Greater Cheshire: Day 4

The heatwave is well and truly over.  Today we needed fleeces and coats.  It was raining before we got up, but for the first part of our journey at least it was dry.  We got the washing machine going before set set off, and then left at about a quarter to 9.  The first part is through woodland, but then there are a couple of examples of flashes — wide expanses of water caused by subsidence from salt extraction.  The first is very shallow, with warning signs; the second has been turned into a marina, open to the canal, with a tea room and bell tents.

Orchard Marina, which closed a number of years ago for refurbishment, appears to be completely finished — but still empty.  When we were investigating possible bases in March, we were told it should reopen in a month or two, so that hasn’t happened.

At Broken Cross there’s a very long established pub, which now looks rather nice.

In that area there’s a huge bakery, and there was definitely the smell of bread in the air.  But then you come to the Tata chemical works, which spans the canal.  There is a new sustainable energy plant being built — it’s the big building right next to the canal.  They had a couple of the biggest cranes I’d ever seen, and as you go past the unfinished building you can see six or seven turbines with huge blades.

Wincham Wharf was a nightmare with moored boats, including widebeams, so you can’t see if anything is coming through the bridge.  Fortunately nothing was.  It was raining quite hard by now, and we moored up a bit further along, outside the Lion Salt Works.  Once we’d had lunch, we went through the towpath gate just by our stern, paid our money (a reasonable £7.50 each) and went for a look around.

The whole area around Northwich in particular but also Middlewich and Nantwich has a history of salt production, and the Lion works used bit open pans with furnaces underneath to boil brine and leave salt.  They had recreated the effect of the steam, and we also liked the way some of the old machinery had been left if its decayed state.  I can’t imagine an atmosphere full of salt does equipment much good.

There were also lots of photos of the effects of subsidence in the area, with some buildings falling down, some being jacked up, and others on rollers so they could be moved.  There were cracks in the roads several feet deep that people could stand in, and there was a canal breach when a mine collapsed — although it was fixed in a fortnight.

It has brightened up slightly this afternoon, but to be honest we need the rain to start refilling the reservoirs.  The next couple of weeks looks as though we could get wet a few times.

6 miles, 0 locks.  (20 miles, 12 locks)