From bjg@wordwrights.ie Tue Jun  8 09:17:54 1999
Date: Tue, 08 Jun 1999 12:20:40 GMT
From: Brian J Goggin <bjg@wordwrights.ie>
Reply-To: canals@blacksheep.org
To: canals@blacksheep.org
Subject: Trip report: Irish River Barrow part 1 (long)

The first weekend of June includes the June bank holiday, That was
when we finally reached the River Barrow.

The Friday was the last day of Carolan's school year; the school
sports were to be held on that day. Anne took the day off from work
and Ian the day off from school; they left Limerick before 9.00am,
heading for Waterford. They did some shopping and had breakfast in
Clonmel, before arriving at Carolan's school to watch the sports.
Carolan, despite having cut her leg badly a week or two before, won
the junior girls' cup.

When the sports events finished, they loaded all Carolan's gear: large
suitcase, large box, many bags, rollerblades --- everything she's had
for the year --- and went to Tramore, a seaside resort, to give Ian a
couple of rides on the dodgems. Then they had something to eat and
headed north to Goresbridge on the Barrow.

I left Limerick in the other car at 3.00pm. I had most of the luggage,
Goldie the Hairy POSSLQ and, on the roofrack, Ian's dinghy, which we
use as a tender. I took a cross-country route to Goresbridge,
travelling through Tipperary, Golden (where I crossed the infant River
Suir), Cashel, Fethard (where the roads are all tarred), Mullinahone,
Callan and Kilkenny. On the way, I drove through some of the most
severe hailstorms of the year --- and this at the start of the summer.
Heavy, blinding hail, rain and very strong gusts of wind didn't seem
like good omens for the weekend.

I stopped in Kilkenny to buy something to read --- and managed to pick
up some beer. In the last few years, several micro-breweries have
opened up in Ireland, providing an alternative for those who are fed
up with (or simply dislike) the regular range. Since it has become
almost impossible to find a pint of Guinness that isn't so cold as to
be tasteless, I'm always glad to find supplies of the micro-brewers'
beers. The Kilkenny supermarket provided two beers: Behan's No 1 Brew,
a lager brewed in Newbridge on the River Liffey, and Finian's, a red
beer from Enfield, on the Royal Canal. I'd had No 1 before but hadn't
seen Finian's, so I stocked up with both. Then it was back to the car,
across the Nore and on through Gowran to Goresbridge.

The quay is beside an old stone bridge (built in 1756) at one end of
the village. There were six boats at the quay, five of them the fleet
that Arthur Kepple (Chairman of IWAI's Barrow Branch) and others had
brought down from Vicarstown the previous weekend. There we
transferred some stuff from Anne's car to mine, leaving most of
Carolan's luggage behind in Anne's car. Everybody got into my car and
we drove north to Royal Oak (where there is a bridge over the Barrow),
Leighlinbridge, Carlow, Stradbally and Vicarstown.

Vicarstown was much as we'd left it, although the departure of
Arthur's fleet meant that there were only about a dozen boats there.
One of them, a long, narrow Norman, was having its outdrive fixed:
there was one man in the boat and another, wearing waders, standing
behind it in the water. We loaded the boat, launched the dinghy and
parked the car; Carolan, tired after the sports and the term --- and
after staying up late the previous night --- went straight to bed.

I tried fixing the loo, with a new piston that Lee Sanitation (God
bless them) had rushed over to me; miraculously, it seemed to work.
Then we had some food and some beer or wine. We stayed up for a while
but it was extremely cold (4C, we heard afterwards) so, having no
heating, we soon retreated to the warmth of our sleeping-bags.

On Saturday morning I woke up at an ungodly hour, before 8.00am, only
to find that Anne had been woken even earlier by the dawn chorus. It
was a lovely morning; clear and sunny, even if not yet warm. The loo
was still working. We had coffee and then did a bit of arranging of
gear on the boat. That included rigging the stern anchor: heavy rope,
a metre of heavy chain and a 4-stone weight, all ready on the
bathing-platform. Then, at 9.30am, we set off. I rang Arthur Kepple to
say that we were on our way; he said that he would meet us at Athy and
that he would alert the lock-keepers for us.

Vicarstown to Athy is about seven miles, so we had a couple of hours
of canal. As we travelled along, I added a few fittings to hold ropes
and did some other tidying up on deck. The weeds had grown quite a bit
since our last trip, but not enough to cause any problems. We admired
the River Stradbally as we passed over it; from time to time we were
able to see, through the trees, where the River Barrow flowed to our
left. There is a road all the way along the canal; we had actually
driven it a couple of weeks before.

At one stage we passed a large field full of long, narrow huts, very
close together, with high-pitched roofs. We couldn't tell what it was
for: we considered mushroom-growing, pig-farming and battery hens, but
learned later that it was a mink farm.

There are three locks, fairly close together, on the way into Athy.
Arthur was waiting for us at the first of them, 26th lock, which he
had ready for us. This one has an 11' 3" fall followed by a bridge;
the canal then goes through a cut, making it difficult for the lock
crew (Arthur and Carolan) to get back aboard. However, we managed it.

Above 27th lock, there is a range of old warehouses. There is also a
dry-dock, which from time to time gets restored --- before being
wrecked by the local vandals. As we passed, we saw that the gates had
vanished. There is a restaurant in an old townhouse beside 27th lock,
but otherwise there was nothing to show that the townspeople had the
slightest interest in the canal, other than as an outdoor activity
centre for vandals:there was not a single boat to be seen (although it
may be that the townsfolk keep their boats on the river rather than on
the canal) and the old buildings were decaying. We had been told that
it was not safe to stay in Athy: a pity.

The lock-keeper lives at 28th lock. There were several boys fishing
there; they helped to open and close gates. We pulled into the lock
and tied up to take on water, but it was taking so long that we
decided not to fill completely. The keeper operated the lock and we
went down  --- and immediately out on to the Barrow.

The river is navigable for a short distance upstream into the heart of
the town, but we didn't go up to see the sights. Instead, we turned
right to travel downstream. We had to cross the river immediately to
travel under the eastern arch of the railway bridge; there is a weir
on the right just below the bridge. Then we were into the first of the
lateral cuts leading down to Ardreigh lock.

The pattern for most of these cuts is the same. A long island or
series of islands divides the cut from the river. A weir on the river,
near the top of the cut, keeps the water level high. Some of these
weirs run along the side of the cut, at least part of the way, so that
you have to watch for the sideways force of the current. At the bottom
of the cut there is a lock (usually with a fairly small drop); then
the boatstream rejoins the river, which sweeps in from the side below
the cut.

The locks and their associated cuts are referred to by names rather
than by numbers. The longest is Levitstown Cut, about two miles long;
there are a few contenders for the title of shortest cut.

Later on the weekend, we met a chap with a GPS system, which he was
able to use to work out the difference between his boat's speed
through the water and its speed over the ground. He reckoned that the
current was running at about three knots, although it was faster in
places. That meant that our downstream speed was considerably faster
than it had been on the canal. There is a speed limit of eight mph
(eleven km/h), but you're allowed to go faster when strong currents
require it. Despite Friday's hail and rain, the flow didn't seem to be
too strong.

One of the lock-keepers told us that the water level was about a foot
and a half above the summer minimum; that meant that we were unlikely
to hit anything if we kept to the boatstream. There were several
stretches where the echo-sounder was showing a depth of 0.0 metres and
where the ground seemed to exert a pull on the boat, but we didn't
touch at any stage.

One notable feature is that the trackway (towpath) is in good
condition all the way. It would be difficult to tow a boat from it
because, in some places, small trees have grown between trackway and
boatstream, but it would be easy to walk and, in some places, to
drive. In many places the grass has been cut; on different stretches
the keepers use 4WD vehicles, quad bikes and motorbikes to get from
lock to lock (each keeper covering several locks). In many places
local people use the trackway for walking; the occasional angler is to
be found. All the anglers were friendly, when necessary lifting their
rods or poles out of the way as we approached, and exchanging a few
friendly words.

The anglers evidently understood that boats have to keep to the
boatstream: the east side from Athy to Carlow, the west from Carlow to
Leighlinbridge and the east the rest of the way down. Arthur advised
us to keep about eight feet from the bank; that worked very
satisfactorily.

More on the trip itself in the next instalment.

bjg