Tag: pubs

Posted on

At last!

Just a sunny day in Worsley

2024 cruising has been an awfully long time coming.

Spotted this chap in Wigan!

I’ve been working all winter and have barely seen anything apart from the view out of the window. The plan was to finish working at the end of March and set off to have some fun., but plans don’t always work out. We left the marina on 3 May and I’m still slaving away on my laptop three days each week. We’ll see how long that lasts.

Lord of all he surveys passing through Parbold

We’ve been on a mission for the past week. The canals up here are very familiar to us and the weather has been kind so we’ve been moving when when we can and picking places where we know the internet is good and there’s something for Martyn to do when we can’t. Some of the familiar stops have just been a quick touchdown; like coffee from the Horsebox in Worsley and a swift couple of pints in the Brewery Tap in Lymm. We did meet fellow Bickerstaffe owners Sean and Diane on Alchemist in Stockton Heath and had a most convivial evening over a couple of bottles of wine. There is, sadly, no pictorial evidence.

There are so many cute goslings this year. Canada Geese are honking, pooping machines, but also extremely good parents.

We still get time to stop and have a little nose around. We tried to repin an unmoored boat in Manchester and found a car boot sale in Dunham Massey. It was probably the worst one I’ve ever seen, but it was all for charity so we paid our £1 and went for a nose. We even rescued a party of lady hireboaters who got themselves thoroughly stuck coming out of the Saltersford Tunnel. Sir Martyn the Chivalrous to the rescue!

The advantage of only moving at 3mph is that on a nice day you can walk alongside the boat and admire the canalside art

So today we are sat in the sunshine at Kings Lock in Middlewich, having dodged several historic boats yesterday on their way to a festival in Anderton. We are getting new batteries and having a couple of other boat-related jobs carried out ready for this year’s cruise. You know what the acronym BOAT is, right? Bring Out Another Thousand … If the canal gods are kind to us, and we have the time we have plans this year that include Stratford-upon-Avon, but we’ll see how it all pans out.

Fish and chips and a pint in Middlewich – rude not to
Posted on

Old King Coal

Pennington Flash is lovely. We stayed put for a couple of days, did a supermarket shop, hunkered down in front of the fire when it rained and had a good wander around when it didn’t.

Down by the water watching the birds

There’s a lot of new development on the other side of the canal, on the site of the Bickershaw Colliery. Martyn researched it and said there were several collieries there that amalgamated after WWII when the British Coal Board was formed. 90% of the coal went to fuel power stations and the remainder to the railways and the domestic market. It’s difficult to imagine what the landscape must have looked like then, it’s so beautiful now. The giveaway is the shoreline of the flash is black and littered with little lumps of coal.

Swanky new marina development at Plank Lane

Yesterday we moved on. Just the other side of Leigh we left the familiar Leeds and Liverpool Canal for the new-to-us Bridgewater. We needed to top up the water again. Our tank holds about 100 gallons, but I’m not frugal enough with the water and had been doing the laundry. No worries, we would pass two water points. But we couldn’t find the first. The second, in the pretty village of Worsley (where the water is the colour of yellow ochre from the iron in the soil), was closed up and padlocked. Oh dear, no shower for us!

So we carried on through the outskirts of Manchester. We’d save the turn into the city centre for another post-pandemic day.

Perhaps he’s dreaming of what he’d like to be

Twitter advice and Stretford Marina saved us. The marina has lovely people and free water. They also sell ice creams!

I had to wind to get to the water point. If you’re not a boaty person, winding is turning the boat around. Normally I get Martyn to do it. It’s a confidence thing, I had a fabulous teacher. Martyn was messing around with the hose, so I was going to have to go for it. And Beau Romer behaved like the lady she is. She rotated like the second hand on a clock, even though it was breezy. I was so pleased with myself!

A lot more industrial landscape than we’re used too – and a handy entrance to the Trafford Centre if you fancy a shopping trip

We passed the Kellogg’s factory. It has a wharf that’s probably been out of use for decades, they don’t bring the grain in by boat any more. We sniffed the cereals baking. It reminded us of being at home and driving past the Ryvita factory in Poole!

I hope this is being preserved and not demolished

After 19 miles we reached Little Bollington and moored up in a picturesque spot overlooking Dunham Massey Hall. If you’re ever in the area try The Swan with Two Nicks for good beer and tasty food. Again, we may stay here for a day or two.

This’ll do