Winter 2025 - Issue 80
The Winter 2025 issue includes the following features. You can purchase this magazine from our online Shop.
You can read the articles in this and all other NarrowBoat issues online by becoming a NarrowBoat subscriber.
Front Cover: A British Waterways motor-and-butty pair cut through the thin ice that has refrozen overnight, after being broken by several pairs heading south the previous day. Both vessels are large Woolwich former Grand Union Canal Carrying Co craft that British Waterways inherited after nationalisation.
A Place in History
Tales from Harecastle Tunnel
Andy Tidy heads deep beneath Harecastle Hill to reveal a story of bold engineering and electric ingenuity
This is our free-access sample article from the Winter 2025 NarrowBoat
View an excerpt.
Historical Profiles
The Leicester Navigation at Mountsorrel
Chris M. Jones looks into the history of industry and canal traffic at Mountsorrel
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Picturing the Past
Harker’s barges on the Aire & Calder
Maik Brown explores images of the Knottingley carrier’s craft at work in the 1960s
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From the Archives
A late proposal for the Leeds & Liverpool
Joseph Boughey examines archives revealing a last bid to give the L&L a new freight role
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A Broader Outlook
River Nene at Wisbech
Chris M. Jones looks at images showing the port of Wisbech in Cambridgeshire, where fen lighters carried import and export cargoes to and from wharves and warehouses served by seagoing vessels
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Historical Canal Maps
Penetrating Paddington
Richard Dean highlights the difficulty of urban canal-building
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Picturing the Past
Images of the Erewash
Chris M. Jones explores photos showing working boats on the Erewash Canal
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A Broader Outlook
Barging through Sharpness
Chris M. Jones looks at photos from the Jack Parkinson collection showing commercial traffic working through Sharpness Lock on the Gloucester & Sharpness Canal
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Picturing the Past
Revisiting the Old Thames Waterfront
Chris M. Jones explores images showing the waterfront of the tidal Thames in and around London
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