Fun in the Sun

Monday 2nd September
This morning started out pretty chilly, so we bided our time in bed with our tea and coffee.  After quite a few boats had passed by, by 9:30am, we thought that it would probably be a good idea to get up and moving.  After all we had a number of locks to get through and up this end of the Shroppie they are all double locks again.

So off at 10:30am and we arrived at the first lock, Bunbury Staircase Locks.  Good start to the day, 2 boats going down and one coming up   So we did the 'staircase shimmy'   Once the boats were at the same level, one of the two going down moved next to the boat going up. The boat going up takes the place of the boat that has just moved, allowing the second boat going down to move up next to the first boat.  There, all boats have swapped locks.  Gates closed.  Boat going up fills their lock and boats going down empty theirs. Brilliant

Old Lock keepers hut Tilstone Lock

View ??

Our first glimpse of Beeston Castle

 
One of the other locks we went though was the Beeston Iron Lock.  This lock has been made completely of iron.  The reason for this is the soils around this area are all very sandy.  The lock kept collapsing during it's early years of use back in the 1800's.  The problam was finally resolved by building a complete lock like an iron bath.  Based on the same idea as the Pontcysillte Aqueduct.

Me working the paddle

Lock as seen from inside

 
As you can see, as the day progressed the sun got warmer and the cool wind became a warmer wind. 

Closer view from Wharton Lock

and further along the canal

    
Before passing Tattenhall Marina we tried to moor up quite a few times but as usual the edges were way to shallow. 

The moorings by the marina were in the trees, therefore bad tv signal, so we continued on hoping to find somewhere better.  Not far past the marina there were some long term moorings, all 132 of them, taking over 30 minutes to travel just over a mile !!

Anyway, no decent moorings again, so we have ended up at the 48 hr moorings beside The Cheshire Cat.  Turns out that it was a good thing as the  last meal that we had aboard did not quite smell up to the edible side, so we ended up in the pub for dinner.  And a particularly delicious dinner it was.

So a bit of tv and then off to bed.

Night all, sleep well