Pontypool Best Western

As we were having breakfast this morning I looked out of the window and saw our car reversing down the towpath. Nigel had brought it from there compound and reversed down from the zebra crossing for us to load up. As this involved a trip round the one way system and reversing  over the pavement from the crossing going between the wall and the belisha beacon post we were just going to carry the bags over to the car.

I think we had to vacate the boat by 9-30, we were away well before 9am. Walked across the road and said goodbye to Sally and Nigel and reported what we had used from the first aid box when Diana got her finger bitten by a dog. We then walked back to the car and said goodbye to the American couple we had dinner with on the next boat.

We should have been driving home today but decided to spend another day looking round so booked a room at the Pontypool Best Western for the night.

 

Our first  port of call was Llangattock, access to the towpath was over a stone style beside the bridge, road side the style was about 3 foot high but towpath side probably 8 feet with stone steps sticking out of the wall. We walked both north and south along the towpath as far a Brecon

 

boats who have a ferry across the the tramcar tea rooms, but they didn’t open until 10am.

They have a couple of interesting electrically powered day boat, there was one behind where we moored last night letting a lot of guests off, probably hired for a couple and then picked the rest up on route.

Then it was off to Crickhowell to look round the town including the remains of the old castle, there is very little of it left. A nice little café for morning coffee and a Welsh cake ( I’m rather taken by these) and wander down the narrow streets to the river Usk.


The river is crossed by a single lane bridge, but traffic is controlled by traffic lights in both the street at the town side of the river and the three way junction at the far side of the river, so sometimes the queue up through the town is quite long. If you think this bridge is narrow wait until you see the next one.

 

Up in the town there is a post box, this is situated right beside the fire station outside the Post Office. Like many post boxes around the country it has received a knitted cover, this one supports the emergency services .

 

There is also the local garage, to our surprise the petrol pump was live and displaying the last sale at £1-50 lt. On the forecourt outside the doors is a wheels free car hoist with a car minus its four wheels up in the air at head hight. Being a Saturday there was no one around. the garage also sells motorbikes with three rather nice examples in the showrooms . The garage it’s self is of corrugated iron construction and we had a one just like it in the village when I was a kid. We also visited the local market and had a long chat to a bee keeper and ended up buying both a jar of honey and a jar of bee pollen.

Then off again to Talybont-on-Usk, we didn’t stop her but just drove through to see where the two pubs were in respect to the canal,turn round and then back to 

 

Llangynidr where we parked beside the lock and walked along the towpath to the village, on the way we passed this day boat having a double birthday celebration about 30 years apart. We wondered if the boat hire company provided the cold buffet because it looked  very nice and quite professional.

 

Our reason for coming her wat to look at the bridge across the Usk, we crossed this last week driving to Brecon, its much narrower than the last bridge and doesn't have any traffic light, you could sit here all day watching the drivers who don’t realise there is a car already starting to cross the bridge from the other end as the approaches are at 90° limiting vision. One car was three quarters of the way across when they met a campervan who wouldn’t back up. I wasn’t expecting this delivery van to make it.

Looking both down and up stream there were people bathing in the river. I bet it was on the cool side. On our walk back to the car we called in at Walnut Tree Café for lunch, well worth a visit if you are that way. We walked along the river bank for a bit so we could get a shot of the bridge arches.

Then back to the car and off to Goytre Wharf the ABC hire base, not only is there a tunnel under the canal and quite a bit of the old Lime Kilns there is also a very nice café for afternoon teas, more Welsh Cakes and jut as important, loos.

Our last trip of the day was down to 5 Locks, the end of navigation where we walked down the unrestored part to bridge 48 where the unrestored section disappears underground. The levels in the old locks and between them was even lower than 2 days ago when we visited by boat.
By now the temperature gauge in the car was reading 32° and were were both feeling bushed so off to the Best Western at Pontypool and our hotel room, impressions so far are good and we both checked out the shower before going for dinner at the nearby Harvester, not been to one for years, I am sure the salad bowls are much smaller but no reason why you couldn’t go for more, but the main courses were much better than they use to be. The beer, I wont say to much about that fizzy stuff,

Gilwern

A leisurely start today as we didn’t have far to go so it was 10-20 when we set of following a cooked breakfast, needed to use the eggs and bacon up.
I have no idea why this group of young cattle decided to gather on this bridge.We met a couple of hire boats and a private on all in nice places as we made our way to LLanfoist where we stopped for a while for a look round. We passed

under the canal in the old tramway route to the far side of the canal, there are a couple of reproduction tub on a sort bit of rail but its quite overgrown. The old wharf is now holiday lets and the entrance to the tunnel from this side has been extended and built over, the old tram way running to the right of the picture cut unto what is now lawn and the driveway to the house 

The old tunnel entrance is several feet inside the square entrance you can see above. Its all rather dark and damp down there, not from the canal above  it leaking but streams coming down the mountain.

 

  

We then went for a walk round the village ending up down at the garden centre for ice creams, well the sun was well up by now and it was hot.
We pushed off again and I couldn’t resist a selfie in the windows of the wharf as we passed 

Just around the bend from the wharf was this floating garden. Even the fenders had flowers in them.

We then stopped at Govilon and walked through the chapel yard and di a circular walk of the village before coming back to the boat and doing the final bit back the the hire base. We are moored right outside a pub again so we had a very pleasant evening sharing pizzas with the American couple who also returned to the hire base the same time as us.

Today’s Journey 8¼ miles in 7¼ hours including stops. This is the end of our Welsh Canalboat holiday and we have had some cracking weather and met some very friendly people. We leave the boat in the morning, but have decided to spend another day  in Wales before driving home.

Today’s Journey8¼ miles with no locks in 7¼ hours including stops.

Some pictures of the boat as requested by Barbara

Llanover

My word we have been lucky with eating establishments this week. Two lovely meals last night in the Open Heath and just one minute back to the boat.
9am this morning and we were on our way right to the end of the present navigation. On the way we passed under Crown Bridge, this was the end of navigation until the early 90s. when the one with no headroom was replaced

This end of the canal is very slow going with quite a bit of weed, I doubt many boats come this far. There is a new housing development by the winding hole and the winding hole has been replaced with pontoon moorings .

There is also a short tunnel to negotiate before finally reaching the basin. This is all nice clean brickwork inside it, its bot often you see one this

nice.  unlike the last one we did on this canal, this one has good head room as well, saves my knees.

We winded at the basin entrance and then removed the blanket weed from the prop, this operation was repeated a couple of times before we reached clear water.

Whilst moored at this lovely but under used basin, it has water, pump-out and electricity we took a short

Walk down the first of the disused locks, its the first time I have seen concrete lock gates. I bet they don’t rot any time soon!            

The canal is severed here between the basin and the top lock by a road, not a major one but big enough to stop the restoration
One of the worrying things was there is very little water flowing over them, yet further up the canal there is a steady flow from Brecon which CRT are buying for a lot of money, I wonder where its all disappearing to.
The lock chambers look in very good condition but the canal is only a few inches deep in most places, full of water plants including this large bed of yellow waterlilies. Back on the boat we chugged slowly away, pausing to let the weed float off the prop every few minutes. Just to the north of the tunnel is a long length of steel piling with steel capping, Its marked “No Mooring” I would have thought with a few rings welded on  it would make an ideal mooring, but I doubt there is any call for it.It wasn’t long, but longer than it should have been before we were passing The Open Heath. Much quieter than yesterday evening. When we stop at a pub like this we go straight in and book a table, as when the weather is like this they soon fill up. We don’t book ahead in case we don’t get there that night.The journey back to Goytre Wharf was very quiet only meeting one boat, a Wilderness cruiser. One of the things we were on the lookout for was this folly,the guide book said it should be easily visible from near bridge 58 looking left and you can walk from 59. Yes you can spot it if you are lucky but its more visible further on and bridge 59 goes straight intosomeone's garden. The Folly is a bit like Wormleighton’s radio tower, later its on the right hand side  of the canal.
The other gay I posted a photo of a company boundary marker up by the locks, today I saw one in someone’s front lawn showing just how much the canal company own.

Just before Goytre Wharf we came up behind a moored wide beam, I did wonder if I would get by, but thankfully the offside is a bit deeper there.

Its so shallow against the bank unless its a designated mooring, you have to navigate down the centre all the time and in most cases meeting a boat one will go aground.
Once we passed Goytre Wharf all hell broke lose. first a day boat right across the cut so we stopped until he sorted himself out, then two sets of tandem canoes with 2 instructors on the tow path trying to get them to paddle the right way, at the same time a cruiser came the other way, once the canoes were against the off bank the cruiser came forward and I went round him when a hire boat appeared behind him. A blasted the horn and the cruiser said “take care its a hire boat” I reply so am I, to which he said “yes, but you know what you are doing” Nice complement. Anyway one of the instructors ran forward and stopped him, when I got there there was another tandem canoe hanging onto the bushes, round that one and yet another hire boat appears. We then carried on to the 2 day visitor moorings and just managed to get in on the end. Mooring was a good move as the hire boats have been returning to the wharf ready to go home.
Just by where we are moored is an animal drinker, a culvert from the canal, under the towpath and wall into a small pond.

Today.s Journey10¼ miles with no locks in 6¼ hours.

Pontypool

This morning we moved all of 100 yard to Roadhouse Narrowboats pump-out point and Nigel was there spot on time to do the business so by about five past nine we were on our way leaving Gilwern for a second time, this time going south. The first thing I noticed was once through the bridge

without decapitating my self was the water was  much clearer and there were more plants growing in the canal. You soon come to a right angle bend where the canal goes under the new Top of the Valley dual carriageway, luckily its a very wide bridge as there is a boat moored under it.

I then had the first weed hatch moment of the trip with a load of bulrush roots round the prop and shaft, sorted in minutes, I didn’t even pull into the side.
he owner of this offside mooring has a very good collection of street furniture, I won't go into the legalities of their collection.

I can’t imagine this boat gets taken out very often, it wasn’t the only one we saw like that.

There were over a dozen Wilderness trail boats moored at Govilon Boat club amongst all the many cruisers.

I don’t know how frequently the busses run along this canal, but if you want one this is the place to stand.

With most of the full length of this canal effectively being on an embankment, its a contour canal hanging on the side of a mountain we only saw two stop gates that have seen any recent maintenance.

We passed this rather impressive building, it still has a davit hoist on the end, Llanfoist wharf.

Looking out across the valley we could see this row of spaced trees along the ridge. Sorry about the electric cable.

I didn’t realise that Wales also had little people who lived in the woods, I thought it was just the Irish?

I don’t know who, why or when these little figures were set out along the back of the towpath, but I like them. They are only tiny.

This is the only cutting we have been through on the full length of the canal, I know we haven‘t quite done it all yet but I don’t think there will be one now.

We were soon at Pontymolile Basin were we visited by car last week. Although its called a basin its actually a junction where the Pontnewynydd Arm of the Monmouthshire Canal use to go off.The

The white building use to the toll house and there is a gauging lock right outside it. This is just north of the old junction.

 

 

 

From here the canal runs along the back of terraced houses both sides of the canal and the only thing of real interest beside the weeds which was now slowing us down was this old chapel that has numerous plaques in the wall with names on them.

I have no idea about the doorway up in the air. From here it was only a few hundred yards to our mooring for the night, right outside The Open Hearth pub and as it was so close it would have been silly not to have checked out the beer and food.

Today’s Journey

16½ miles with no locks in 8½ hours