Monday 30 April 2012

A mostly sunny day

Today has been breezy but mostly sunny, so after dumping the rubbish and topping up the water tank we continued our journey towards Leeds.

We had a bit of help at the bottom lock at Audlem from one of the BW volunteer rangers, I suppose that should be a CART (Canal and River Trust) volunteer ranger now that they have become a charitable trust and changed the name. At least so far they don't seem to be spending a fortune desperately changing the name on everything! The only problem with the assistance was that I got chatting and forgot to buy my red onions from the farm shop, it will have to wait until Middlewich now as I don't feel like stopping just for onions.

It was another uneventful day of travel, the gusting winds gave us a few problems particularly at the Nantwich Viaduct where our attempt to reverse in order to allow an oncoming boat passage first resulted in us being diagonally across the canal. The approaching boat attempted the same manoeuvre with the same result so there we both were at either end of the viaduct on a diagonal. The other boater realised we were towing, which makes life a bit more difficult and managed to straighten up on the offside and waved us through.

We continued to make slow but steady progress due to the inevitable moored boats and made the turn onto the Middlewich Branch about 3.30. We found a quiet spot to moor before we reached Cholmondeston Lock and I prepared dinner while Ray cut some wood. Nimue ventured outside for the first time since having her kittens and managed to fall in but she was very sensible and didn't try to go back to them until she was dry.

Tomorrow is another day when we might or might not travel, the weather forecast isn't promising.

Today's journey 10.7 miles and 5 locks

So far this year we have travelled 262.9 miles, 165 locks, 5 swing bridges and 6 tunnels

In 2011 we travelled 461.4 miles, 444 locks, 3 swing bridges, 34 lift bridges and 15 tunnels

During 2010 we travelled 740.3 miles, 642 locks, 53 swing bridges, 4 lift bridges and 25 tunnels



Since Ray retired we have travelled 1464.6 miles, 1251 locks, 61 swing bridges, 38 lift bridges and 46 tunnels

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