Floating about: Day 17

A sunny start, but accompanied by a very brisk wind.  We set off at about 9 — but not before a boat moored beyond the bridge behind us had come past.  It meant that when we reached Stanthorne Lock it needed turning before we could go up.

As we were leaving the lock I spotted a boat coming, so we could leave the gate open for him.  As we approached the railway bridge, an Edinburgh to London Euston service went over.

People nearly always take a photo of the house in the converted stables, but this time I decided to take one of the house next door, which is equally attractive.

We continued to moor on the rings after Bridge 14, after about two hours of boating.  We hadn’t been there long when the rain started — and carried on for a couple of hours.  It’s difficult to complain though, bearing in mind how much water the canals need.  But after lunch the sun came back out, so we walked back to the new farm shop, to see what it was like.  You go through the towpath gate, then through the farmhouse garden, then across the farm yard.  The lady told us it’s only been open a week, so they’re still finding their feet, and the range of stuff they offer will be expanded.  We made do with a couple of Snugbury’s ice creams.

We hadn’t been back at the boat long when there was another sharp shower, but it didn’t last long.  It’s meant to carry on being showery for a few days, but it would be nice if we could lose the strong breeze.

5 miles, 1 lock.  (95 miles, 21 locks)

Floating about: Day 6

No rush this morning as we were expecting a visitor: my friend and former colleague, Jordan, was coming to see as, as his girlfriend’s family live nearby and he was up for the weekend.  He was quite keen for a little ride on the boat, so we went across the aqueduct and round the corner, all the way to the water point!  There we filled the tank, got the washing machine going and did other domestic tasks, while continuing to catch up with what we’d all been up to.  It really is nice to see people from our former lives.

When the water tank was full (it took a while as we hadn’t filled since Monday), Jordan headed over the bridge back to his car, while we continued north.  We caught up with a little boat going pretty slowly — we were only just over tickover the whole time, and when he went into tickover we had to slip into neutral.  Fortunately he pulled in at the Barbridge Inn and we slipped past.  We then turned right onto the Middlewich Branch.

We were amazed to see the moorings above Cholmondeston Lock with only two boats on them, as rhey’re noamally busy.  A boat which had not long come up the lock said there were lots more to come, so we’d have an easy ride.  Another boat was just coming up, and then we went into the lock.  There were four boats waiting below, with another arriving to join the queue.

We pulled onto the wharf at the Chamberlain Chandlery at Venitian Marina, to get a top up of diesel and change a gas bottle.  We also wanted to see Nik at Covers and Canvass about some new porthole bung covers, as ours are disintegrating.  He was out on a job, so we pulled forward onto a pontoon and waited for him to come back.  With those ordered, we set off again.  At Minshull Lock, Adrian got off with a windlass at the bridge, but we could see a boat was coming up so I just waited in the middle.  There was another one waiting to come up, and the crew said they’d work the lock so Adrian could get on board.  He’d closed one paddle and shut the top gate, so had done some of the work.  It’s a lock where it’s not easy to get back on at the bottom, so it was quite handy.

The moorings beyond Aqueduct Marina had a few boats on them.  At Bridge 12, which is on a blind bend, there was a boat coming the other way so I had to get out of the way to let him through.  Then it turned out there was another one, but he backed off so we could come through.

The moorings overlooking Church Minshull were surprisingly completely empty.  We considered stopping there, but there are rocks under the water that make lift difficult, so we carried on to the rings before Bridge 14 where we stopped last time we were here.  These were also empty, but a couple of boats arrived soon after.  Where is everyone?  Have they all gone back to their marinas because of the imminent closure of some Midlands waterways?  Are they all on the Llangollen?

Because of the late start and the several stops it was gone 3pm before we had tied up, which is pretty late for us these days.

8 miles, 2 locks.  (22 miles, 6 locks)

Greater Cheshire: Day 12

Remarkably, we had the lovely Clive Green moorings to ourselves last night.  This morning, with a very unambitious target, we were in no rush to get away.  We eventually got a wash load going to try to reduce the backlog, and set off rather slowly at about 10am; the was no point it getting to where we were going if the washing machine hadn’t finished.  The local farmer and his team was busy muck spreading.

The canal seems very quiet at the moment.  No boats had been past before we set off, and we passed only one in the hour we were moving.  We moored up just through Bridge 14, on the first of the Church Minshull moorings.  These ones don’t have a view over the valley, but they do have a nice piled edge rather than rocks below the water line.  A while later, when it was lunchtime, we walked down the road from the bridge into Church Minshull.  There’s a bridge over the River Weaver, with a view of Bridge House, which has a rather unexpected tower.

The church bell ringers had been doing their thing for the best part of an hour already.  It’s quite an unusual shaped building, and we were headed to The Badger Inn next door.

We had an excellent and good value lunch from their sandwich menu, so good in fact that we’re thinking we really won’t need much dinner later.  Then we had a walk round the village, which has lots of half timbered buildings.

To get back, we took a footpath which started along the valley then climbed up through woodlands and even involved a couple of bridges across gulleys.

The last comes out by the next canal bridge, so we could then walk along the towpath back to the boat.  We’d thought about doing another mile or two, to the moorings before Aqueduct Marina, but decided to stay where we were.  Adrian has spent the afternoon working on a project while he has a good signal; I went for a walk to complete my steps for the day, but otherwise have done very little.

3 miles, 0 locks.  (60 miles, 18 locks)

Northern Exposure: Day 18

As we watched Boris Johnson lock down the UK last night, we realised we’d be implementing Plan B rather than Plan A: we wouldn’t be able to return to our home marina, and would have to leave the boat up north instead.  Fortunately we’d already been in touch with our good friend Bill who owns the Nantwich Canal Centre, who said he had room for us.  We considered his other marina, Uplands, which is closer, but it’s more difficult to get to a station from there.

Perhaps not surprisingly, we were awake early and set off just before 7am.  It was a beautiful morning.

I thought I’d worked out what time we needed to leave to cut down the waiting time at Preston Brook Tunnel, which only allows southbound from half past for ten minutes.  However, we ended up having to wait for half an hour before going in.

Once inside the tunnel we were back on the Trent and Mersey Canal, and CRT waters.  We were also back the land of mile posts, which reassuringly count your progress.

Saltersford Tunnel is another one which can only be used from half past the hour when heading south, but this time we had just ten minutes to wait.  By the time we set off, there were three boats behind us.

In fact we’ve seen more moving boats today that pretty much any day of the trip; we reckon a lot of people were caught out by the sudden implementation of the lock down, and are returning home or moving somewhere with good services.  One of the permanent moorers at Acton Bridge summed it up: ‘At least the weather’s nice,’ he said, ‘the world’s gone to sh*t but at least the weather’s nice.’

We made another touch and go visit to the bins at Anderton — the Bridgewater is terrible for services, in fact we haven’t seen a bin since we last came through Anderton.  We had lunch on the move, just before going through the chemical works, which if anything looks even more impressive going this way.

Back out in the countryside, we saw our first kingfishers of the trip — in fact there were two, but only one stayed still long enough for a photo.

We passed a boat shortly before Middlewich, so were hopeful the locks would be in our favour.  They were, largely.  Adrian worked Big Lock, then I took over for the flight.  Andersen Boats at the bottom had lots of boats in, and I guess it will stay that way.

There’s a right angle turn between the middle and top lock.

I walked up to the junction and found a boat about to come down Wardle Lock.  Adrian waited until he was down and had made the turn before bringing the boat through the junction bridge into the lock.

Another boat was waiting at the top of the lock, and another boat arrived below.  A bit further along, we came to Stanthorne Lock, which is more than 11 ft deep.

We carried on until just before Church Minshull.  Last time we spent ages trying to get into the side, so this time we decided to stop where there was a bit of piling to moor against.  It was 5.15 so we’ve done another long day.

25 miles, 7 locks.  (253 miles, 103 locks)

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)