Thames Canoeing -1
Lechlade to Northmoor
A politics free update of the iGreens.org.uk itinerary (click here).
You can start at Cricklade, 10.5 miles above Lechlade, but that section is narrow and shallow. Although it’s nice to avoid motorboats, the best time is the winter. By early summer reeds make paddling a chore.
Start – Ha’penny Bridge Lechlade (1792)
Old toll house left. Camping at Bridge House click here. £8 per adult, £4 child. An easy carry to the river. (2019 update; £10 adult. The price increase seems to have been spent on “dog lead police”. Still a lovely site.)
1 mile – St John’s Lock (1790)
Get your river permit here. No camping on the island.
St John’s bridge (1886)
The first of many Trout Inns, left just below the bridge. Jazz and folk venue.
Land back up the weir stream. Slipway in side channel leads into field downstream from the pub. Camping. Ask at the Inn.
Bloomers Hole footbridge (2000).
The National Trust car park right bank is a good launch spot.
2 miles – Buscot lock
2.25 miles – Eaton footbridge.
The site of the last Thames flash lock which disappeared in 1938. Houseboats are moored in the backwater.
3.75 miles – Kelmscot village, Kelmscott Manor and Plough Inn left.
There used to be a Camping and Caravanning Club certificated site, i.e. field and tap for members, just past the pub sign on the left bank. It’s still there, but a sign (July 2013) says it’s closed.
Kelmscott Manor was co-owned by William Morris, the founder of the Arts & Crafts movement, and Dante Gabriel Rossetti, the pre-Raphaelite painter. It is a lovely house.
4.5 miles – Grafton lock
6.5 miles Radcot Bridges (1225 and 1787)
The river divides above the bridge (main channel left), but the right one is easily navigable for canoes. There are now two stone bridges at Radcot; the older (1225) over the side stream, and newer (1787) over the main river. The arch is narrow, the bend blind, and the Swan Hotel lawn is a good place to watch power boats struggle. Camping on the island. Ask at The Swan Hotel (Click here).
Some lovely back streams behind The Swan
7 miles – Radcot lock
A canoe pass appeared here a couple of years ago. It would be good in a kayak. Our Canadian bumped a bit, but we got down.
7.25 miles – Old Man’s Bridge (1868)
10 miles – Rushey Lock
Camping at the lock – toilet, hot water and showers.
10.5 miles – Tadpole bridge. c1789.
The canoe centre that used to be just above the bridge seems to have disappeared. The Trout Inn, right bank below the bridge is now an expensive restaurant catering to motorists of both the boat and car variety. I suspect they’d take a dim view of canoeists pulling up for a beer. Unless you’re very thick skinned, land opposite and scramble up to the Thames path.
The next 100 yards of right bank, which used to be a campsite, are now motor boat moorings. Slip discreetly in, for a bit of wild camping beyond.
12.25 – Tenfoot bridge
13.5 miles – Shifford lock cut left.
14.25 miles – Footbridge.
14.5 miles – Shifford Lock
Small campsite on the island – toilet, and shower.
Just below the lock the original course of the river enters right. You can paddle back up this original stream about half a mile to Duxford where there is a ford. A lovely spot for a swim. iGreens.org.uk mentioned a campsite in Duxford but it seems to have disappeared.
17 miles – River Windrush joins left. Newbridge c1250.
Two famous pubs here. The Rose Revived left. Maybush Inn right.
Land 100 yards downstream on left at Cokethorpe school canoe club landing stage.
17.5 miles – Hart’s weir footbridge
Site of another of the long gone Thames flash locks.
19 miles – Northmoor lock
Camping (click here) at Northmoor Lock Paddocks right bank. Access both above and below the weir.
Tap, cold shower and composting toilets. Fires allowed. No electric hookups. A lovely site.
(2019 update. Site closed when we arrived on a weekday. The owner seems to be in dispute with the environment agency who won’t allow camping on the lower flood plain near the river, and with the local council who limit the number of open days per year. Paddle on to Bablock Hythe; the Ferryman Inn allows much cheaper camping.)
Jim Thornton (to be continued)
A great new book has come out.☺
Heres a preview…
”
Concisely and eruditely set out, this impressive volume details why policy makers should immediately stop funding the UN’s IPCC and disband all climate -related institutions that rely on a trove of “secret science” that forms the backbone of UN IPCC alarmism.(Hear…hear.)
Tim Ball explains all the steps that have led to the situation we still find ourselves in today, despite all the abject failings of all predictions and/or scenarios concocted by doom saying errant computer models. Shadowy figures behind the scenes such as billionaire Maurice Strong, are openly identified in the book and one can only hope that for their misdeeds the fraudsters will be called to account.(Oh yeah.)
The undertone throughout is that sceptic scientists have long been rebuffed by the presiding UN climate cabal that refuses to enter into public debate.(Its just forced down the throats of children. Dictatorial abuse and then the masses pay for it too in taxs. Totally immoral.) .And it is no surprise the doomsayers are shy or open debate – much of their supposed evidence for global warming is either kept hidden or premised on the failed predictions of junk models. In fact, Dr Ball demonstrates there is no openly verifiable proof showing human-made carbon dioxide measurably altering climate, let alone ”catastrophically,” as is all too often claimed.
The books called…
Review: ‘The Deliberate Corruption of Climate Science’ by Dr. Tim Ball Written by Hans Schreuder & John O’Sullivan In this mind-blowing book ‘The Deliberate Corruption of Climate Science;’ one of the world’s leading sceptic climatologists, Tim Ball, presents us with the evidence as to why the UN IPCC is nothing more and nothing less than a politically contrived organisation. This is the book Ball has been eager to publish the moment he was free of the censorious legal shackles imposed upon him three years ago when Penn. State University’s Michael Mann (‘hockey stick’ graph fraud) filed a libel suit against him in Canada.
Here, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the supposed world authority on matters of climate, is demonstrated to be a tight-knit and politicized advocacy group – a “cabal” as Ball calls them, that has cost the world multi-billions of dollars for no result whatsoever. Today we may see for ourselves why Ball correctly adjudged that Mann (and others) should be in “the state pen, not Penn. State.”
Date: Tue, 18 Feb 2014 07:53:20 +0000
To: pureform2000@hotmail.com
I am the owner of the campsite at Northmoor Lock – our website has changed so your link is currently not working. How do I contact you to update you?
No worries. Send the link and I’ll sort. Give me 1 week, cos I’m out of country just now. Great site BTW.
all sorted now. I’ve gone for the barefoot campsites link. let me know if any probs. jim