Talk like the towpath
Canal glossary
Forty words the wharf uses daily, defined the way Win Harrow would define them.
Barge
Strictly a wide-beam vessel, as opposed to a narrowboat. On the Bridgmoor the word is used loosely by visitors and precisely by Win Harrow, who will correct you once, kindly.
Biscuit tin
Martha Marlow's enamel-order tin from 1902, opened once a year for the shop standard review. The most protected object at the wharf, including versus the tea urn.
Blackjack
Hull tar and pitch for blacking a hull below the waterline. Scent arrives free with every hull treatment, embedded in your coat whether you asked or not.
Boatman's cabin
The small stern cabin of a traditional narrowboat: stove, bed, and a painted side the family insists on decorating. The firm's boats keep theirs painted to house standard.
Buckby can
A decorated water can in the Northamptonshire pattern, named for the village. Painted roses on the body, lettering on the shoulder, and the firm's boats all carry one painted by the towyard.
Butty
A boat without an engine, worked in pair with a motor boat. The firm's Nell & Ivy pair still runs this way at festival weekends, towing the slow way, on purpose.
Caulking
Driving oakum into hull seams before paying with pitch. The yard's caulking bench remains hand-worked by tradition and by Sadie Quill's veto, exercised in 1997 and unexercised since.
Cratch board
The curved board at a boat's bow holding the cratch cover. On passage boats it is the best seat on the vessel, and the first thing the tea urn queue looks at.
Dyed-in-the-wool
The phrase bridge-watchers use for a crew born to the canal. The firm's version: born, painted, or married in.
Flash
A surge of water from a lock operation arriving downstream without warning. Causes boats to surge, mugs to spill, and the lock keeper to shout, in that order.
Flight
A series of locks close together. The Bridgmoor flight is twenty-seven locks; the record for the round trip is held by Owen Brack's uncle and disputed by everyone else.
Gongoozler
An onlooker who stands on bridges watching boats work locks, fondly. The firm's seniority count of gongoozlers begins in 1903 and continues without interruption.
Graving pump
The cast-iron dock pump installed in 1911. It has drained the dry dock continuously since, and the yard suspects it of being immortal and treats it accordingly.
Horse-drawn
Worked by a towing horse on the towpath. Retired on the Bridgmoor in 1958, except once a year, when the past works a weekend shift.
Humbug
A painted pattern of round striped panels, the hardest pattern in the towyard repertoire. Current commission queue: nine months, and worth every one.
Lock
A chamber that raises or lowers boats between levels of the canal. Twenty-seven on the Bridgmoor flight, each with a personality and at least one story the yard clerk will tell at cost of time.
Lock wheel
The winding gear for lock paddles. Turned slowly, always: the canal hates a splash more than a scandal, and so does the tea.
Motor boat
A powered narrowboat, as opposed to a butty. All eleven firm boats are motor boats except the Nell & Ivy pair, which are butties, and proud of it.
Narrowboat
A boat built to the canal's narrow lock width, about seven feet. The Bridgmoor's locks take seven feet precisely; anything wider arrives on a lorry, having failed geography.
Oakum
Loose fibre picked from old rope, driven into hull seams in the caulking process. Heat-dried at the yard, which smells of the whole nineteenth century at once.
One-shot enamel
Brush enamel made for coachwork, used for bands and lettering. Dries glossy, stays glossy, and forgives nothing, which is why Nesta applies it slowly.
Paddle
The sliding door in a lock gate that lets water through. Ground paddles fill a lock from beneath; gate paddles empty it onward. Both live under the windlass and the yard's rules.
Rose & castle
The classic canalware pattern of painted roses and castles, learned by Martha Marlow and kept as the shop standard. Four colours, strict relationships, zero negotiation.
Roseducing
The towyard's word for painting roses from a template rather than freehand. Costs less and admits it. Nesta offers both and prices your nerve.
Scenic panel
A painted cabin-side panel showing a landscape or a castle. The firm's boats carry scenes of the Bridgmoor itself, painted from the towpath by the painters who know it best.
Shake test
Win Harrow's final inspection: shake the tiller bar. A rattle means another day in dock. The yard has never lost money to the test, only temporarily lost boats to pride.
Spinning
Turning a boat in a winding hole, the wide spots cut for the purpose. The Bridgmoor has nine winding holes, spaced by the engineers so no crew ever has to reverse in anger.
Summit
The highest level of the canal, where the flight tops out. The Bridgmoor's summit pound is fed by the Felly brook and in dry years the tea room at Lock 14 discusses it daily.
Tiller
The steering bar of a narrowboat, pushed across to turn (opposite, and yes, deliberately). Kindly's tiller carries a groove worn by five generations of one family.
Toll
The fee for carrying cargo on the canal, collected at the wharf. Rates are fixed each spring at the rate meeting, which is longer than a meeting and shorter than a negotiation.
Towpath
The path horses once walked, towing boats. Now walked by everyone. The firm maintains its two miles of it, and the towpath baking is at Lock 14, not ours.
Towyard
The painting studio above the cargo shed, named for the towpath below. Where every hull, can and stool at the wharf is painted, and where the biscuit tin lives.
Winding hole
A wide spot where a boat can turn. See Spinning. Also the answer to 'what if I miss the basin?' asked at eleven miles an hour.
Windlass
The lock key: a hand crank that winds paddles up and down. The firm issues brass ones to crew, and they take them everywhere, including, once memorably, to a wedding.