Who do we know in Leicester?

Tuesday 14^th July; King’s lock to Castle Gardens, Leicester

This morning I took Jess into the water meadows again for her walk.  The bridge over the canal here is called Pack Horse bridge, but the original one must have been partly demolished when the canal was built.

It’s similar to Essex bridge at Shugborough on the T&M

We left at about 8.30 under cloud and in a chilly breeze to descend the last three locks into Leicester.

The dye works once dumped its untreated waste into the river, which ran black

The first time we were in Leicester was 2013, just after Richard III’s bones were found, and then again in 2016, both times on Chuffed.   I remembered these locks as being very difficult to operate but they really weren’t, just rather heavy.  Maybe my technique has improved over the years.

At Freeman’s Meadow lock, with the Leicester City football stadium beyond the weir, the river is very wide

Just a trickle going over the weir today

Hello

We moored at Upperton Road bridge to visit Lidl (thanks Alchemy for blogging this!) before moving on to Castle Gardens where the pontoon was empty apart from a cruiser at the far end.  The owner came up to ask us very politely if we would help him get his boat across the river, which of course we would.  He wanted us to take a rope across to the other side so he could pull his boat over, with his mate to help.  We did that and reversed back as he took the rope and completed the manoeuvre.

Half-way across

It would have been easier it he had stepped onto our bow and tied onto our bow rather than running all the way across the bridge and faffing about with the rope.

But it worked

We were moored up by midday.  After lunch Jess got a play in the gardens, I had a fun trip to Tesco and the Fuel Doctor arrived on the opposite bank to get the cruiser sorted out.  Then we all walked up to the cathedral (dogs allowed luckily, as it was too hot to leave her in the boat) to visit the tomb of Richard III.  In 2013 we were able to visit the dig at the car park where his bones were discovered and also the temporary exhibition where a hologram of the skeleton was displayed.  (If you don’t want to read more about Richard and his tomb, skip to the last paragraph).  There was a big argument between York and Leicester as to where his final resting place should be – Leicester won, and he was re-interred in 2015.  The coffin was made by Michael Ibsen, who is descended from Richard’s sister Anne of York.  He is one of the people whose DNA was used to confirm the bones were indeed Richard’s.  In the cathedral we watched a video of the making and installing of the tomb which you can see HERE.   

The plinth is made of dark Kilkenny marble.

If you watch the video you will see that one of the technicians was standing in the hole where the coffin would be put to ensure the plinth was placed correctly.  Carving in Kilkenny marble shows up white, so  the lettering is clear as is the small representation of his badge, the boar.

Loyalty binds me

His coat of arms is not, as you might imagine, painted.  Watch the video to see the painstaking preparation of the individual elements.  It was made using the ‘traditional technique of pietra dura.  This involved cutting and fitting together over 350 pieces of stone.  The blue is Lapis Lazuli from Afghanistan and the red, Duke’s Red Limestone quarried on the Chatsworth Estate in 1823.’  Taken from HERE.  The skill involved is just wonderful.  The stone for the tomb above the coffin is a Swaledale fossil stone, quarried in North Yorkshire.  This was chosen not only because it will polish to a fine finish, but also because the fossils within it are long dead creatures immortalised now in stone’.  Taken from the same source.  Very well worth the visit, and highly recommended if you have any interest in Richard III.

It was beginning to get dark when a knock came on the window – another boater asking were we Debby and Dave?  We had a visitor at the gate!  (It's a secure mooring, the gate opens with a BW key).  Who on earth?  We don’t know anyone in Leicester… well we do now!  Ann, a blog reader, lives nearby and had worked out when we might be in Leicester.  She also reads the Alchemy blog, among others, and saw my comment to Mike regarding the man we met a couple of days ago who was getting his qualification to crew a trip boat in Burnley.  She has connections to Bromsgrove and Droitwich and knew that the boat, specialised for disabled access and now called Ten Thousand Reasons, was the original Pamela May trip boat in Droitwich, which following serious fundraising now runs Pamela May II which we have often seen.  What interesting connections, and how exciting to meet a blog reader!  Lovely to meet you Ann, or are you Anne?

3 locks, 2½ miles, old bones and a new tomb, and a new friend