WORDS once SPOKEN now CAPTURED

This episode is especially for our youngest regular listener to the podcast, Rory, who had her 6th birthday a couple of weeks ago. So tonight, we explore the narrowboat Erica and what it is like to live on a boat, and then, especially for Rory listen to a story about another little girl who met some rather strange and wonderful people. Journal entry: 29th September, Thursday. “The reservoir is grey and slabby today, Crests form on wavelets the colour of old ice. Ghosting veils of low...

This week much of the country fell silent for a while and that stillness was the occasion for a chance encounter and finding within the silence the music of bells among crow song. Join us aboard the Erica tonight as we are touched by the enigmatic qualities of bells and stillness. Journal entry: 21st September, Wednesday Dew, the smell of sheep and wet grass. Rooks jostle the lightening sky. The company of ducks hunched at the water’s edge Shake themselves awake And drop into the pool o...

The second of our reading this year takes back to the working-boat families of the First World War. Geoffrey Lewis’ beautifully detailed and cleverly structured tribute to the people who worked the boats through this turbulent period is a lovely and moving tribute to their hard work, sacrifices, and bravery. The Longest Trench follows the lives of two families as they work their boats and provides an intimate and carefully-researched window into their lives, charting not just the hardships, ...

The first of our ‘Summer’ readings this year is a litle different from those we looked at last year and features Andy Griffee’s meticulously researched, fast-paced, crime thriller Canal Pushers. Set on the West Midlands canals from Stratford-upon-Avon up to Birmingham and down to Hanbury (a handy map is included at the front of the book). The detail of the canal systems travelled is beautifully captured as is life aboard a narrowboat for would-be owner Jack Johnson. I initially started the...

There’s a warm welcome awaiting you under the heavy night skies of summer’s hinterlands. Tonight we meet a very special person with a lop-sided smile and who might be able to teach us to walk with elephants. Journal entry: 30th August, Tuesday. “Day’s end. I stand up here and try to see what is Infront of me. But the future is just a confused blur of uncertainty. When I look back, I can so easily draw-out the most intricate constellations that map the chaos of my footsteps of the paths ...

Although a little delayed, the long-awaited rain and thunder did eventually arrive. Join us tonight as we hunker down beside a young willow and enjoy, with a field full of crows, the wonder of a thunderstorm as it roars overhead and all the richness it brings. Journal entry: 19th August, Friday. “An impulse forage among the brambles on a Blustery day of tall clouds and sunshine. I pick the high berries, you the lower ones. I extricate you when a bramble thorns your sleeve. Thirty-seven ...

It has been a sweltering hot week with temperatures in the 30s (90F). Join me onboard NB Erica, on a hot August night just as the heatwave is about to break, as we listen for the rolling sound of distant thunder. Journal entry: 10th August, Wednesday “The last of today’s sun slowly climbs the dolphin-backed ridge of hill, colouring the broad cluster of oaks and tawny grass with long shadows. A few hundred yards from me A barrel-roofed lock cottage, Its red door peeling And windows no...

Join me this week as we moor on a still August night, under a proud stand of poplars studded with starlight and moonlight. Tonight, we explore the evocative power of scents and smells. Journal entry: 6th August, Saturday. "The sun is three fingers above the horizon and washes the bankside reeds with golden fire. Three ducks cast perfect wakes of Vs Slowly, swimming the channel of molten bronze. There is something ethereal about this light Like stepping from one world into another....

There is a spot of ground that is special to me. Perhaps you have one too. They often are not particularly attractive, but somehow they are places we can go to find quietness. Join me to tonight when we visit one of my special places as we go down to the cattle pond with the help of Wendell Berry. Journal entry: 27th July, Wednesday “Drifts of mist rise and ghost upon the water In the pre-dawn light. The air is deliciously cool. The heron is in the cow-splash down by the oaks I climb...

The forecast hot weather has come and gone, but its psychological, as much as physical, effects feel a bit harder to shift. So join with me tonight as we gaze deeply into the mirrored dome of the night sky and its web of starlight, to discover what stories they tell and their challenge for us to begin to create newer ones. Journal entry: 22nd July, Friday “Every day shakes the kaleidoscope. Lift it to your eye. Twist the base and look. Today, three young jackdaws chase each other Thr...

These are the long days. The days of heat and dust. The days of quiet skies and dulled colours. Days of eclipse and renewal. These are the dog days of summer. Journal entry: 23rd July, Saturday [should read 16th July - blame the heat!!] “Martins twist and flit around the large ash, Clustering in the branches like cockney parakeets. En masse they drop, forking down to the water surface, Swimming the air with dolphin-like grace. We slip the mooring ropes and leave.” Episode Informat...

Old stories can lift an unfamiliar mirror up to our lives so that we see ourselves anew and as we really are. Tonight, I will tell you an old story. It’s a story about a silvery day of sea fret (mist), rolling ocean waves, empty fishing nets, and a solitary herring. Journal entry: 6th July, Wednesday “I sit on the bank, one leg hanging down. A drake mallard in eclipse, treads water, with slow, lazy strokes of his feet. He watches me. I watch him. We are both waiting for something... ...

With apologies for sounding like an asthmatic badger, tonight we explore the special qualities of an unremarkable dusk and why we can feel so at peace with it and the darkness it can bring. Journal entry: 28th June, Tuesday. “I stop work to breathe in the storm-wind And bathe in the whirlpool of its noise. My shoulders feel heavy As If I alone am holding up the blanket clouds That sag grey above my head. The water hose, snakes and hisses around my feet. Head upright, neck relax...

Odd little shards of memory take on new meaning. A young man clinging to the side of a bridge, a walk around a reservoir, a canal-side pub, a bridge crossing the Grand Union. It is funny how, looking back, distinct paths and interconnections can be found. It is, sometimes, tempting to see them as clear paths that we are destined to follow. However, sometimes, they are coincidence or simply a case that one spots significance after the event. Whatever the case, they can also be 'love letters writt...

The heat of the past few days has broken with sweeping skies filled with rain and lowering clouds. Join me tonight, as we reflect on life on water in the heat of summer, listen to the poetic words of one of our listeners, and discover the wisdom of making bread through the words of another listener and Robin Wall Kimmerer. Journal entry: 14th June, Tuesday. “The day starts fresh with clean skies and grasses that glitter with rainbows. Beneath the rushes, a moorhen fusses. The air is scente...

This week has been one of extremes that encompasses the splendour of solitude and an onboard visit by three very enthusiastic police dogs (and a puppy)! Alongside all this, we took time to listen to some bats, watch the cygnets as the grow ever stronger and contemplate the hidden depths of the most surprising people. Journal entry: 8th June, Wednesday "The wind is kicking up among the branches of the ash and oaks while clouds as heavy as wet blotting paper begin to gather. There is t...

On the week that the cygnets of our swan pair hatched, we explore the rather contradictory nature of the canal through the eyes of poets Jo Bell, Nancy Campbell, and Ian MacMillan. We find romance amidst the unromantic and beauty in the unbeautiful. Journal entry: 1st June, Wednesday "Heron, streak of grey light, Standing on the bank, Coverletted in Moon's-Eye And the first flush of poppies of the season. Rain falls as needles of sunlight. The heron preens for a while And then is gon...

May slowly rolls into June, but is summer really here? The towpaths and hedgerows are garlanded in summer colours and the ducks (and swans) are beginning to move into their time of eclipse. Some of the mallard drakes are beginning to look very travel-worn! Meanwhile, days like these seem to bring a lot of childhood memories to mind. Journal entry: 27th May, Friday "Two hours until sundown and a stillness already settles. Shadows creep low and long through the sedge and long grasses on t...

I want to describe to you what I saw today, but I can't. We have so many words to describe and represent the most complex of concepts. Why then is it almost impossible to describe something so simple and ordinary as the colour of the water earlier today? Kathleen Jamie and Thomas Merton (with a little excursive with Hana Videen) help us to find some answers. Journal entry: 17th May, Tuesday "The hills are painted a dusty grey and the world is filled with the quietness of sheep, the cry ...

The Greek myths tell us that there are times when the gods come down from Olympus to walk amongst mortals. We had a very similar experience when, on a sunny day in late March, David Johns came to visit us and record an episode for his canal-based vlog Cruising the Cut. Journal entry: 11th May, Wednesday “The carp are spawning! May rain casting rings on thrashed water, The flash of fin, And a watery thunder That rumbles along the side of the hull. I lie in the half-light of dawn, S...

Banbury has a significant place in the history of canals, most notably for being the location of Tooley’s boatyard and its association with canal restoration campaigner LTC (Tom) Rolt. However, the relationship between town and canal has not always been easy. Join me today, as we explore the town through the eyes of Temple-Thurston, Rolt, and Pearson, from the comfort of a coffeeshop window seat on a rainy Saturday afternoon. Journal entry: 7th May, Saturday "Another early start. At lea...

Why are canal boats and traditional canal-ware so colourful? When did the custom of painting working boats in bright colours begin and why? This week we explore our attraction to bright colours and what Tom Rolt describes as the ‘working boaters’ inborn gypsy love of colours.’ Journal entry: 25th April, Monday "Heavy grey clouds, ragged and torn drift overhead. Two women sit cross-legged on their cabin roof. A blackbird scissors the sky above forest green conifers. A hint of Ea...

The archdeacon is one of the colourful local characters who live here. Irascible and combative, he is nevertheless an important part of the social life of this small portion of the watery world. He’s a feral domestic duck with a chequered past and a strong sense of his own importance. A rather restless, listless day resulted in me drinking a lot of tea and reflecting on him and the work of Donna Haraway. Journal entry: 16th April, Saturday "I like it up here. It's not miles away from an...

“It is no small gift” wrote the poet Mary Oliver about the joy a dog brings into our lives. In the week that we had to say goodbye to Penny, we remember the many gifts this timid little whirlwind brought into our lives and made them so much richer. We also explore why so many of us find grieving for a pet so difficult. Journal entry: 5th April, Tuesday "The trees are still here; Broken reflections crookedly oiling the surface of the canal. And the blackbird still sings his river of song fr...