A lovely bright sunny day today. We had booked our passage through Dutton and Saltersford locks for 11:00 and 12:00 respectively. We arrived at Dutton just after 10 o’clock so moored up and had a cup of tea while waiting. The CRT guys turned up about 10:40 and locked us through. We met them again
We are moored on the river Weaver after a really great days boating. The wildlife here is abundant with ducks, swans, geese, great crested grebes, little grebes, cormorants, kingfishers, coots, moorhens & herons. All this and trip down the amazing Anderton boat lift.
We have arrived at our new marina. The trip down from Wheelock went fairly quickly as all the locks were in our favour. The weather wasn’t too good though with a cold wind blowing most of the time. There were very few boats around, we didn’t meet any until after Middlewich. As we needed a
A really good days boating. 10 miles and 26 locks, mostly in lovely autumn sunshine. There was quite a hard frost overnight.First thing this morning it was still freezing enough to make the ropes solid. We set off at 8:00 to get to Harecastle tunnel by 8:30 when the tunnel keepers come on duty. It
A much warmer day today. When the sun came out it was very pleasant. Quite a few more boats about than yesterday. We met one at almost every lock. We followed an Australian couple on a Black Prince hire boat up through the Stone and Meaford locks, but they then stopped at Barlaston. Near Barlaston
To confuse matters there are two ‘Weston’ locks on tne Trent and Mersey canal. We are moored just above the more northerly one, near Weston Upon Trent. Today has been the coldest boating day we can remember in over 20 years. Ususally I dont feel the cold too much, but today I had five layers
An uneventful day. We set off at 8:00, dropped down the last two Atherstone locks then chugged the long pound past Polesworth, Alvecoteand Amington to reach Glascote locks. We had hardly seen any boats all morning, but now found ourselves third in a queue for tne locks. These are very slow to fill so it
The weather forecast for the week speaks of much colder. So we thought that we would get going early in case we need to do short days later. The water was topped up, then round the junction and onto tne Coventry canal. Again the wind was cold and today the sun didn’t come out. It
A fairly uneventful day with only the three Hillmorton locks to do. The sun tried to come out, but it was still cold due to the wind. Last time we came this way we saw several water voles, despite keeping our eyes especially alert today we didnt see any. Perhaps they were all hiding away
Much colder today than yesterday. There was a cold wind blowing along tne Oxford summit. It was slow progress down the Napton flight. We were following a couple on a hire boat who insisted on using a rope in each lock. We told tnem it wasn’t necessary, but he said that it gives him ‘more