Crochet on the Canals…

We recently enjoyed a weeks holiday hiring a narrowboat and cruising up the Llangollen Canal between England and Wales. It has been a holiday on our wish list for quite a while and I absolutely loved it! Yes, I could easily see myself living on one of these boats…And there’s certainly a connection with crochet which is why I’d like to share a little of our travels here in this blog post… it’s a photo heavy post as we were immersed in such beautiful surroundings! Last year we visited the Crick Boat Show which I wrote a blog post about…

Crochet at the Crick Boat Show

…so I was already aware of the links with crochet. 🙂 Living on a canal boat certainly goes hand in hand with crochet. Here goes with sharing some of that crochet inspiration with you…

Firstly, yes there’s plenty of crochet to spot on the narrowboats seen along the canal. Such gorgeous filet crochet framing the windows and very intricate circular designs in some of the porthole windows too. Here’s a selection of just some that I saw during the week…it’s not always easy getting photos as the boats are often moving.

Many of the narrowboats themselves are so beautiful too. Many owners are obviously very creative people. This old traditional boat caught my eye…

Do you see that gorgeous Filet crochet there… 🙂

This boat was very pretty with a crocheted blanket in a cosy seating area…

And I spotted a knitted ‘Rosie and Jim’ on this boat as it went by…

Not only are the boats beautiful, showing so many signs of creativity by their owners, but they also have wonderful inspiring names too…

Spending time on a narrowboat provides a lot of time to enjoy crochet. These boats only move at a walking speed so the pace of life certainly slows down which is just wonderful and provides quite a few hours for crochet on the go…

I was lucky that other family members were happy to do the steering, work the locks and do other boat related tasks so I did get lots of crochet done. I finished a ‘Salty Kisses and Sandy Toes‘ hat for my mum. My parents came with us so there were 7 of us living on that boat together (plus little Salty)…

I used hand dyed yarn from The Mermaids Purse Yarns for the hat and look, the yarn matched our canal map! 🙂

And here’s the finished hat on my mum, whilst I’m wearing the original!

After the hat I moved on to make a scarf with some hand dyed yarn from Country Mouse Yarns…

And yes, I managed to design and make a whole scarf during the week. Here it is almost camouflaged on the boat… do you see it? The pattern is coming very soon…

I brought a sample of Week 1 of my Changing Tides CAL blanket for a photo opportunity…

I didn’t just crochet all day, I promise… there was a lot of team work going on (there has to be on a boat) and look, I did have a little go at steering the boat too…!

I’ve learned so much about the network of canals across the country. We don’t have any canals near our coastal stretch on the south east of England so it was great to discover more about them. Most canals were built over two centuries ago for carrying cargo and trade.

Canal and River Trust

Many canals remain (with others being restored) and they are now used for people to enjoy for pleasure. Whether that’s on a boat or walking along the tow path.

The New Canal Age

And I loved that we could moor up anywhere along the canal so our overnight stops were often in the middle of nature!

My family know that I’m always on the look out for crochet so I was really happy when one of my sons spotted this in a tree along the canal tow path… a canal side crocheted Yarn Bomb!

There are lots of reasons to stop along the canal… and this little book shop with an honesty box to pay for items was really lovely and well worth pulling over for a visit.

The scenery as we slowly travelled along the canal was stunning. We were transitioning from winter into spring and nature was showing all the signs of bursting into life.

We saw an unusual encounter between a lamb and a peacock which was quite captivating to watch…

These reflections in the water were stunning and so peaceful…

Along our route was the World Heritage Site Pontcysyllte Aqueduct It’s an awe inspiring aqueduct where the canal is literally carried across the valley and over the River Dee below on a 200 year old structure. It was an amazing experience…

Yes we went over that aqueduct on the boat – not for anyone who has a fear of heights!

Also along our route were a few long tunnels to go through… this really does show the meaning of the saying “there’s a light at the end of the tunnel”!

In Llangollen I visited a craft shop. Many of you know I love to support local yarn shops wherever I go. It wasn’t a yarn shop but they did stock a wide range of ‘Anchor Tapestry Wool’. They were selling discontinued colours at half price so I treated myself to some. No, I’m not going to do any tapestry work but I’m sure I can crochet something with these 10 metre skeins! And I got some ever useful notebooks too…

And there was crochet to spot in the window of a charity shop too…

As you can see a week on the narrowboat was perfect for inspiring me and to get my creative juices flowing. From time gained in a much slower pace of life to the beautiful scenery, nature, boats and places to visit. It was a special family holiday and we all enjoyed it with happy memories made. It’s an experience I would certainly recommend and I would love to do it again… Happy Crocheting Everyone… and the ‘Canal Side Scarf’ pattern is coming soon… 🙂