It was nearly seven years ago when a very particular cruise saga started. Techno Son-in-Law announced that a birthday present for two would be dispatch on a Cruise – a cruise along the Manchester Ship Canal… Arrangements were made, tickets were booked – but, if you read here, you’ll see that due to most unusual circumstances the cruise ended up in a very expensive taxi ride… A boat trip to within sight of Runcorn and a clamber over a wall...

Liverpool – upbeat, lively, self-mocking, positive:  that’s the impression gained of Liverpool three years ago – it’s an impression that has not changed. There is much to see – the skyline, the varying shapes and styles of buildings, the UNESCO waterfront, sculptures, museums and art galleries. Yet often it is the incidental remark or chance sighting that sticks in the memory. On the first day as floating residents in Salthouse Dock the Captain and Boatwif made their way (again) to...

Lydiate to Salthouse Dock: 14½ miles, 6 locks, 7 movable bridges and 1 tunnel Only a couple of weeks ago Cheshire Mum and Cheshire One had driven from Macclesfield to Liverpool. Their journey had taken about an hour and a quarter.  Cleddau’s journey started about three hours north of Macclesfield – and took something like 62 hours to complete. The last stretch of this 129 mile long cruise was to involve some physical effort, a continuing attention to timing and...

Dunham Massey to Lydiate: 47 miles, 8 locks, 7 movable bridges B words (not swear words, just B-beginning words): Bridgewater, Burscough, bridge, baked beans, baby, birthday… To back track: eventually, a day later than planned, Cleddau had reached Dunham Massey, and in lieu of the planned “day off” a couple of hours was spent at the Dunham Massey Estate. It was Sunday, it was dry – and it felt a slightly dangerous place, the grounds packed with families and bikes,...

Middlewich (Trent & Mersey) –  Dunham Massey (Bridgewater Canal): 30¼ miles, 2 locks Any readers of the previous post who got to the end may (or may not!) be awaiting report of a Monkton Moment*.  From the overnight mooring just back from the children’s park in Middlewich Cleddau cruised the few hundred yards / metres to Big Lock. This lock is well-named as it is wide enough for two narrow boats side by side or for a wide beam boat… A...

Red Bull Aqueduct (Kidsgrove) to Middlewich:  14 miles, 34 locks Cleddau and crew left the Macclesfield Canal on Tuesday morning to start their descent down the Trent and Mersey Canal to the Cheshire Plain.  In 7 miles between Hardings Wood Junction and Wheelock  there are 26 locks. Many of them are paired single locks. One lock down and the canal flows underneath the Red Bull / Poole Aqueduct, on which Cleddau had been moored the previous evening. Though several of...

Victoria Pit, Higher Poynton – Red Bull Aqueduct: 23 miles, 13 locks Home for three nights. Mail checked. Admin attended to. Grass cut. Light weight clothes selected… Then it was back to the boat to start the 2019 cruise. The easterly blasts had gone and warm summery temperatures had arrived. There was earnest discussion abut the coal, whether to retain it on board in case of back to winter temperatures or to offload it so as to give more space...

So, after last year’s disruptions (the breach on the canal at Middlewich, the water shortages that closed Bosley locks), it seemed timely  to cruise along all of the Macclesfield Canal from end to end. Once past Victoria Pit Moorings at Higher Poynton it’s about another five miles to the end of the Macc, where it meets the Peak Forest Canal at Marple. Onwards Cleddau cruised then, past many moored boats, past the Man Shed like no other (at Bridge 13),...

So there Cleddau was, at the bottom of Bosley Locks   on a Tuesday morning.     A volunteer lock keeper was hovering at Lock 12, keen that no water should be moved since he had set locks 11 and 12 for a down-coming boat. Pause. Wait. Then action – and all went well for quite a while.The lock keeper disappeared back up the hill, setting locks for this ascending boat. Somewhere between lock 6   and lock 5 there was a lengthy...

Onwards along and – up – the Trent and Mersey Canal. The four Meaford locks to the north of Stone are close together and a joy to work. It was a Saturday morning and the cycling tribes were all out and on their bikes. One tribe is Local Lads, always male, sometimes young teenagers, sometimes chaps who are friends. You don’t see cycling helmets being worn by them. Then there are the Families, young riders being urged to keep up...