Manchester...

Left Lymm about 7am to get a good run to Manchester. Had rained overnight and the forecast didn't look too special for the rest of the day. Started off fine and it wasn't until we'd travelled 700 yds that it started to rain again.
There's a saying, "If you don't move in the rain you'll never move" so onwards it was.


Standing on the rear in the cold and rain gives one time to think...

Where the Freak'n hell is Leonie??....

On the outskirts of Sale stands the ...

Old Linotype works building...1897... Where metal printing type was manufactured...

As we approached the junction, Waters Meeting, to turn right to Manchester the rain stopped...
Past Old Trafford and the...

Manchester United footy ground stands tall with the Sir Alex Fergusson Stand and large posters of him holding trophies... Lucky the fans have long memories.....

Closing in on the Castlefield Junction basin and...

Old warehouses, dilapidated and the surroundings neglected boarder the canal...

Passing under....

 An old bridge with new housing going up nearby...

Then as you enter the basin...

A very easy on the eye Victorian style rail bridge....

We had a short stroll around the nearby city later in the afternoon. It was a public holiday but the city was very quiet. We returned to the NB and just made cover before it rained again...

Today we headed farther afield up town central and checked out a few sights...

One being the...

John Rylands library building... opened 1900......

Built in a Victorian Gothic style....

The entrance hall....

And if your into flooring, like real "cool Classy" flooring, try this....

Herring Bone Parquet... Oak??....

Up the stair way to the Reading room....

Light stand and small internal balcony...

And in the reading room....

 The Classy reading alcoves are lit by oriel, bay, windows....

And at the end of the reading room is...

A round wall containing shelves of  rare books behind glass doors.....

If you wanted a " lite" read you could...

Try some of this collection.. some dated 1576...

For something a bit "Heavier" try...

One of these... must weigh about 10 kilo's each...

Moved on around town checking out what's left of the old Victorian style...

 

A pub...

Restaurant.....

And another restaurant....

The Town Hall....

With restricted access you could only view the main entry hall..

The stairway leading to the second floor...

Nice old buildings but I must say it is the Dirtiest city/ town we've visited. A lot of broken bottles on foot paths, fag butts, overflowing litter bins, food scraps on the footpaths and around bins and even an Ash... ooonn family letting their, about 6 yr, old, have a spew in the middle of the footpath down in the Asian food quarter, not that you could blame the City Fathers for that.  Must have had to much Monosodium Glutamate.. MSG....in his tucker....
Guess who didn't buy an Ash.. ooon Takeaway?..

Tomorrow more exploring....

 

Bang.. Bang....

We left our mooring on Saturday not until 3.30pm as heavy showers kept sweeping by. Plus the morning was taken up watching the AB's demolish the Aussies to win the Bledisloe Cup.
Passed through the Preston Brook tunnel, only made it by a minute or two to set off through the tunnel in the allowed time frame.
It had warmed and dried up so it was good to be moving.

Passed by, in the distance, the....

The Norton water tower.. 1892.. cast iron tank on top  holds 650,000 gallons... feeds Runcorn....

Then in the distance and seen from our overnight mooring....

The Fiddlers Ferry coal fired power station.....

We moored with about 6 other boats and turned in for a quiet night after our exhausting day, 6 miles 1 lock 1 tunnel... Sound asleep, and dreaming about Saturdays race results in Friday nights paper, it was about 2.15am when we were both awaken by someone banging on the NB roof above the bedroom..
"Who's there, what do you want" I called out
"Where's Greenfields?" came the reply with a male voice
"I don't know"
"Where's Greenfields?" bang bang again
"Further on up the canal" I yell
"Which way?"   bang bang again
"Stop banging the boat" I yell
"Where's Greenfields"
"We Don't know" yells Leonie
"You don't know, F- - -  You"
And with some more muttering moved off along the towpath. I jumped out of bed and looked out the front and to the sides but he had disappeared.

Sunday morning and a inspection of the outside of the boat on the towpath side showed no interference from the midnight rambler so we moved off intending to stop at Lymm about 8 miles away.

The sun was up and being early, 8.38am, it was enjoyable plodding along..

The sun.....

 Bounces off a hidden house....

And off....

A hidden bridge.....

These ducks hadn't moved yet but....

Slept looking Back... They'd heard about the Gay Parade this weekend in nearby Manchester....

Arrived at a very occupied Lymm but spied the one and only spot to moor.....

Watched the F1 on the telly then went for a walk...

Headed up hill to the...

Lymm Dam... has several walking tracks through the trees....

A few light spots of rain started but didn't continue....

Half way around the dam and we'd gotten away from the lower route, waterside, so I said to Leonie...

 

"Follow me, I know a short cut"... with the recent rain from the day before it was very muddy in places but we both stayed upright.....

Had a quiet end to the day... got some "Greasys" for dinner.......

 

Lymm,  no moorings left at night.....

Shut The Door....

We left Stoke heading for Manchester but a change in plans now see's us going via Middlewitch and not up the Macclesfield canal as planned. We'll return down the Macca, later.


On the outskirts of Stoke passing ruins of industrial buildings there are still....

Active industry in some buildings and more Bottle Kilns....

Of different shapes and sizes......

Surrounding the.....

Middleport Pottery works...

A lot of the canal side buildings are...

Derelict and obviously not on the "Appartments to Be" agenda.....

A couple of miles farther on...

 

The entrance to the Harecastle Tunnel fronts..... but the entrance is blocked...

It's a one one way  tunnel and controlled by the Tunnel Keeper who will allow a maximum of eight boats through in convoy at one time. When you enter from this side large doors slam shut behind and huge fans start to suck out the exhaust gases as the tunnel doesn't  have the customary  ventilation shafts through the roof.

We had to wait about three quarters of an hour for NB,s coming through...

The doors open and....

Out comes the first of three NB,s...

The tunnel is 2926yds long and takes about fourty fives minutes...

The third boat out was....

Waka Huia... Marilyn and David from NZ....

They stopped opposite....

And David tied up the ropes at the water point ...
We had been following their blog and had hoped to meet them on the other side of the tunnel at Kidsgrove at the junction for a catch up.. The tunnel man only allowed us to Yak fo a couple of minutes then told us to "Get on Ya bike"...
Hope to catch up in the future.....

We cast off and....

Lined up the entrance....

It's quite wide, about 13 feet......

It widens after this entrance section...

But the Freaky part is...

About halfway when the width narrows and the roof gets low... very low..... not good if one suffers from claustrophobia...

Anyway we.....

 

Made it through and the sun was shinning....

We started the first of many locks.....

Hardings Wood Junction..

Passing by the...

British Waterways yard at Red Bull with two old cranes on the canal side....

We were going along fine having completed five locks....

Looking back from the sixth lock... It's here were a passing boater told us about a problem there had been at lock 63, the pound had run dry, and the lock was shut down. Cart had managed to flow  water from a reservoir and open the lock. Meanwhile a cue of 50 NB,s had formed over the last two days  coming toward us.  It was going to be open until 8.30pm today but shut tomorrow. Nothing to do but pass lock 63 today. That's seventeen more locks plus three more to clear the flight...

We had a few holdups as there were several NB,s going our way but six  hours and 26 locks in total later we moored up at Wheelock......

Looking back toward the Macclesfield canal and...

Beyond is Mow Cop hill and castle ruins.... 1754.....

All the locks are singles but....

Mostly there are two side by side which speeds up traffic.....

The water in this canal....

The Trent and Mersey is a different colour.....Iron Oxide leaking into the water from the ground mainly around the tunnel area.....  Leaves a reddy brown muck on the lock walls......

Next day overcast but fine... we reached the junction  at Middlewich where the Shropshire union canal heads off left toward Chester...

doing the....

Kings Lock outside the same named pub.....

Must have been a full moon or something happening... At the next four locks we meet some strange people who displayed a varied array of poor boat handling skills and protocol... Still better than being at a real job...

Still putting on a show....

Plenty of hanging baskets....

Passing the large industrial.....




ICI plant with rows of pipe work, steel support and electrical ducting crossing the canal in 8 -10 different places.....

All to maintain.....




Production......

Through out the area there are vast salt mines underground and after years of nining there's a lot of subsidence...
It causes problems with the canal sinking and in places there are what's called....

Flashes... the canal has widened and takes on a lake look... Actually makes for a nice place to moor up and enjoy the view....

It was at one of the Flashes we met....

John and Diana....  NB Molly Rose...More "Kiwis" doing the NB experience and they are from the same town only living about three quarters of a mile from our home....

Also moored nearby were....

 

Ray And Dianne NB Ferndale.... we had met last year so a catch up along with John and Diane aboard NB FireflyNZ filled the evening.....

This morning early... about 8.30am...

Ray & Dianne left heading for Middlewich....

We got moving a bit later.... 11.30am and because it wasn't raining "Cats & Dogs"  like last year when we were here we....

 

 

Decided to go down and back up the Anderton Boat lift.... One of the Wonders of the Canal system....
Entering the lift.....

 

The door shuts to close off the canal water.....

Going down and you can see....

A  maze in the kids play area  made out of counter weights that were used to operate the lift before it was converted to hydraulic.... each one weighs 14 tonne... 250 tonne in total....

As we go down the ...

Other steel trough with the boats goes up on the Stainless steel hydraulic rams... German made.. 1 million quid each....

It was well worth doing again... especially in the dry......

Near the Saltersford Tunnel....

A tidy little English cottage and garden....

Travelling through the tunnel....

Leonie sees up a ventilation shaft....

The tunnel is only 424 yds long but is quite bent... Being one way you have to wait and go through from our side only on the hour to twenty past....

Once in the tunnel....

There were two boats behind us... not visible because of the bend....

Started to rain going into the tunnel....

But fine when we emerged...
Moved on about three mile and....

Moored up with a rural view...