Canal Boat Rental in the U.K.

I have no suggestions, but this trip sounds wonderful. I hope you are able to make it happen.

I should be able to help here. My wife and I have been canal boating since the 1970s and we had our own boat from 2003 until a few weeks ago. we have travelled over the majority of the navigable system in England and Wales. We are also in our 70s but the sale of the boat was not for health reasons, but more for lack of time due to family commitments with a new granddaughter.

Many would point you in the direction of the Llangollen Canal, which has the world famous Pontcysyllte Aqueduct over the River Dee. There has been a breach on the canal which means that only the western end west of Whitchurch is available until later this Summer, but there are lots of hire bases and only two locks to navigate. But as a consequence it does get very busy and would not be my personal choice. The canal is beautiful at the very western end but fairly nondescript for large sections further east.

My personal favourite canal is the Caldon, which runs from Stoke-on-Trent east into the edge of the Peak District National Park. But it does have a number of locks.

One canal that I have never cruised but have walked along a length of is the Brecon & Abergavenny which runs in South Wales along the edge of the Bannau Brycheiniog National Park (formerly known as the Brecon Beacons NP). The canal is not connected to the national network but is a gorgeous short canal which will reward a leisurely week long cruise.

There are many other choices and many hire companies and bases to choose from. Three national companies with many bases are Black Prince, Anglo Welsh and ABC. ABC have a base on the Brecon & Abergavenny and there are also 4 small companies - Beacon Park Boats, Castle Boats, Cambrian Narrowboats and Road House Narrowboats.

Please ask if you have any more questions.

This is a link to the organisation responsible for our rivers and canals - the section dealing with lock free canals.
https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/boating/boating-news-and-views/boating-blogs/top-six-lock-free-boating-locations
It also has links to further information about canal holidays.

These are links to some of the companies that hire boats - both river and canal.
https://www.hoseasons.co.uk
https://www.abcboathire.com
https://www.waterwaysholidays.com

They all say they welcome beginners.

Bon Voyage

We had a canal boat when I was a teenager so I have some experience.

It’s a great way to travel but it’s not for the physically unfit. You need to be able to hop an off the boat quickly when mooring up, also have the strength to pull the boat in either by rope of boat hook.
If you are inexperienced I understand wanting to avoid locks but they are part of the experience. You also tend to have more of them in scenic areas because the land is less flat.

For a beginner it can be stressful, you are in charge of several tons of moving metal with no brakes!:-) I’m mentioning it because my aunt and uncle decided to have a canal holiday and they hated it. 30 years later they still talk about the river ‘parking ticket’ they got from the Queen!

A number of companies run hotel barges on the canals, that might be a better option for you?
I don’t have any experience of sailing there but the Norfolk Broads could also be an option for the simple reason it’s flat? Other forum members will likely have more experience of this.

Sorry if this is a bit negative….

A lock free navigation (except for the 6 locks on the Glasson Dock Branch) is the 41 mile Lancaster Canal from Preston through Lancaster and Carnforth to the current head of navigation at Tewitfield, on the southern edge of the Lake District (where the M6 cuts the Northern reaches off).
From there you can walk the towing path to the original terminus at Kendal- quite an interesting walk and some stretches remain in water/have been restored to water. The hourly 555 bus to Keswick via the Central Lake District stops at the Canal Terminus.

The other obvious option is the non tidal Thames- above Teddington Lock. Yes there are locks but they are all manned, and if not manned at any time are automated push button ones. I know the Thames is a river, not a canal.

But if you take a hotel boat then all the work is done for you, although you are free at any time to assist with the locks (or swing bridges on some canals) as and when you want.

This is the umbrella web site for hotel boats in the UK- https://www.hotelboating.co.uk/

EDITED- To add if you do the Lancaster, do visit the Maritime Museum in Lancaster. I was there yesterday, one of the exhibits is a reconstruction of one of the short lived packet boats which plied the canal before the railway came. It took up to 70 passengers, horse drawn at an average speed of 9mph. Lancaster was once a major ocean port, and the museum does an excellent job of telling that story. Entrance is just £5.

which episodes intrigued you? I regularly watch it, and am a regular gongoozler and occasional narrowboater

After Canal Boat Diaries (which is really an account of an experienced "live aboard") you might like to watch this Youtube video made by a young, strong and fit tourist from Vancouver who did two tours in two summers. https://youtu.be/ZBwE9Vw9LNU?si=q-PJHvTO0zqsZbGI

I think you already know that it wouldn't be easy task for you. You should also remember that these boats move at around 4mph and you are expected to return them to where you began. Rentals typically lose the first half of the first day and second half of the last due to handover procedures. So a one week rental would give the equivalent of 6 days touring - 3 out and 3 back, often by same route. If you were only managing 5 hours travel per day you would only reach around 80 minutes car driving distance of where you started before you had to turn around. Now I've done the negative stuff I would support Emma's slightly alternative suggestion, have a look through Google and Youtube for boat rental on the "Norfolk Broads". These are a network of small rivers and lakes with NO LOCKS. Different style of boats but a similar, and less physical, experience. And Norfolk tends to have less rain!

But be warned, all boat rental is expensive compared to similar sized accomodation on land.

How far you could get and how hard you will find it very much depends on your fitness, but you don't have to be super fit, just prepared for some physical exercise. One factor to consider is are you both prepared to steer? Very often women don't like to steer and therefore inevitable end up doing kore of the physical work whilst the man drives. My wife and I always split the driving.

Whilst the standard maximum speed on canals is 4mph in reality apart from one or two canals the reality is 3mph or occasionally even slower. But that's the whole point, the speed gives you the time to see things that would pass you by with other forms of transport and is one of the delights.

If you have watched Canal Boat Diaries I assume that you are wanting to experience a narrowboat, which is a specific type of boat built for the narrow canals. You won't find this option in the Norfolk Broads.

On cost the lead rental figure will look expensive but you need to factor in that that figure will be inclusive so you will have all your fuel costs and most of your entertainment costs paid for. And all your meals if you choose to self cater although I would encourage you to explore the canalised pubs. It can actually be a very affordable holiday if you want.

Can you manage any locks at all?

I haven’t done a lock since I was in my 20s and now in my 60s I wouldn’t even consider it (and I run 3 x 5kms a week).

If you can regularly run 5km I can’t imagine what issue you would have with working a narrow lock, unless you have particular issues with strength. I’m 73 and I’m sure I could work a boat up Wigan locks tomorrow- 23 of them and all double. You just need to take your time.

Whilst Wigan is at the extreme end in lock working we always regarded a day without a few locks as a lesser experience.

We have taken three trips with https://www.leboat.com/en/.

The first in Scotland in 2009 (I was 64), seeing Loch Ness and Fort Augustus. Unfortunately the weather was so bad we had to cut it short. It was a back and forth trip.

Second in Ireland in 2012 (I was 57). This was by far the best trip: the weather was warm and dry, it was easy to find mooring, there were many pubs for lunch. This was an A-to-B trip. All locks were manned, but you had to pay pr lock.

Third was England in 2023 (I was 68). It was difficult to find mooring and it was cooold. We cut it short by two days. This was an A-to-B trip. All locks were manned; except one where I had to press the buttons myself. Pressing was esay, but I read the instructions thrice to make sure I did it in the correct sequence.

My conclusion:

• it is a wonderful way of seeing the scenery
• GO IN LATE SUMMER. In June the water in the Thames was still bitterly cold and while the boat is heated, it only works while the motor is running, so the nights and mornings were freezing.

The experience on rivers is dramatically different to that on canals. You probably won't be in a narrowboat, the locks are probably either all worked for you or electrically operated and finding moorings is more difficult. Some people will prefer that, we never did.

There should be some form of heating available in any narrowboat offered for hire these days. I'm surprised to hear that it wasn't on a hire boat on the Thames.

Weather is always a lottery in the UK. I would have said that June would be an excellent time to be boating, warm weather, long days and not the peak of the season for prices and busyness. I'm a bit perplexed by the comment about the water temperature. Why did it matter? You surely were not planning to swim in the river?

You could well be on a narrowboat on the Rivers, especially the non tidal River Thames, linking as it does several canals. Although only for the experienced you can and do see narrowboats on the Thames tideway- coming out of the Grand Union at Brentford and back into the system at Limehouse.

In East Anglia you can hire a narrowboat at Ely on the Great Ouse- go up to Kings Lynn, and the other way to the heart of Cambridge. The Great Ouse connects through the Middle Level Navigations, and thence into the River Nene up to Northampton and the Grand Union on the main system- weeks worth of boating.

The problem with this brief is trying to avoid locks, as they are part and parcel of canals.

Another very interesting and lovely trip you could do (if you can find a hire company), but is not lock free is to start in London circumnavigating the north side of London on the Paddington Arm of the Grand Union to Limehouse, and then up the Lee and Stort Navigations well into Hertfordshire- lovely waters and the locks are well spaced.
The unnavigable Lee can be explored on foot beyond Hertford a further 25 miles to Luton, and also the unnavigable 28 mile New River (an artificial 'canal' which brings drinking water from Hertfordshire to London. The New River is one of London's secrets, built in the early 1600's.
That would be memorable- I very much like the Lee and Stort (helped by having lived beside the Lee while building the Rye House CCGT power station for a while).

You can hire narrowboats and cruise on rivers, although I think it might be difficult on the Thames, unless you hire in Oxford. But in that situation I would much prefer taking the Oxford Canal north.

The route through London and up the Lee & Stort would be a nice route but it has a few practical difficulties. Most importantly unless a new business has sprung up recently I don’t think there is a hire base that would give access on a week long break. Even if you found one the route has quite a lot of broad locks that can be quite hard work. Heading west from the Grand Union mainline the first lock you come to is at Camden. Whenever I’ve worked that lock you firstly have to clear all the tourists sat all over the lock before you can work it and you will have a large audience.

Finally for large parts of the route you will only find moorings at the Canal & River Trust payable and bookable moorings, which will have to be booked well in advance, which takes away the spontaneity which is such an attraction of canal cruising. This is because the difficulty of London housing has driven many people to live on boats on the city’s waterways.

A sincere thanks to the many replies to this topic - every one of them, helpful. I should mention we are also fans of an earlier television series, "Great Canal Journeys" - especially the episodes which feature Timothy West and Prunella Scales. In that series, they are much closer to our age and their life experiences, to some degree, parallel ours, recognizing, of course, that they were very experienced canal boaters.. Although dementia is not an issue with us, we do have irreversible conditions not uncommon to our age demographic - which does hasten the possibility of this adventure. We are tentatively looking at September, 2026.

My wife and I were also enamored by the canal boat shows. But we know nothing about navigating a boat on the canals, so we certainly weren't going to do it by ourselves. so a guided tour is what we were looking for.

and we found a hotel boat, the lady Teal

https://ladyteal.co.uk

Our 4 day trip isn't until May, so I can't give you any review from actual experience. But their trips are always sold out and we had to book almost a year in advance.
I mention this because next year will be the Lady Teal's last season. So if you are interested in doing this, book NOW.
After my trip in May, I will write a review about the Lady Teal and our trip in England.

The Lady Teal cruises mostly on what were our home waters so I’ve seen it a number of times and have passed the time of day with the owners. Obviously I haven’t actually cruised on it but it always looked a fine boat. Note though that it’s a wide beam and not a narrowboat, if that’s important. I see that they do have availability for a 6 night cruise this September. Not cheap but then it is full board with all “entertainment” included, including on that cruise a passage of Wigan locks.

I'm a bit perplexed by the comment about the water temperature. Why
did it matter?

The cold water sucked up any warmth from the motor through the "skin" of the boat. At least that is what I think happened. The temperature in the boat was fine while the motor was on, but started to drop as soon as it stopped and the next morning it was so cold in the boat, that I wouldn't have ben surprised to see ice on the water. My wife wore three T-shirts in the morning until we started and the motor could heat the air in the cabin.

I am surprised that there was no wood or coal briquettes stove, or propane gas heaters....

I've never been on a narrowboat with no cabin heat.

I absolutely agree with lp enersen's post, I've experienced the same phenomenon early and late season on the hotel boats, even on the narrow canal system. Not to the same extent and for me it distinctly adds to the charm.
But then I grew up in a house without central heating, so was well used to waking up to frozen windows in the days when we had proper winters.

To add to the Lancaster Canal it does seem a pretty good solution, but then I don't know it well. I've only walked it several times end to end (some sections I do frequently, like Carnforth to Galgate) and done on the day trip boats (the successor to the packet boats, at a more sedate speed) end to end over several days. I don't think they run now.
I know there are at least 3 hire companies which I can trace. I didn't look on Friday when I went past (running late and a bit stressed) but the company at Carnforth Wharf may have gone, as I can't easily find them on the internet
While the Glasson Dock branch has a few locks it is well worth the diversion. Glasson Dock village is very nice, and the Dock is still used by ocean going ships, so an interesting place.

I am also a bit bewildered by the comment that there was no heating on a hire boat. We first hired a boat in 1975 and even then there was always some form of heating. Although, to be honest, in June in the UK we would never have had heating on in our boats. I also can't see a significant increase in water temperature between June and say September.

I have no idea whether this is a factor but I wonder whether there is a difference in heat retention depending on the material of the boat. It sounds more likely that i.p.enersen was hiring a fibreglass boat given the holidays s/he describes, rather than the steel a narrowboat would be made of.

We were looking at a canal boat for sale in Skipton yesterday and fantasizing about living on it and slow boating around the UK but we decided we’d have bring our grandson with us to do the locks. Do you have a grandchild you could borrow for the trip?

Rather weirdly we have just spent a few hours walking the canal towpath just to the east of Skipton today. We went to see the bluebells in Farnhill Wood but it turned into a rather longer walk, and in the end a rather wet one.

l.p.enersen was hiring a fibreglass boat given the holidays he
describes

Yes - sorry I was unclear. It was a fibreglass boat.