Barleston To Wheelock After enjoying a nice meal in The Plume of Feathers pub last night, we set off quite late at 11:16am. We had a good run up all but the last two locks where we had to wait for some boats to get through. We found a woolly jumper under one bridge which took a liking to our propeller, and no amount of engine thrashing would clear it. We took the weedhatch off, and without even trying I managed to pull it straight out. A couple of BW men in a little day boat type affair were passing while we did this, and I complained to them. "Oh yes, there is something under that bridge", they said!
Then we hit our next snag, we couldn't find the mains power lamp we have been using for our tunnel light until we manage to buy a proper one. We had the whole boat out, but nowhere to be seen, then Dad mentioned that he might have taken it home because it was getting in the way! We reached the tunnel and there were two boats in front of us in the queue, the BW boat, and some Germans on a hireboat. After 6 boats had come out of the tunnel (it's single way operation for those that don't know), the BW boat was let in first, and then the hireboat before us. It was only once I'd entered the dark tunnel that I could see the hireboat trying to go sideways down the tunnel (which is quite a feat!). I thought we were going to be in a for long trip through the tunnel, but thankfully someone else took over the tiller, and made good speed through the rest of the tunnel averaging about 3 mph along the length. The hireboat turned off at the junction to go along the Macclesfield Canal, and we reached the twin top locks of what is known coequally as "heartbreak hill" at 4:21pm. There was another boat going through the other lock, but since it was quiet we decided to get down the locks before having tea. The other bloke asked if we were heading for Middlewich tonight as we sped through the lock, but I said we'd stop at the bottom of the locks. We did the 26 locks to Wheelock by 8pm – we would have been faster but some boats coming up did all they could to slow us down, one bloke instead of emptying the half full, all gates shut lock started shutting the gate of the lock I had already got ready in our favour. He was setting two locks ahead of his boat, and his long suffering wife - "Give two hoots on the horn dear", he said as we were swapping locks. Another bloke earlier in the flight turned a much fuller lock around leaving me to top up the second lock. "Oh, I didn't even look at the other lock, it's says it's not working", he said. True enough, it did said that in faded paint on the brickwork below, and so I let it pass. It was only once I was biking to the next lock did I realise that he was quite happily turning a lock in our favour as we approached it, in which case he would not have heard the last of it. Once at Wheelock Dad wanted to eat, and we saw the restaurant alongside the canal, and thought we might try there. Dad didn't feel like paying the prices, at £20 for steak, so we looked at the pub opposite, the Cheshire Cheese. It was 8:20 when we go in the pub, and they had stopped serving food some while ago, but the landlord said, "Just you two?", and with that we good some very good food. In fact, if they have finished serving food they are quite happy to let you order a Chinese from just down the road and eat it in the pub! Cheers, Mike -- Michael Askin http://shoestring_DOT_zapto_DOT_org/ ------------------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/canals-list/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/canals-list/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
