Canal photography | Nigel Borrington

If I could choose the life I please, Then I would be a boatman !

Canal boats and the Boat man
Photography : Nigel Borrington

Way back in the 1990’s the Levellers an English rock band, founded in 1988 and based in Brighton, England released this song “The boats man” from their album “Levelling the Land”.

Some songs stay with you all your life and for me this is definitely one that has 🙂

It screams out to “Personal Freedoms” , being free to live your life that way you want !! “Free as the rivers breeze”

The fact it centers on the lives of boat people is perfect, for some reason the people who’s lives where lived on the canals and river banks always felt more free, free to move and travel making a living from transporting goods (Coal, timber and foods ), from boat repairs and from music played in the many pub’s along the river banks.

The levellers

http://youtu.be/ZYcXjJXxqVM

If I could choose the life I please
Then I would be a boatman
On the canals and the rivers free
No hasty words are spoken
My only law is the river breeze
That takes me to the open seas
If I could choose the life I please
Then I would be a boatman

If I could choose the life I please
Then I would be a rover
And if the road was not for me
Then I MIGHT choose another
Cross mountains and the valleys deep
Where I WILL take these weary feet
If I could choose the life I please
Then I would be a rover

But these things they’re so hard for me
I cannot choose my own destiny
And all the things that I want to see
Are so unclean

Well I wish I could choose the life I please
But I am not a free man
Others rule my destiny
But my will’s never broken
I know someday I will be
Everything that I dreamed I’d be
And when I live the life I please
Then I will be a freeman.

I know someday I will be
Everything that I dreamed I’d be
And when I live the life I please
Then I will be a freeman.

And when I live the life I please
Then I will be a freeman.

February 19, 2015 | Categories: Comment, Gallery, Images for music, Story telling gallery, Travel Locations | Tags: 1990's, Boats people, canal boats, Canal life, Canal photography, English rock bands, images for music, Levellers, Nigel Borrington, Personal Freedoms, river images, river life | 5 Comments

Llangollen Canal and the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct

Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, Llangollen Canal, Trefor North Wales
Landscape photography : Nigel Borrington

Llangollen Canal and the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct

The Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, full name in Welsh: Traphont Ddŵr Pontcysyllte is a aqueduct that carries the Llangollen Canal over the valley of the River Dee near the town of Wrexham, north east Wales. The Aqueduct was completed in 1805 it was built by Thomas Telford and William Jessop, it is the longest and highest aqueduct in Britain.

The images here are from a visit made a few months back, this is a truly wonderful place to walk and sightsee, the hight of the Aqueduct is the first thing that hits you on arriving at the village of Trefor. With the canal quays and Mariana at one end and the small village of Froncysyllte at the other the Bridge crosses the River Dee some 126ft below.

As you walk across the Aqueduct it is very noticeable that it only has railings on one side, the side of the footpath, the other side that contains the canal has none and is fully exposed to the view from and 126ft drop below. At first this is a little disconcerting until you realise that its only really a problem for anyone passing over by boat.

The environment and atmosphere around the canal here is just wonderful, people walking , artists running small shops from the side of open boats, Families and groups taking boating holidays and then the wonderful landscape views over the River Dee and the Dee Valley are breath taking. If your are visiting North Wales you just have to spend a couple of hours walking along this canal and the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct in particular.

I hope the images below give some sense of this place as it is very special and well worth a visit.

Llangollen Canal and the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct Gallery