Beeston to Chester

Despite the warm sunshine yesterday we still had a frost overnight, but it soon disappeared with this mornings sunshine.

The Cheshire hills are very beautiful.

This is Beeston Iron lock, the sides are unusually constructed from iron panels, which was used due to the nature of the sandy ground at the site.

The ruins of Beeston Castle look very precarious perched on the hilltop, but you do get a good view of it from the canal as you pass by.

This is a new marina which has been built since our last visit 6 years ago.

These two donkeys were sheltering in the shade.

The final run into Chester is very contrasting. This is approaching Hoole Lane Lock, the last one before entering the city. There was a vacant mooring at the Tesco moorings before Cow Bridge, so we pulled in and moored up. We had a late lunch, then a quick walk into the city to get our bearings. Tomorrow is market day, so we just have to find it, it must be somewhere in the city.

Keith.

Winsford Top Flash to Beeston Iron Lock

 

Unfortunately having travelled to Beeston yesterday, I could not get a signal to post to the blog, so a day late but here we go. We had queuing at Chelmondeston lock as usual, yes even this time of the year. At Barbridge junction we swung north onto what was originally the Chester canal. Bunbury staircase locks had a few gongoozlers, but they had nothing spectacular to watch in mistakes, which is unusual for me! The sun shone through a cloudless sky all day, and it was nice to finally get out of my donkey jacket, and down to just shirt sleeves and waistcoat. we moored up between Beeston stone and Beeston iron locks. We walked down to Chas Hardern’s and had a look around their shop. Last time we were here his wife was sorting out all the ribbon and laces plates Chas’s mother had accumulated, apparently she found it hard to refuse the salesmen!

We then had a wander around the reclamation centre the other side of the railway, they had everything you would need to restore, rebuild or renovate old buildings, and interiors.

Keith.

Middlewich to Winsford Top Flash

An early walk around Middlewich ended with a visit to Tesco’s for a few items. Then we headed off to the countryside for the weekend. One of our favourite moorings places was empty of boats, that was handy, so we pulled in and moored up.

This time of year you get a better view of the flash than you do during the summer, when you can hardly see it for all the vegetation. As seen in the aerial view above the flash looks like a giant dinosaur footprint!

For a short time now Hadars engine has been suffering from too high oil pressure from cold, 100+psi! Although once the oil had warmed up and the pressure dropped, it is not good when part of the oil supply system is via copper piping and olive joints, which are not meant to take such high pressure. I had suspected that the last time recently that I had removed the filter bottle I may not have refitted the pressure relief valve correctly, which had been previously working, which should allow a maximum pressure of 70psi. Wednesday when we stopped cruising I took the oil filter bottle off the engine, removed the pressure relief valve again, cleaned it up again, and refitted it again. I had suspected that the spring may not have been sitting correctly in the cups of the valve or the retaining nut. Yesterday we certainly did not get the high oil pressure any more, but due to taking everything apart, the pressure reading was all over the place, which I know, from previous times, that this happens, and it takes a while to settle down. This morning everything was back to how it should be with a maximum pressure of 70psi from cold, pheww!!!

Keith.

Rode Heath to Middlewich

 

With the sun shining brightly this morning we set off from Rode Heath. Someone has smiled on us today as nearly all the locks were in our favour.

This is what is left of The Romping Donkey, which on 2 previous occasions when we have tried to get a meal there it has been closed. Apparently it is being rebuilt as the original structure was unsafe.

Lock 57 at Hassal Green is looking very smart.

And the pink corrugated steel church is still very pink!

The heavy traffic roars by on the M6 below lock 58, which is just below Hassal Green.

All sorts of interesting loads!

At lock 61 this paddle ratchet was stuck in this position, Jo whacked it with her windlass a few times but it was not budging. A report to BW will follow shortly.

The offside lock 65 was being worked on, as we passed by.

The Kings Lock pub is looking very smart in the spring sunshine.

It was a sad moment of reflection whilst passing through Wardle lock as it was only last week we heard that Maureen who used to live here had passed away, she will be very much missed by all who knew her. We moored up just beyond the lock, between Bridges 30 & 31. having travelled 9.6 miles, through 20 locks in 6 hours we will leave visiting the town till tomorrow morning.

Keith.

Red Bull Aqueduct, to Rode Heath

We set off this morning, and were soon heading down the Red Bull flight. At one of the locks were was a pile of flowers, soccer scarves, etc. Apparently a 19year old Stoke fan had tried to jump the lock with fatal consequences back in December. As much as people want to pay their respects, this laying of flowers and artefacts is spreading and in this case how long is it before it all ends up in the lock and around someone's prop?

Most of the locks were with us so we carried on to Rode Heath. Unlike yesterday as Bosley locks were someone had left the paddles up, here someone had left the gates open. Even a gentleman walking his dog commented on them being left open.

Having moored up and disassembled the oil pressure relief valve again, to try to get it to work, we decided to have lunch at The Broughton Arms, which was some much better than the lunch we had there 6 years ago, things have obviously moved on since then.

Keith.

Oakgrove to Red Bull Aqueduct, Kidsgrove

 

We crept pass nbs Alton & Shirley just after 8:00am this morning, we hope we didn’t wake Brian & Ann Marie. We stopped at Bosley top lock and I pulled this lot of the prop.

The blue plastic is a woven sack, took some serious hacking with a knife to get it off, and the blue and yellow tape was twisted around one of the blades, and I had to unwind the whole lot to get it off. I think that lot had been on all day yesterday, I had meant to check when we stopped yesterday, and despite writing it in our notepad, I still forgot!

As we chugged through Buglawton we were amazed to watch before our very eyes a sparrowhawk down a blackbird and had it pinned to the towpath as we passed by.

The blackbird put up a good struggle as can be seen from the feathers everywhere, but the sparrowhawk had too good a grip, and was just waiting for its victim to finish struggling before carrying it off for lunch. It kept a close eye on us as we passed by, but wasn’t going to let its grip go unless we were going to get close, which we weren’t. Not something you expect to see unfold before you.

We arrived at the moorings between Red Bull aqueduct and Poole aqueduct, ready to start the descent down the Cheshire locks tomorrow morning.

Keith.

Adlington to Oakgrove

A pleasant trip this morning. We passed “Wandering Duck” on their return trip. We pulled into the 48 hour moorings just before the swingbridge at Oakgrove. We walked down the road to Brian & Ann Marie’s base, for a quick chat and to pick up some engine oil. As we were chatting a mink casually swam along between the bank and their boats! We look forward to seeing them again over the Easter weekend at Ellesmere Port.

Keith.

New Mills to Adlington

Following a night of rain, the towpath was full of puddles, let’s hope they also had the rain in Leicestershire and Northamptonshire. It was much easier going once we re-entered the Macclesfield canal at Marple. There was a fishing competition just north of Goyt Mill in Marple. The rest of the journey was fairly uneventful. We arrived at Adlington and there was only one other boat moored here, so we pulled in and moored up, we had travelled enough for a Sunday.

Keith.

Bugsworth Basins to New Mills

Having spent a week at Bugsworth basins, which has enabled me to finally sort out Hadars electrics, with the help of Kuranda by replacing the 10mm alternator cables with new 35mm cables, and installed and set up a Victron Battery Monitor, and rewired the batteries etc. so that the shunt required for the monitor is positioned to read all charge/discharge currents correctly.

We set off this morning having winded at the top basin, and topped up with water, and headed for New Mills. Brian on nb Alton had recommended a deep water mooring there so we thought we would try it out. it is near the Swizzles Matlow factory. We moored up and had lunch, before setting off to explore New Mills. As we passed the sweet factory you get a good whiff of refreshers, love hearts, etc. that they make, mmmmmm.

The Nicholson's guide mentioned the Heritage Centre and we though this was a good place to start. We were totally unaware of what we would find when we got there. The first indication was when we crossed the road viaduct in Union Road which crosses the River Goyt gorge. We found the Heritage Centre, which although quite small, has quite a lot of information and history of New Mills. We then headed down the path from the centre to the floor of the gorge, and from here we headed to the road viaduct we had crossed. Underneath the viaduct some climbers were starting to climb the crag. I knew there was climbing in this area, and the crag certainly looks quite interesting.

There are 40 climbs in all, graded from Very Difficult to E5, and vary in height from 25ft to 90ft. The particular climb the climbers were on is called "Honcho" and is graded at E4 6b with 1 star and is 45ft high, with one fixed peg. The lead climber soon gained the top and set about setting to belay the other 2 climbers.

The above photo was the lead climber starting up the rock.

And here he is almost at the top. This whole area is so hard to capture in photographs, you really have to visit it yourself to get the full effect, but Jo did take some photos which follow.

This is the full view of the viaduct, the climbers were under the right hand arch. The building in the foreground is part of the Archimedes reverse screw Torrs Hydro scheme which supplies electricity to the area.

This photo is taken from under the viaduct. The small building is at the top of the Archimedes screw, which is itself housed within the green cage sloping down from it. Although it was turning, it was not fast enough to actually generate any power, as there is a digital readout for visitors to see beside the building, which was showing 0kW. The weir is what was originally created for the Torr Mill, which stood where the hydro scheme is now sited in the remaining ruins of the mill.

This road viaduct is just a short distance above the weir, the lower arches were added later apparently. We then walked back under the viaduct and the climbers toward the new Millennium Way when we came across the ruins of Rock Mill.

 

This is the Millennium Way, a new walkway curving around the course of the river, alongside the railway stonewall embankment.

The mill in this photo is called Torr Vale, and only closed in 2000, the same year the walkway was built, although now having stood empty for 12 years, it is still in quite good condition, but needs some TLC, hopefully it will be used for something and not allowed to become another ruin. There is much more of the gorge to explore, that will be something to do another day when we come this way again. Jo was rather taken with this advert in the window of the local newsagents.

Keith.