Monthly Archive: May 2015

1

Delays, guests and gifts

From Stone to Tixall Wide – simple, just 10½ miles and four locks. Why then, did a trip that can be done in four hours take nearer six? South of Stone the properties have expensively furnished gardens.     A few years ago the Cheshire One, during an elephant phase, used to delight and giggle at the sight in a local garden centre of a massive glossy elephant garden feature, water spouting from its trunk. It would be viewed often, until when...

0

Turn on the light!

(Congleton – Stoke-on-Trent – Wedgewood –Stone) The faint sound of church bells ringing (from Congleton?) drifted over the canal on Sunday morning.  Drifting too was fine rain, soon to become much heavier.  The stunning views of The Cloud were hidden.  Cows cowered under what shelter they could find.     The view from Biddulph Aqueduct over Dane-in-Shaw Pasture SSSI  was a disappointing featureless grey haze… What was not disappointing, however, as boaters who frequently pass this way, was the towpath transformation at Hightown....

3

Southbound – slowly

Grass cut front and back, meetings met and minuted, clothes and gear assembled, car loaded – and at last, after months of winter planning, the Cleddau crew were ready for OFF. Spring-time has been busy with trips to Pembrokeshire and Scotland; the Captain’s voluntary work consumes great swathes of time and cartridge ink, but now the Summer Escape has begun. It was at ten to four on Friday afternoon when Cleddau was reversed back from her mooring pontoon.     (Ten to...