Entering London(Paddington Basin)

This is where boats were gauged and tolls were levied.

 http://www.londoncanals.co.uk/index.html
Same place when it was covered.

From the toll house bridge looking into Brownings pool or more commonly known as Little Venice.

Sharp left in the pool and you enter Regents Canal through north London and onto the Rivers Lee and Stort.

Our route is to the right and into the basin

 

A close up of the entrance to the basin

 

Looking back to toll house bridge where we came in

Along this stretch are land based coffee shops and restaurants. The same are represented afloat plus  book and jewellery boats.  Also if a certain crew is reading this, we did spot you but for reasons of privacy and security will not name you.

 This bridge marks the point boats enter the inner basin. It comes under the control, the land that is, of Merchant Square a large property company.

The water disturbance at this point is caused by air pumping in from below the surface. The idea is that any rubbish will not drift in and make the basin untidy for residents and commercial occupiers.

A bend to the left past the only remaining canal buildings

and here is our home mooring for a few days. nb Valerie is just past the rolling bridge on the left.

A better view. Not sure why they rolled the bridge up as usually it`s only done on Friday at noon.

The end of the basin has been dammed and drained to make way for a new bridge.

Boats will never pass through the bridge as the end of the basin is surrounded by residential flats. The money they pay means they will not want a lot of narrow boats moored under their windows running engines and lighting smoky fires.