THE THUMB OF POWER

 

Salthouse Dock

Things have got busy for me on this route as there are more locks and swing bridges to do. But I am not complaining at all, the exercise will do me good after all the beer we had in Wigan, and are planning to have in Liverpool.

The Leeds Liverpool has more swing bridges than any other canal I believe, and its a mixture of how you open them. The ones I like the best are the all electric ones, and this is were the ‘power of the thumb’ comes in, because you simple press and hold in one button to bring the barriers down to stop the traffic and open the bridge, and another to reverse the process. It also means I have the power to control the vehicles using the bridge, and this gives me a feeling of ultimate power.

Other bridges, which tend to be pedestrian or access to fields for farms, are manual and don’t have a barrier, and after unlocking the restraining mechanism you simply push them open, well you try, some can be a bit on the heavy side. But there are all sorts of variations on this theme.

First day and I had 5 locks and one swing bridge ahead of me. At the 3rd lock we stopped, and I headed to a recently built Lidl which was about 7mins from the canal. Shopping done and we set off again. At Dean lock we stopped to put water in and a boat arrived to come down the lock. NB Knot So Fast, and her very Liverpudlian Captain and crew. We helped them lock down and followed them once our water tank was full, this meant they got to do the swing bridge, and we sailed through first. They must then have moored up, as we were joined at the next lock by a yoghurt pot (small fibre glass cruiser). The Captain is not fond of sharing the locks with this type of boat, as a 16ton narrowboat can do a lot of damage to one if something goes wrong. However its Captain assured him everything would be fine and they joined us in the lock. Everything was fine. Even better, a widebeam boat was heading for the lock so we could leave the gates open, or so we thought. Unfortunately my gate wouldn’t stay open, so I had to lean on it until the widebeam was in, its all about being helpful.

We moored for the night at Parbold and resisted the urge to go to the pub.

Just before we left next day I recognised the boat coming towards us, NB Ebony and its Captain and crew Steve and Anne, we had met them in Wigan a few years ago on their anniversary and had a few pints together. We had a quick catch up which was great. They have a Facebook page about living on Ebony, I have included the link below

https://www.facebook.com/groups/491339448840055

Next day we passed the junction of the Rufford branch which takes you to Tarleton, and the Ribble link onto the Lancaster canal, which we cant do as we are too deep drafted.

https://canalrivertrust.org.uk/canals-and-rivers/rufford-branch-leeds-and-liverpool-canal

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

We had 5 movable bridges to navigate which took us through Burscough, a place we usually like to stop as it has a large Tesco, and a bar called the Thirsty Duck, which is great, but we kept going as we were planning to go to the pub the next night to watch the football, England v Netherlands in the semi final.

https://www.facebook.com/thethirstyduckUK/?locale=en_GB

The Ship Inn was our chosen pub for the football, but when we got there we found in impossible to moor. There was a widebeam moored outside the pub so we decided to moor in front of it, only to discover that the moorings were permit holder only, the sign was very confusing, as it had arrows pointing in both directions but there was not obvious start or finish point for the restriction, so we kept going and decided to watch the match on the boat, it was another squeaky bum match, but we won, so on to the final on Sunday when we will be in Liverpool.

After we moored up in the MONW we were joined by NB Tui, who then shared the rest of the journey into Liverpool with us, and the swing bridges. Very helpful.

A second night was spent in the MONW before we reached Litherland. This is were you spend the night before cruising down the Stanley flight of locks and into Liverpool.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Stanley_Lock_Flight

The moorings are on the offside, as are the services, which we needed to use to do a pump out. When we got there we could see the moorings were full, boats were moored on the towpath side and there was a queue for the pump out. A single handed boat was using it as we arrived and NB Yesdear was waiting, so we tied up against a CRT work boat and waited our turn. The moorings here are restricted to 2 days because as I have ready explained, everyone stops here before going in to Liverpool the next day. However, and really not surprisingly, the boats moored had been there some time and the boats on the towpath were the ones going into Liverpool. This is really annoying when boaters are so inconsiderate. Litherland isn’t considered to be the safest place to stop for the night, hence the offside secure moorings.

After NB Arcona and Yesdear were done using the pump out we pulled forwarded and emptied our tank. The Captain then made the decision to pull back and spend the night brested up against the work boat. In fact all the boats on the towpath side moved across and brested up with other boats.

We have never been to the pub in Litherland, the Red Lion, but after talking to a local I found out it had been refurbished and decided it was worth giving it a try. As we headed out we stopped to talk to the Captain and crew on Yesdear, Jan and Dave, who had moored on the service point with Arcona on the outside and they decided to come with us.

The pub was a noisy locals pub with a pool table and dart board. I recognised the 2 guys playing pool, they were Mark and Nick off NB Ellis and NB Distraction who were brested up in front of us. We sat near the pool table and Mark and Nick soon joined, us as did Jan and Dave, and we had an amazing jolly time. I discovered that Mark on Ellis ran a hotel boat, Nick was a friend and they travelled together. Such lovely fellas, but they weren’t due in Liverpool until Sunday.

https://www.narrowboatellis.com/

After a great night, luckily we didn’t need to set off to early next day, as you cant go down the Stanley flight until 1pm unless the lockees tell you to. NB Tui set off just in front of us as all the other boats had already left. When we reach the first lock at around 12, Yesdear and Arcona were already in and waiting to go down, but it wasn’t going to happen until 1pm as there were swimmers in the water going into Liverpool. Not a problem, we could have some lunch and just chill out.

Of course this didn’t happen as we got chatting to a couple of gongoozlers. An interesting couple who were having a boat built to live on, but had very little idea of boating. We chatted and explained how the locks worked, and the gentleman was very impressed with the Captains mooring skills as he fitted the boat neatly into a space that was only just big enough. The lockees then declared we could go early, and off we went to help the first 2 boats down the first lock. I showed the lady how to wind the paddle, and the Captain invited the gentleman to come down the first lock with him. I hope we gave them some useful tips and that they enjoy their life on the water.

Tui had joined us in the lock and we completed the journey into Liverpool together, mooring up around 1.30pm ready for the fun to start.

The Way into Liverpool

36 miles, 11 locks, 14 bridges, 3 tunnels and 1 canal