A DREAM COME TRUE

How Ian Randle fulfilled his childhood ambition

As a boy, many of my holidays were spent at my grandparent's cottage in Thrupp, near Kidlington. The cottage was next to the canal. During my stay, some narrowboats would be passing by which created a desire in my young heart to one day travel on or even own one of these vessels.

Many years later as a family, we were working as volunteers at a youth camp on the Isle of Wight, and the tea girl who was also a volunteer told me about St Basil’s charity in Birmingham that owned and loaned out an old narrowboat for a small fee. I was intrigued and made further inquiries. The woman who gave me the first lesson on handling a narrowboat dropped her house and car keys in the canal, what a disaster!