North West Passage: Day 23

We set off just after 8am on quite a reasonable morning weatherwise. Once out of Anderton, the scenery was quite pretty.

As we got near the chemical works it started to drizzle, and there have been showers all day between spells of sunshine. We made it to Big Lock at Middlewich by 11, and that's when everything slowed down. There were a couple of boats just going in to go up in front of us, and a couple to come down. Once we were up we joined the back of the queue for the three Middlewich locks -- we were sixth in the queue. Adrian stayed with the boat while I went to help out crews ahead, mostly by setting the next lock up. There were far more boats to go up than were coming down. Eventually we were at the front of the queue, and another four boats had joined behind us (a couple of the boats along here were moored).

By the time we were up the three locks it was 1.30. Then we joined the queue to turn into the Middlewich Arm. There was a boat coming down Wardle Lock, then two boats ahead of us to make the turn and go up the lock. It turned out that the next boat to turn at the junction was a Braidbar we recognised as One Day, with Martin and Anna on board. One of the things I recognised was the apple and pear on the bow flash.

Soon it was Adrian's turn to make the turn under the junction bridge -- not easy as the waiting area is at 90 degrees to the bridge. These are new waters for us; strangely, even though Debdale was moored at Norbury Junction for a while, we never did the Middlewich Arm.

The first hundred yards of the Middlewich Arm is actually the Wardle Canal, the shorted canal in England. It was built by the Trent and Mersey Company in order to extract more tolls; the rest of the arm is part of the Shropshire Union.

The lock cottage used to be lived in by a former boat woman called Maureen, who would give crews 'advice' on how they were working the lock. After she died, it's been sold and is being done up although there appears to be some work still to do.

There were a few boats moored in Middlewich but still plenty of room, but we were carrying on. We did one more lock -- another deep one at over 11ft -- and continued through the lovely Cheshire countryside. We passed Rowington, which is Catherine and Nigel's share boat going the other way. Then at a farm, a calf had just been born.

After some really quite warm sunshine there was then a torrential downpour. The sun came out again before we moored after Bridge 13 at Church Minshull, on moorings recommended by Catherine and Nigel. The Shroppie shelf is in evidence below the waterline, meaning the stern is more than a foot out from the bank, but the views across the Weaver Valley are spectacular.

Today has been a day of almost eight and a half hours. But by turning the engine off during the long waits at lock, the engine hours were only six and a half -- which shows how much of a delay we had.

16 miles, 6 locks. (274 miles, 143 locks)