Copper Jack

• Adventures

Copper Jack is a passenger boat, managed by the Swansea Community Boat Trust. Bookings can be made online and groups and special events can book it for trips.

Somewhat larger than Brandy Pad, Copper Jack provides trips out of Swansea Marina and up the river Tawe exploring the history of the copper industry on the river, where at one time almost 80% of the world’s copper is thought to have been smelted. The copper industry has long died out in Swansea and the old North Dock is now car parks and shopping.

A barrage at the mouth of the river means it is no longer tidal and the river is coming back to life. The surroundings are now green and verdant.  Wildlife has been returning gradually with the occasional flash of blue when a kingfisher passes by.

We both enjoy helping out, which involves crewing outside and inside.

Outside crewing includes managing the ropes, being bow lookout, whilst in the marina, or steering, something we are, of course, well practised at albeit on a smaller craft.

Inside involves taking payments, supplying tea and coffee or alcoholic refreshments. It may, eventually, lead to giving the talk as we travel up the river, before winding near the Liberty Stadium and returning to berth in the marina.

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Over the rainbow…

• On our travels

Last Thursday we took Brandy Pad out for a couple of nights. We were fortunate to have very pleasant weather and travelled up through the three top locks on the Droitwich Canal, then turned right to head towards Worcester. We moored up after a couple of hours at a favourite location we have stopped at previously.

A church and chocolate-box house

I have posted a photo of this scene before, but in the winter sunshine, it looked just as pretty.

The evening was clear and many stars were easily visible. We saw the ISS passing overhead, lit up like a huge, travelling star in the sky. It was easy to imagine some shepherds leaving their flocks to follow it had it been around a couple of thousand years ago.

The next day we did a Geocache which took us to visit the wonderful, old church in the picture. A wooden church is thought to have been on the site in the 1200s and was replaced with this stone building in the 15th century.

A double rainbow at Droitwich lock 1

On Saturday it was time to turn around and head home. Just as I was descending the first lock, I spotted this and was able to grab a picture just before I got too far down. Interestingly, the image betrays the limits of a camera’s ability to catch (and then display) all the colours that are visible to the human eye. Not all the colours of the rainbow are visible in the image.

It was a very windy day, which made lining up to get through the entrance into the marina very challenging. I am afraid we did rather bounce off the sides on the way in. Once we made it, we found ourselves travelling sideways down the marina. It was impossible to get the bow round into the wind, even with our bow-thruster going flat out. We eventually managed to get onto our landing stage successfully, but had to go in bow first, when we normally moor up stern first.

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The Severn Estuary, part 2

• Travelling

Having made the journey from Sharpness down to Portishead, the next day we had to complete the second part of the trip to Bristol. This time on our own as no pilot is available for this leg. We set off with a little trepidation.

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Many thanks to Rob for the photos of our arrival at Bristol.

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