Winter stoppages and the 14-day rule

Every winter the Trust closes sections of the network for maintenance — lock gates, culverts, embankments. The programme is published in advance, and it is the single most common reason a continuous cruiser cannot move as planned.

Where you stand

The 14-day limit allows for genuine reasons to stay longer, and the Trust's guidance names an emergency navigation stoppage as one. Planned stoppages are different: the Trust publishes them as soon as possible so that you can take another route, and it will expect you to have planned round them. Neither excuses you automatically. Contact the local Trust team at the time and ask them to agree a longer stay, rather than leaving them to reconstruct your reasoning from a sighting record months later.

What to do

• —Check the notices before you commit to a route, not after
• —If an emergency stoppage traps you, contact the Trust, ask it to agree a longer stay, and note the date and who you spoke to
• —If you want to stay put for the winter, look at the Trust's winter mooring permits — check its winter moorings page for this year's sites and terms
• —Record the stoppage reference alongside the mooring in your own log
• —Move as soon as the route reopens, and log that move

Why the note matters more than the excuse

At renewal, an unexplained three-week stay looks the same as any other overstay. The same three weeks, agreed with the Trust at the time and noted against a stoppage anyone can verify from its own published notices, is a different thing entirely.

That is the general shape of all of this: the facts rarely change the outcome on their own. The record of the facts, made when they happened, is what does.