Brentford!

Teddington to Brentford, 5.5 miles, 3 locks

Couldn't sleep. I took the phone to bed with me because I kept thinking that the Brentford lock keeper would call any moment and that it'd be action stations in order to catch the early tide. In the end I must have fallen asleep, because I woke at 04:20 and there had been no phone call. Well that's the pressure off for tonight at least.

In the morning I woke early and can't get back to sleep again. I lie in bed worrying about the journey to Brentford and how I'll cope. The crazy thing is that over the last few months I've done a reasonable amount of night-time boating—the last few locks of the Aylesbury arm or the day I went through Leicester for example—so I know I can do it. What's more, I've done the trip from Teddington to Brentford before, so I know I can do that too. And I've got technology on my side in the form of the moving map on the iPhone. Really, unless the engine conks or there's some difficult-to-see underwater obstacle, there's really nothing that should go wrong. Trying to look on the bright side, I even tell myself that it might be a more scenic transit, since I'll see Twickenham and Richmond by night from the river. It doesn't matter though—I'm completely wound up about the whole thing and no amount of rationalisation can do anything about it.

I get up and go back to bed a few times, forcing myself largely because I'm scared to be awake to face the day, but by 9am I can't handle it any more and I have to get up. The high tide isn't until 17:41 and I don't expect to leave until about 17:20 if the lock keeper is going to be there tonight, so I've a whole day to kill. I'm not very hungry but manage an F2 breakfast of bran flakes, banana and yoghurt. I have coffee with it, which is probably a mistake and upsets my stomach.

After a while I decide to take a walk into Teddington, largely to pass the time. John—the captain of Daisy—is out and about and we chat about the latest news. He's been told that they're going out of the lock at 4pm, which is  barely 40 minutes after high water at London Bridge and means that they'll be going against the incoming tide. It's probably fine for them, with their 4.7 litre engine and their wonderful power/weight ratio, but not so good for me. I mention this, but John says that the lock keeper thinks the tide will be a gentle one and it won't be a problem. I decide to talk to the lock keeper myself.

On the way there, I notice that they've gone to Yellow Boards. This means that there's a caution warning, that the current may be stronger than usual and additional care must be taken. I assume that this is due to Saturday's water coming down from the Midlands, which turns out to be the case. I ask about this business of going out at 4pm and why the tide might be gentle, and the answer to the last bit is that the water coming downstream will counteract the incoming flow to some extend, which is in my favour. The 4pm thing is so we'll have daylight for a large part of the journey and twilight as we arrive at Brentford, which will be safer than travelling in the darkness. We'll still need the tunnel light on and navigation lights, but it won't be too bad. It all sounds very reasonable and reasoned, but I say that I still won't go unless I know there's to be a BW lock keeper waiting and the EA lock keeper agrees. He says to call Brentford at 15:45, since the lock keeper should be on duty by then.

With all that settled, I head for Teddington. I've wandered along the main road before and been struck at the number of 'French' places that there are, but they seem to have multiplied since last time. Even the 'French' gastropub has opened a tiny bistro opposite, which is undercutting the pub with its "Formule" set lunch. Amazing to find this French idea at French-style prices in Teddington. There has to be a story behind that.

I walk the length of the street until I run out of shops, then turn round and walk back. There's nothing particularly I want and I feel too sick in the stomach to stop somewhere for coffee. I decide that it might be better if I ate something though, so I pop into M&S and buy a loaf and a cheap sandwich, which I eat as I walk back to the boat. I've decided that the thing to do is keep busy, which will stop my mind from worrying, and that this aimless wandering is making things worse not better.

Back at the boat, I top up the engine water and am delighted to find that it needs almost none, then I start the engine. Down below, I apply myself to the problem of the rear navigation light, because I've decided that taking the control panel off in order to sort out the live wires I found yesterday, just before I'm about to go down the tidal river, is just too risky, so I can't use that as a power source. What I did notice yesterday, while I was fiddling with the wires, was a 9 volt PP3 battery. On a whim I pop back to the engine room to get it, to see whether it's powerful enough to light one of IKEA's LED lights. Turns out that it is, albeit not as brightly as 12v would, but probably still brighter than the 1.5v incandescent that the rear light should be. The problem is how to connect the wires to the battery, since the PP3 has that weird press-stud arrangement on the top. In the end I figure that the bare wires touching the contacts, held in place with an elastic band would be perfect, but I don't have an elastic band. I rummage around for a bit and come up with a possible solution: Velcro cable tidies. These are supposed to attach to a cable so that when you gather the cable up, it will wrap around and keep it tidy. I try wrapping one around the battery and get a very snug fit; pushing it off the terminals slightly so I can get the cable in, then pulling it back, seems to keep the bare cable ends attached to the terminals. The whole lot fits back into the light's housing well enough for the waterproof seal to be made. Problem solved!

It's now a bit after 2pm and I pop out to check that there's going to be somewhere to mount the rear light. Turns out it'll hook over the diesel tank breather tube, which is conveniently centred on my back deck. John comes over and we discuss the evening's plans. I tell him about the 15:45 phone call, which to me is very tight if we're setting off at 16:00, but John says that if we don't get a reply then we won't go, which I'm happy about.

Not long after, another narrowboat arrives. They're going to Limehouse; or rather they're going to the West India dock, since this is their home mooring. We discuss strategies for getting in there, but they've done it loads of times and think nothing of it. I'm slightly envious of their confidence, but I'm pleased to say that it rubs off on me. 

At 15:30, I put in my contact lenses and start to take equipment to the engine room. I've got the Uniden Mystic GPS VHF radio; the map book in its little house along with the iPhone, whose power cable is dangling out of a corner; the power supply for the iPhone; a mains extension lead, my normal phone and the everlasting torch. John says that he's going to move up to the lock ready for the off, so after plugging everything together—and discovering that the iPhone's touch screen still works through the plastic of the map book's waterproof housing—I join him. It's just before 4pm and as I pull into the lock alongside, I ask if he's heard from the Brentford lock keeper. He has, and says that they're waiting for us. That's good, because it has just started to drizzle, to make things more interesting.

The descent into the lock is gentle and although I start on a centre rope, I don't need it and get back aboard. The gates open and John waves me to go first as we'd agreed. Fearful of the power of the tide and also the water coming down the weir, I open Oothoon's throttle fully and roar out of the lock. The GPS on the VHF radio tells me my speed and it's initially 3mph, 4mph and eventually once I'm clear of the locks and wash from the weir I get up to 7.9mph. I'm fretting about this, because to me it shows that Oothoon isn't fighting the current well enough, but after I look back and see that Daisy is a long way behind, it dawns on me that I'm in the wrong units! Changing the setting on the radio to show KPH, I realise that I'm doing over 12kph—far in excess of the river's limit of 8kph. Relieved, as this will mean that the engine doesn't have to work so hard, I slow down and start cruising at a more reasonable 8.9kph, which I think is a good compromise between keeping to the limit and not wishing to waste the daylight.

The river splits and I'm a bit confused as to which way to go, but I stick to the right and this seems to be the correct course. The iPhone is showing my position perfectly  and because I can move the map around through the plastic, I'm able to see that this island is quite short and is really a detour for a boatyard, so I'm on the right course.

Not long after and I'm at the first bend and I can see a huge island ahead. A quick check of Nicholson's shows it to be Eel Pie Island at Twickenham, which to me is a milestone. I used to work in Twickenham, many years ago, so this feels like familiar territory to me. Past that and the stately homes of Ham House and Marble Hill house and there's another island. Once again I can see that I just need to stick to the right and I'll be fine. Daisy is coming up on my port side and we go along together.

Round the corner and we're going past Richmond. I can see navigation lights coming towards me and I'm worried that Daisy might not have seen them, but it turns out to be another narrowboat coming upstream and there's plenty of room for us to pass. Daisy is still parallel as we approach Richmond Bridge and although I head for the designated navigation arch (indicated by two orange lights above) Daisy goes through the one next to it. There's nothing coming, so it isn't a problem, although it is starting to get dark now.

Soon after Richmond Bridge there's the railway bridge; and immediately after that there's Twickenham Road Bridge. The navigation spans are all lined up, so going through them isn't a problem, and beyond them I can see that two spans of Richmond footbridge are open. This bridge spans Richmond Lock and the weirs that will be left open after the weekend, although they're clearly open now and not an obstacle. Another milestone. Daisy has pulled behind me now and is keeping a decent distance. Perhaps they're following my rear navigation light, which is still shining perfectly.

It's properly dark now, probably because after you leave Richmond there's Kew on one side of the river and Isleworth Ait on the other, neither of which have much lighting. I'm close enough to the shore that I can still see it clearly though and the iPhone is showing me exactly where I am, so I'm not worried. I can't see Nicholson's anymore without using the everlasting torch, but I've mainly been using that to check the temperature gauge, which has risen slightly above 50° but still not reached 60°. As we reach the end of the Ait, the iPhone has a glitch and pops up an alert to say that Data Roaming isn't enabled. This will be O2's network playing tricks on me, so I tap OK, press the home button, then restart Google Maps. After a moment it finds me and displays my position on the map, however it has zoomed out from where I previously had it and shows me a bigger picture. It's fine, because I don't need fine detail at the moment, although the rain lying on the plastic of the map book cover is a nuisance.

After Isleworth Ait, Syon House takes over and so there's still no light on that side of the river. After what seems like a very long time the tower blocks at Brentford come into view and we're on the home straight. As I get close to where the iPhone says the lock entrance should be, I zoom in a little and I'm glad for the clues it gives me as it lets me work out where the entrance to the marina is—hard to do because the bright light from the Brentford towers has turned everything into a silhouette. If that's the marina, then the lock entrance should be straight afterwards and the iPhone shows that I'm nearly upon it, so I start to turn. As I get closer to the bank I see the strange silvery sculpture that is at the end of the lock cut and know that I'm there. All I have to do is avoid hitting the sides as I turn into the cut and I'm in. I get a little way down and look back, to find that Daisy has followed me and is also in the cut. Looks like we've made it.

It's a bit dark in the lock cut and the drizzle is making things very hard to see, but it looks to me like neither lock is open. I get closer and closer, and more and more worried, then finally the left hand lock opens almost as I'm upon it. In I go, followed by Daisy. The lock keeper closes the gates and asks my name, and when I reply he says that he's left a message on my voicemail telling me to come down. He also apologises that no-one got back to us yesterday, but the regular lock keeper has been ill and it was only when he came on duty today that he heard all the messages that we'd left.

The water is level through the locks, so there's no delay waiting to go up or down, and the lock keeper opens the far gates immediately. He warns us that headroom is very poor under Brentford High Street bridge, but that water levels are dropping and if we can't get under, it'll only need a wait of about 10 minutes. The cut from Thames Lock to the Brentford Gauging Locks is quite twisty and full of moored boats, so it takes about that long to get to the bridge anyway and both of us can slip underneath without a problem. The crew of Daisy go ahead to get the lock open, but there seems to be a problem with it. Eventually I go in the one door that they can get open, and nip over so that Daisy can get in alongside. Between the three of us, we can't figure out why we can't get the lock to fill once we've closed the gate. I speculate that the problem might be that the lock is broken, so I activate the other lock to see if that works. It seems to, so I don't know what's wrong with the lock we're in. Eventually it turns out to be operator error caused by a lack of light on the control panel. If we could have seen it properly, we might have worked out that there are separate buttons for the gates and paddles on each side of the lock, but I guess after the Thames locks—where it's all sequenced off a single button—that isn't what you're looking for. Eventually we figure it out and the boats come up and we get the gates open, but it's tempting to say that instead of having a little 'lock activated' light, a proper overhead light so you could see the whole panel, or perhaps illuminated buttons, would have made life much easier.

Brentford basin is full, or at least the visitor moorings are anyway. Daisy is small enough to turn and nip back to park on the pump-out mooring, but I'm having terrible trouble controlling Oothoon due to the wind blowing down the exit from the basin, which is bad news with so many boats around. Eventually I get her under control and need to reverse back down the basin, as I'm not convinced that there's room to turn at the other end. It takes a little while, but the practice I got reversing around corners and back down the Oxford canal, the second time my impeller failed, proved invaluable. I end up moored just after the locks, on a mooring of indeterminate purpose. I'm not on the 'facilities' mooring, but I think there are water points, so I'm probably in someone's way. It'll do for this evening though.

I call my friend Jan and he comes round for dinner. I was originally going to suggest that we ate out, to celebrate my safe arrival back on the canals, but in the end I make Chicken Fajitas, using a bag of frozen 'popcorn' chicken from Tesco. It's lovely and very quick to make (about 15-20 minutes from lighting the oven to serving). I'm running short of coal and Jan kindly takes me to Bulls Bridge Tesco to get some more. I know I'll probably be there tomorrow, so can get some myself, but there's the possibility that something will happen and I won't make it, so I'm pleased we went.

I'm completely exhausted and really looking forward to a good night's sleep. In hindsight I can't see what all the fuss was about and it was all very straightforward, but I suspect that it's more due to the lock keeper's idea that we go at 16:00 to get some daylight, than any brilliant navigational abilities on my part. Either way, I'm glad it's over. Now there's just the long lock-laden journey back to Battlebridge.