The last blog posting mentioned the extensive flooding that Ireland experienced in November and early December and I expressed our relief at being safely moored on the Grand Canal. We remain safe and well but our cruising range suffered a blow when, as a consequence of the heavy rainfall, the canal in Sallins became impassable to anything bigger than a narrowboat.

We have spent many years moored on canals and have never experienced a day when the water levels rose to nearly 12” above ‘normal’ as they did here one recent Sunday. It was a strange few hours with a constant stream of foul water tankers pulling up in the lane next to Hawthorn and discharging their loads into the storm drains. It turned out that these were coming from Clane, a town about three miles away which was desperately close to being flooded by the River Liffey. The tankers were hoovering up water that was getting past the flood defences, driving up to Sallins and then dumping it. The oddest thing, and the source of much amusement to the locals here, is that Sallins is upstream of Klane! While this was going on the national news was reporting that ‘The Waterways’, a new commercial and housing development in Sallins, was being evacuated as it flooded to a depth of four feet. This site is only a few hundred yards from where we are moored. The following day we took our usual stroll down the towpath with the dog, only to find it closed by a crude barrier beyond which all sorts of mayhem appeared to have happened. Being curious we went on to see just what the fuss was about.  The barrier was just before a spot where an 18” pipe discharges water into the canal: it usually runs fairly hard and the silt carried in makes the next couple of hundred yards shallow and slow going for boats  but what we were now looking at made our hearts sink. The canal was full of boulders, rubble and silt for over two thirds of its width.

 The cause of all this was the huge trench that had been dug across the canal side road the pipe runs under. What had been road and road base was now in the canal.

A lot of media attention was focused on this event and subsequent newspaper reports reveal a typically Irish approach to planning and profit. The site of The Waterways development had been used as a pitch and putt course in summer and in winter it reverted to a lake. Locals knew it as ‘The Swamp’ and, when building on it was suggested, senior County Council engineers pointed out that the storm water drainage was inadequate and, to quote a local newspaper  ‘The Leinster Leader‘, suggested that "under no circumstances is this development to be granted until the service matters are addressed".  Of course, planning permission was granted and development followed and, as with so many of these sites, the development company went into liquidation when the Celtic Tiger rolled over and died before the planned site was finished. It would seem that nobody is now responsible for sorting out the problems caused by rash planning but that the 18” pipe into the canal is to be replaced by a 42” one suggests that the drainage engineers were correct in the first place. The extent of the flood damage across Ireland is such that the Environment Minister admitted that, had the floods happened fifteen years ago, many of the flood plain developments would not have gone ahead. This will be little comfort to the unfortunate owners of many new properties (whose value had declined by up to 50% even before flooding) and it is too late to undo the aesthetic damage  done to many lovely places that would have been best left alone.

Ironically we were lucky with the damaged canal as we had planned to go down to the fifteenth lock for a change of scenery just before the flooding happened but, unable to pass the wide boat that had been moored outside another wide boat in the middle of Sallins village, we stayed put.  While seriously unimpressed with this feckless bit of boating at the time we now realise that we were blessed by its presence: had it not been there we would have been stuck with less than a mile of cruising and no fresh water for however long it takes Waterways Ireland to get the canal cleared in Sallins and to finish the repairs (originally scheduled as a few weeks work in November) below lock fourteen.  Clearing the canal of the flood damage may take some time as there will doubtless be some argument about who is going to pay for it. Now, when we want to get out of the village for a few days, we head west and moor above lock 16. Fortunately the canal here is wide enough for us to turn or we would be facing a mile and a half reverse back to the junction with the Naas Line - not fun but possible with a hydraulic bow thruster. What is really great about this mooring is that, when it is not raining, the Wicklow Mountains are clearly visible beyond the lock and road bridge.  The picture below was taken in October - it is not quite so green now.