April 4

Wow, what a week.

Spring has arrived, and there are daffodils, pussy willows and baby lambs everywhere.

New lambs near Braunston

Ringing this week has dominated all the ‘free time’ between renovation boaty things. I had a chance to ring in Ashby-St. Ledgers on Monday- one of the older sets of bells in the area. Having been duly warned that the bells were ‘difficult’ to ring, we raised the bells and all was well. We started off to ring rounds (bells in descending order by pitch). No so good on first attempt, but the second was going well. We finished by ‘standing the bells’ and this is where the special things started. Instead of stopping as the bell is upright, the bell continued all the way over, pulling the rope (and ringer!) towards the ceiling. I let go, and the rope continued, disappearing through the roof. Hmmm. A trip to the bell chamber showed that a piece of the mechanism called the slider had come loose. A very rare occurance, apparently, so it was replaced and back down to ring again. This time, the ringer of the treble had an issue, we all stood the bells again, except that again, my rope made for the heavens. The other ringer’s bell had dislodged a plank of wood from the bell room, her bell had hit this plank and smashed it to smithereens. Graphic evidence of the power of a swinging bell. Again, the slider had come off, so prudence said no more ringing of those bells!

Tuesday saw me ringing in Daventry, and we were gifted with a visitor who proceeded, in inebriation, to stand-up while we were ringing. This is very dangerous (see above!) so ringing suddenly ceased while he was escorted out.

Thursday, I was asked to Fawsley where a very old church stands in the most delightful surroundings overlooking a small lake. The bells are the oldest complete set made by the same founder, probably about 1440. They have been rehung, but are delightful in sound and relatively easy to ring. It is a set of 4 and I rang 3 of these 4 very ancient bells.

Friday, I went to the Taylor Bell Foundry in Loughborough, where I retrieved the bell I have obtained for my boat. They supplied a mounting and clapper, and I will spend some time mounting this on the front of Wandering Canuck. Photos to come! Taylor’s has just finished casting a replacement bell for one of those damaged in the Christchurch, NZ earthquake of a couple of years ago. The tower collapsed, sending all the bells crashing down. They were retrieved, sent to Taylor’s, and renovated to mitigate the damage. It turns out that one bell needed repair, one was recast, and one additional bell provided. Earlier, I went to the foundry as saw this bell being cast. A Victorian appearance in the foundry, where the scene couldn’t be told from one of 200 years earlier, but for the electric overhead hoist.