Mon and Brec - day #1

 Saturday 6th July 2024

Exactly one year and one day after delivering Powys (formerly known as Jannock) to Rugby Boats brokerage we are hiring Gilwern Countess from Roadhouse Narrowboats for a week to rediscover the Brecon and Abergavenny canal. We last visited this canal in 1980 hiring Gilwern Queen from the same company (although under different ownership now) We were very lucky as they gave us a ‘returning customer’ discount when we booked this holiday even though it was 44 years ago.

We arrived at their base in Gilwern and were allowed to take the car down the towpath to the boat in order to offload all our ‘stuff’. Once the car had been parked in their yard, we were then taken through a very thorough personal (no DVD’s here) handover process before setting off towards Brecon just before 4pm. Nigel, our trainer accompanied us through the first bridge and around the first bend before abandoning ship to walk back to base.

It’s wonderful to be back on the cut again, floating through dappled sunshine and glorious countryside. After 44 years we don’t remember much abut this canal so it’s all new to us. We travelled North west through Llangattock and out into the countryside again to moor for the night just before Union Bridge at 6pm.

Countess is only 42 foot length and so is a lot more manoeuvrable than Jannock. She also has a shallow Vee shaped hull to make her more suitable to the Mon & Brec profile and so steers quite well.

G & B