ANOTHER SLIGHT CHANGE OF PLAN.

As we have 3 weeks until we go into Liverpool, and it isn’t really that far, we have decided to go down the wonderful Anderton Boat Lift, on to the River Weaver, and moor at Northwich for a couple of days.

But I am getting a head of myself, as we were in Barbridge at the end of the last blog.

We had 4 locks and 10 miles to do before we reached Middlewich and joined the Trent and Mersey. We split the journey in 2, and on the first day we did 2 locks and 5 miles.

It was a very entertaining day as the canal was awash with boats of all descriptions, hirers, share boats, private boats and day boats. This caused a boat jam at the first lock we came too, luckily for us the jam was in the opposite direction with at least 7 boats waiting to come up the lock. So off I went to help. With so many people helping out it didn’t take long to get a boat up and one down. But I still found the time to chat to the crew off a hire boat, turned out her boat was 6^th in the queue but like me she loved helping with the locks. She also told me they were in the process of buying their own boat, a 57ft cruiser stern, unfortunately I didn’t get the her name, or the boats name but I wish her luck.

At the second lock we met another boat jam, with 4 or 5 boats waiting to come up and a couple plus us waiting to go down. So off I went to help and was soon joined by the crew from one of the boats waiting to come up. We helped a few boats up including hers, then it was our turn to lock down. She stayed to help as they were waiting for another boat to join them for a cruise, and then a curry in Nantwich. As I left to rejoin the Captain she was helping a single hander up the locks, but no one off the next 2 boats showed any inclination to go and help her. They were both hire boats and too busy chatting amongst themselves. As we passed by the Captain pointed out to the hirers that she was now on her own, but it did not galvanise them into action. I hope she just left them to it. This wonderful ladies name was Leslie we found out as we passed her friends boat heading for the lock.

After a night in the MONW we headed for the last 2 locks and the junction with the Trent and Mersey canal at Middlewich. We also went on the shortest canal in England, the Wardle Canal, its only 154ft or 47m long, so don’t blink or you will miss it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wardle_Canal

After mooring in Middlewich we did some much needed shopping and headed to the pub. The White Bear first, nothing on to the suit the Captain so only the one and then we tried the Narrowboat, again a disappointing selection for the Captain so not a successful night for him.

The next day we headed to Broken Cross, the canal is made very narrow in places along this stretch due to the encroaching reeds, which at times were growing over 6ft from the bank. They also make seeing approaching boats difficult, another thing for CRT’s to do list. We moored outside the pub with help from another boater and had a bit of a chat (in the rain). He had just come up the Anderton boat lift off the River Weaver. He told us of a disturbing rumour going about that the lift is to close in Feb 2022 for 18months and may not reopen at all. I found this hard to believe and did a little investigating but could find nothing. I have passed this titbit of information on to Peter Underwood, a boater who is also a journalist to investigate.

We tried the pub, called the Broken Cross, and although they had no dark ale on they did have John Smiths and Black Sheep bitter on, which the Captain found quite quaffable.

The Captain had booked the boat lift for 4pm next day and we made our way to the lift moorings a couple of hours early. He popped off to see the lift keepers and came back saying we could go down straight away. The lift keeper was an extremely friendly, chatty person and I quizzed them about rumours we had heard, but being a sensible chap he agreed with me that CRT would not dare to close the lift completely. Good News (I hope). The Anderton Boat lift is a magnificent feat of engineering and a joy to use, as we went down 2 boats were in the other caisson coming up, so of course we waved and smiled at each other.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anderton_Boat_Lift

On exiting the lift we turned left to head to Northwich and the Captain recognised the boat coming towards us as NB Poppy. Now as you may know the Captain is well into vlogs, especially boating ones, and Poppy and its Captain Matt and crew Dawn have a very good channel called Boating Beyond. He called over and asked how Dawn’s finger was, in the last episode we saw she had cut it quite badly, but as with the majority of these vlogs (and my blog), they are weeks behind and her finger was all healed up.

https://www.youtube.com/c/BoatingBeyond/featured

Now the last time we were in Northwich we found 2 good real ale pubs, a decent Wetherspoons, and a rather pretentious expensive craft ale bar. We started in the Penny Black, the Wetherspoons, as I had promised the Captain to treat him to tea. They had a decent ruby ale on called Nosebag by Tring brewery, and I decided to try one of their new bottled lagers, Singha from Thailand. It was really nice, the Captain tried it and agreed. After tea off to the Barons Lounge, which last time was the best, but horror of horrors, although they had 4 hand pulls and 6+ taps not one dark ale. So out we came and off to the Salty Dog were he found Marble Stout by Marble Brewery of Manchester, plus 2 others on tap. It was band night and we enjoyed our pint whilst watching the band setting up, but we couldn’t stay as it was ticket only, and tbh not really our cup of tea.

We topped up on the essentials (beer and wine) before heading back to the lift and our onward journey. We shared the lift with NB Anvil and chatted with her Captain and Crew. Turned out, like my Captain they had been in the RAF, so plenty to talk about.

And now we have decided on another slight change of plan, we are going down the Runcorn arm of the Bridgewater canal to explore Runcorn.