IT'S an unusually bright sunny day for the start of the British summer - perfect for a trip down the river.

But this is no ordinary river, or for that matter an ordinary boat trip.

This is Tales on the River and I'm just one of a small group of guests for the very first special themed voyage down the Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation in the more than amiable company of actress/storyteller and teacher Kate Millner.

Kate knows the unique waterway very well because for the last few years it has been her home, on board a lovely old barge not far from where we start our trip, the Tea Hut, in Heybridge Basin, very conveniently located by the Daisy Meadow carpark.

Our vessel is the Elver, a 25ft steel narrowboat, owned and run by Basin Pleasure Boats, and today we have two skippers, John, who is steering, and Derek, who is essentially along for the ride but every now and again offers up snippets of history and information in addition to Kate's main narration.

The entire length of the Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation runs for just over 13 miles from Springfield Basin in Chelmsford to the sea lock at Heybridge Basin near Maldon but we are just going as far as the Maldon bypass, which doesn't sound particularly exotic, but from a boat surprisingly is.

Chugging along at a very sedate four knots we begin are way up the Navigation accompanied by the gentle rustling of the nearby reed banks, the occasional staccato trill of a couple of moorhens and of course Kate's lilting voice as she introduces us to a very special place.

Taking its name from the 'high' bridge at the original Iron Age settlement, Heybridge is a very appropriate place to start since we end up going under quite a few bridges on our journey.

Sailing beneath the first one, Kate reveals a wonderful little fact about the strange round holes that have been bored out in the bricks, holes you would only see from the Navigation. During the Second World War those holes would have been packed with dynamite just in case there was an invasion and the bridges had to be blown.

History abounds on this trip from ancient times right up to modern-day and with Kate introducing us to the wonders of the waterway, sometimes you can even imagine yourself being there.

One of my favourites was Kate describing a skipper taking a mound of hay bales up to Chelmsford which were piled so high, he had to keep on jumping up and down to peer over the top to see where he was going. The hay from local fields was going to feed the horses of Victorian London and on his return the skipper had a different problem on his hands, or should I say up their nose, because they would be bringing back the dung from the horses which in turn would go back on the fields. An agricultural circle of production thanks to the Navigation.

What I couldn't imagine was how hard it would have been for the 50 men from Suffolk who came to dig out the Navigation which with its gravel base was not an easy job to do. Long days were compensated with a half decent amount of pay, 15 shillings, which as Kate tells us was pretty good money in those days.

No amount of money would persuade me to swap my comfortable jolly little seat on the water for a back breaking year digging this canal out.

With 13 locks, and an impressive drop of 76ft from Chelmsford to Heybridge, it's quite a feat of engineering and damn hard work.

The world gently drifts by as we pass old factories, now empty, and new offices, a sign of Britain's industrial decline and the arrival of new commercial opportunities. But there's always some industries which remain and on the Navigation its cricket bats, made from the willow trees planted to generate a new revenue stream.

Kate says you know when it's time to cut down a willow because you cannot get your arms around the trunk, and from one tree you can get 20 to 30 bats.

As local boy Alastair Cook approaches his 10,000 runs milestone I smiled at the thought how wonderful it would be if a Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation willow was the one that smashed that final four to reach it.

As well as the history trips, Tales on the River offers parent and toddler voyages complete with instrument playing, song singing, wildlife spotting, and of course storytelling.

There's also pirate trips up the navigation where little hearties can learn what makes a true pirate with hat making, sea shanties, the Elver's very own puppet pirate and tales of salty seadogs and nice pirates too.

For more information go to www.talesontheriver.co.uk

History of the Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation

WORK started on the Navigation in 1793, and although John Rennie was officially Chief Engineer, the project was managed by Richard Coates, who had also assisted Rennie on the Ipswich and Stowmarket Navigation.

It was opened in 1797 at a cost of £50,000, and remained under the control of the Company of Proprietors of the Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation Ltd until 2003. It is now run by Essex Waterways Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Inland Waterways Association.

The Navigation's main purpose was transporting cargo. The first inland gasworks in Britain was built in Chelmsford in 1819, using coal brought up the navigation. But besides coal, there was plenty of other things to bring up including bricks, stone and timber. At its peak in the mid 19th century, the canal was carrying more than 60,000 tons of cargo per year.

Traffic slowly declined until the last load of timber was delivered to Browns Yard on Springfield Basin in 1972. Although commercial traffic ceased, the navigation continued to get income from water abstraction and from the sale of wood from the willows which grow along the banks. The willow is still used today for making cricket bats.