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A celebration of old and new at Crick

Such was the footfall in the Kingfisher Marquee that our supply of Towpath Talk newspapers was exhausted by early Sunday afternoon and we had to rush more copies over for visitors to our stand on the Monday.

With pre-show talk about a decline in lock usage and the effects of the recession on the boat-building industry it was good to see so many new narrowboats on the marina as well as the historic working boats which had made the journey to Crick.

Attracting the attention of visitors were 1909 steam-powered President and butty Kildare, Sagitta from the Dudley Canal Trust and iceboat Laplander, one of the oldest canal boats having been built around 1830 for the Birmingham Canal Navigations.

The winner of the 2011 Award for Favourite Boat of the Show sponsored by Collidge & Partners and RoyScot Larch was William Piper Narrowboats with their 57ft modern trad narrowboat Barolo, with a unique design and superb woodworking which included reclaimed timbers from Windsor Castle.

This was a second win for Northamptonshire-based William Piper Narrowboats having previously won in 2009.

The competition was a close-run result with the winners leading from day one, but being rapidly caught up by the end of voting on Monday. Runners-up were MGM Boats with nb Chance and Braidbar Boats with nb Bunnies Warren.

Among the products unveiled at the show was the Exturn bolt-on thruster which saves valuable space by removing the need for a tunnel through the boat. According to distributors Duncan Yachting Ltd, they are already in talks with a number of boat builders who are looking at developing this technology into typical inland waterways craft.

Evesham Marina, part of the Wakering Engineering Group of companies, unveiled their new £35,000 mobile demonstration unit. It enables the marina to demonstrate Webasto products including heaters and fridges.

Wakering director and general manager Steve Smith was delighted with visitor interest throughout the show and said they had a good mixture of boat owners considering updating their heating systems as well as potential first-time owners.