Trevorthelockeeper’s Weblog

I drove my van the third of a mile down the lane towards the lock cottage. I still couldn’t quite believe that this was where I now lived. It was a beautiful February day and London seemed further away than the four weeks ago it actually was. After work I decided to take the dinghy across the river for a swift pint. Mrs Lockeeper would be in London for another two months while the kids finished term and so such actions didn’t require any excuses or chicanery.

Across the river were two pubs. Low beams, flag stones and real ale was the Old Lock & Weir, while the Chequers was more a high beams and ‘I want to be a hotel when I grow up’ sort of place. I thought I might introduce myself again to the Lock & Weir, just in case they’d forgotten my previous five(?) visits. Half a pint of ale later, a man walked in and asked if there was a man from British Waterways in the pub. A pretty safe bet in any pub within spitting distance of a canal or river on a Friday afternoon. I was duly pointed out and the man explained that a group of children outside had spotted a sporting game bird, complete with bell and leather leash, hopping about the field next to the car park. They had seen me arrive and hence the messenger. I volunteered the fact that I was from London and had only really experienced the odd aggressive pigeon, but this produced nothing more than a few gallic shrugs. I asked the landlord for a few scraps of bacon, and when I’d finished them, he kindly gave me some more. Looking at the faces of the children, something which always makes me check my wallet, I knew there was absolutely no way I was going to be able to catch this thing, but some show of willing was needed.

 Making everything up as I went along, I suggested that everybody left the car park, leaving me to wrap my British Waterways sweater around my fist in splendid isolation. With bacon in place I then decided to spend a few minutes wandering up and down the car park calling ‘here Rover’, at least looking as if I had a clue. A crowd was now gathering as I furiously sent telepathic messages to any lost game bird in the area. The deal was, I wouldn’t bother it, if it didn’t bother me. After a few minutes I gauged that the ‘honour’ meter was showing half full, and was just about to tuck into the bacon when I heard the tinkling of a little bell. My heart sank as I watched this pterodactyl fly up from the field and into a large tree about fifty yards away. ‘Stay there’ I screamed with a telepathic salvo. I turned round at the crowd of eager faces and hoped they couldn’t register the rictus qualities of my smile. I turned back to the thing. Suddenly I felt like a little sparrow. I prayed it was good at aircraft recognition. It launched itself out of the tree, and flew a wonderful pendulum arc, swooping down, and then with perfect air braking, fell the last few inches onto my closed fist. It would probably never experience sitting on a washing machine, but it mattered not. My fist was shaking, partly through fear, partly because I was having to hold this blooming great bird at maximum reach. I think I said something like ‘Hello’.

The children were delighted with the turn of events, the hawk thingy was delighted with the bacon, I would have been delighted sipping a pina colada on a beach somewhere, but it clearly wasn’t my day  for delight. As it turned out, attracting birds in car parks outside pubs is easy. But now I’d pulled, what on earth was I going to do? All I could think of doing was asking somebody if I could sit in their car, with thingy, whilst I tried to come up with something sensible to. The same chap who had originally sought me out offered me his very little car to sit in. I asked if he had another vehicle, preferable an artic lorry. He said he didn’t. We, my bird and I, got in the car. Thingy was obviously somebody’s pride and joy and very happy to be frightening the living donuts out of a poor lockeeper. It was very well trained, as the poor chap would have found out when he next emptied the ashtray. A chap called Kevin, who just happened to be an ex press photographer, took some photos.

The manager of the Chequers came out and said he knew all about such things. I didn’t believe him, he’d said he knew how to keep beer. But by the time he’d finished sporting his credentials, he had been handed my bird and I was ordering another pint in the Lock & Weir. 

    During the winter months, the River Avon responds quickly to rainfall and a few days later the river was in flood. Not a big noisy American flood, just a little English swelling. But it was threatening to go, if not American, then perhaps a trifle European. I was still new to all this and so overlooking the flooded lock from my rocking chair on the patio with a cup of coffee in hand I watched the river rise with great interest. The trees on the island opposite me were bending obediently and I couldn’t help noticing that a little spindly tree on the other side of the river was looking particularly picked on by the wind. My interest increased when the troubled tree became uprooted and started scurrying up and down the lane. It then occurred to me that this tree was trying to attract my attention. To my surprise it retrieved a bicycle from behind a hedge and pedalled furiously off up the towpath.

About half an hour later it appeared again, only this time on my patio.“Hello, I’m Chris”, it said. “My boat’s about to sink and I can’t get to it”. I was faced with a vision of long hair, John Lennon glasses, twigs in lycra and a ‘I don’t want to be a nuisance but…..’ smile. I didn’t beat myself up for mistaking him for a tree, because in my own mind, the jury was, and still is, out on that one. Anyway, I never was one to judge, and as I was clearly in a position to help, offered the use of my little rescue service. This consisted of an old flappy inflatable dinghy that was powered valiantly by an antique two horsepower Seagull engine, and a geriatric border collie call Gemma.  I ran through a few safety ground rules and even through the long streaming hair I could tell the tree was nervous.“I can’t swim”, it said. I mentally ran through a few calming retorts and chose one.“Don’t worry, if you fall in swimming is not really an option”. This seemed to satisfy him and he relaxed into a level two tremble. Just then a tree trunk went floating by face down at high speed, but I thought it tactful not to mention it. 

We clambered on board the dinghy and I hit the outboard with a hammer (you’ve got to ascertain who’s boss from the start with a Seagull). Twenty minutes later after promising never to hit it again (a bit of a porky as it turned out), we ventured out from the lock cut onto the main river. We could barely make headway, but luckily the boat needing attention was outside the Lock & Weir pub, only a little down stream from where we were. The boat was indeed about to go under, trapped by its own lines. We had to work fast, and at one point I had a one leg in the dinghy, one leg outstretched on the gunwale of the ‘sinker’, and arms a kimbo trying to hang on and tie ropes at the same time. Pausing for thought to re check my work, a little black and white nose pushed its way under my armpit and demanded attention. I never really did work out whether it was a nuzzle for affection, or the critical eye of an extremely intelligent old boat dog. After putting fresh lines on the boat I got ready to cut the offending ties. By this time a small crowd had gathered outside the pub and we were blessed with several onlookers desperate to give advice. Thanking them softly between clenched teeth, I got out my knife, resisted the temptation to quote something dramatic at the gallery, and did the deed. Up the boat came like a flamboyant whale, deftly knocking the knife out of my hand. Applause from the gallery would have been more welcome if the Seagull engine hadn’t stalled just as I untied the dinghy. Accompanied by diminishing cat calls and more advice, I spiralled my way over the weir, wondering if the engine might prefer the starting rope pull in my left hand, or the hammer in the other. The dog stayed tactfully silent.