from the quotation above he seems to have captured the essence of canal cruising in the UK.

Paul tours around England on Caroline, his home for months.  He describes the people and places he encounters.  His journey covering 900 miles starts and ends in London, in between he goes north to Skipton, via Birmingham, Stoke-on-Trent, and Manchester.  His return takes him through Leeds (via gangs who set fire to cars and do worse from bridges onto bargees who cross them), Leicester, Oxford and The Thames.  He enters the Grand Union system at Limehouse Basin, our headquarters and encounters Lizzie and Tony from the CA.  (Paul, we’re the Cruising Association not the Cruise Association).

If I’m honest, I have to say that inland cruising has never appealed to me but if you are a fan then I’m sure that you’ll enjoy the descriptions of canal life and the characters that ply their trade up and down the original information superhighway. - CRE

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