Transporting a patient, but visitors none-the-less.

(Boat Chalice- posted by Alan)
Retrospective post for Thursday 7th August.

Leaving Gannow tunnel

As we were finishing our evening meal last night, we settled down to try and go through the various photos we had taken on multiple cameras, with a view to trying to get the blog more up to date.  However, not long into that process, Cath complained she really wasn't feeling at all well, and shortly after she disappeared to bed, with a strategically placed bucket beside it.  Some time later, after we were all in bed, she was indeed very sick.  She made it through most of the night, but was sick again before morning, and the situation was very clearly that she was unlikely to get involved in any of the actual activity of boating for a while.

The rejuvenated "Weaver's Triangle" area in Burnley.

So, whilst trying to keep Cath looked after, David and I set about trying to do what we had planned to do had Cath been OK.  Fortunately it was a day without huge numbers of locks involved, so it was mainly about me spending much of the day at the tiller, although lock flights would need to be tackled by just two of us, for a change.

Looking out over Burnley from the massive embankment.

Yesterday we had travelled through Blackburn, and today's big conurbation was to be Burnley, and its environs.  Unlike Blackburn, Burnley has no locks within the town itself., but we had been contacted by long term Canal World Forum member "Janet S", who works very close to the famous Burnley embankment, and was keen to meet us if she could slip away from work.  (In fact she had tried to get the day off, but it had not been possible).  So I tried to stay in touch with Janet by Internet and by text, and it looked like we were good to meet, (she had been warned about Cath!).

Typical street, end on to the canal, and below it.

Before you get to Burnley though, you get a relatively short tunnel at Gannow.  Having been told it was a "go in if clear" one, I was surprised to see the signs at the tunnel mouth say it was "2 way working".  As we were well through, two boats approached the other end, and looked set to come in.  I imagine you can pass, if all narrow boats, because the tunnel is built for 14 foot wide barges, but I wasn't sorry when they decided to pull back, and wait until we were out.  If you are going in with something coming the other way, you would need to be confident it is no more than 7 foot wide.

Severely low pound at the start of Barrowford locks

We were a bit early for meeting Janet in her lunch hour, so pulled over for a while before Burnley embankment until she could join us.  Being a local to the area, and having done hand-overs at a local hire boat firm, Janet provided us with a lot of useful knowledge about this part of the Leeds and Liverpool.  It was good to meet, albeit briefly, and, if you are reading this Janet, I hope Cath didn't manage to infect you with anything, (David and I thankfully avoided catching whatever it was).

Low pounds mean it is even further down to the boat in the lock.

Burnley embankment is one of Robert Aickman's original "seven wonders of the waterways", although more recent versions of this seem to sideline it and replace it with the Falkirk wheel, which of course is a modern "wonder", aqnd might not have been to Aickman's taste, had it existed then.  It is indeed a massive piece of engineering, being dead straight, towering 60 feet above its surroundings, and incorporating an aqueduct, but like so many such things, attempts to picture all this from the top fail miserably.

The reservoir at Barrowford doesn't seem a very large one.

Shortly after 7 locks at Barrowford proved quite hard work, despite sharing all but one with another boat that only turned up after we had done the first.  These are deep locks, like so many on the L&L, but if a pound below one is badly down in level, as some were, the actual depth of the lock gets further increased by that deficit.  I am very grateful that Chalice is only 50 feet long - short enough to avoid the waterfalls from leaking gates and paddles that cause steerers of longer boats a lot of problems.  50 feet is good!

Only a very short wait, and we have green lights at Foulridge tunnel

After these locks you quickly reach the much longer Foulridge Tunnel, (which we are told is actually said more like "Foolridge").  This is definitely one way only, timed operation, with entry controlled by red and green lights.  Potentially if you arrive at the wrong time you could have to wait up to 50 minutes for "green", but we got lucky, and only waited about 3 minutes before going in.  Although you are warned about changes of height, it is all generous enough, and nothing dramatic happens.  Apparently the three air shafts more or less mark one quarter, one half, and three quarters of the way through, so knowing how far you have gone is easy.

When not broken this simple ground paddle mechanism is quite effective.

Since Barrowford Locks we had been on the summit level, but at Greenberfield locks this ends, and you start going downhill again, after all the climbing.  It became immediately apparent that with a single narrow boat in these very wide locks that going down is rather easier than going up, because when going up, the boat tends to be thrown about the lock by the strong flows created by the paddles, and you also have to be careful not to flood the front end by opening gate paddles too soon, (and often you are forced to open gate paddles straight into a deep empty lock with a boat in, because none of the ground paddles you would ideally open first actually work).

But this style is overall much more common, (and also often broken!)

Given that Cath had been ill, we were very happy not only to have made Greenberfield, but also gone down the locks there - this would have been our target had nobody been unwell.


Shortly after mooring up, someone knocked unexpectedly on the cabin side.  It proved to be Mike Clarke and his wife, who had made a point of coming out to find us.  Mike is a historian of these northern canals, and the author of specialist books on the topic. He is a mine of information about the history of the canals, and indeed the area generally, and topics strayed from canals to the geology of the area, a subject of great interest to Cath,  who, by now, although by no means fully recovered, was starting to be on the mend.

Moored in stunning surroundings at Greenberfield

We are deeply touched that people are following the progress of three people from the South who have brought a not particularly interesting boat onto these waterways, and are actually coming to find us to say hello.  Perhaps this backs up the idea of the friendliness of people up here, versus the often more insular way people behave down where Chalice spends much of her time.  We like it up here.


Near Hapton to Greenberfield Bottom Lock
Miles: 19.8 (Chalice), 0 (Sickle), Locks 10

Total Miles: 486.6, Locks: 246

(My thanks to Ray Butler for correcting me on an embarrassing error made in the post as published - now corrected, I hope!)

"A day in the life"..........

(Boat Chalice- posted by Alan/Cath)
Retrospective post for Wednesday 6th August.

Initially there seemed to be just the one pony, but more then appeared.

For various reasons this is being written 3 days after the actual date being referred to, and increasingly I'm finding it hard to remember exactly what happened each day!

Sign says "Give us a tow - I'm ready to go" - looks risky!

The previous day had already brought us out on to what was starting to be some pretty spectacular scenery, but today would see a mix of that combined with passing through Blackburn, which was obviously going to be less scenic!

Blackburn locks

When travelling by canals in urban areas, opinions differ strongly between different boaters about what are "good" or "bad" areas, with some saying that you moor at a particular location at your peril, and others saying they regularly do, and have never had a problem.  Possibly sometimes we err on the side of "over-cautious", but our usual approach if we have never been somewhere before is to seek the advice of those who have.  Of course that advice will differ depending upon who is giving it, so we usually try and take a balanced view that ignores either extreme, and tries to average things out a bit.

Holes in Blackburn, Lancashire. (Sorry!)

What most people seemed agreed on is that Blackburn, whilst generally not a problem, is equally somewhere where people can experience problems, and, as such, would not be a good choice of an overnight stop.  (Another view, of course, is that even if it were 100% safe, why would you chose to stop there if the alternative was a remote location looking out over fantastic views!).

Yes, I know it has appeared in other blogs recently.

You can't just pass through Blackburn non-stop, anyway, as there is a flight of 6 locks there, and, like most on this canal, whilst not "killers", they are fairly heavy work.  You never know quite what to expect either - the locks are far from standardised, and there are many variations in the paddle mechanisms that at the end of the day do the same basic job.  This is particularly true of the ground paddles at the head of the locks, (which often don't work at all!), although it is too many days ago to remember exactly what the choices are a the Blackburn locks.  I do recall though that some gates have to be cranked open, being connected to the mechanism that does this by curved bars with many teeth on.

This really doesn't start to say how stunning the views are.

The reality, I felt, was that Blackburn felt no better or no worse than many other areas of urban canal which are very run down in parts, but where efforts have been made on some stretches to revitalise them, and integrate with new developments.  At the time we passed people were friendly, and nothing felt vaguely threatening.  I can see, however, that the high level of discarded alcohol cans and bottles could suggest that at other times it might not be so.

Whatever you are doing William Blythe Limited, I hope it never happens!

From memory we didn't see a lot of other boats moving, though did pass some at the locks.  We are starting to see the occasional "short boat" - the type of boat that once worked this canal commercially, and who's maximum size is determined by the wide locks, but which are some ten feet shorter than full length narrow boat - the latter not being able to use this canal at all, of course.  Most of the short boats have their former cargo holds now converted into a  spacious living area.

A Leeds & Liverpool Short Boat - now converted to live on.

At the natural end of long day starting where we did, you end up on a stretch of canal where the M65 shadows it noisily for many miles, and it is hard to find good mooring spots that take you away from such things.  A place called Hapton had been suggested to us, but still a mile from there we were on a large loop that swept away from the motorways, and suddenly placed you overlooking views that went away to hills clearly many miles away, (though I still have no idea which hills!).  This was a spot not to miss.

Starting to see the swing bridges, though not yet in large numbers.

Mooring proved slightly more challenging, as we found much of the edge here, on what was an embankment, had a concrete ledge not far below the waterline, often extending away from the bank by around 2 feet, but that you couldn't actually see this until you tried approaching the bank, but could get nowhere close.  With a bit of judicious use of our short shaft, (or "boat hook" to use a less correct term), we found a slot where the front would come to the bank.  Happy dog, and happy us!

Sunset from our mooring.

Both the scenery, and the sunset were stunning, but photos that could give any real idea of the splendor of it all proved largely illusive.

Johnson's Hillock to near Hapton
Miles: 19.8 (Chalice), 0 (Sickle), Locks 7

Total Miles: 466.8, Locks: 236

The Wigan Flight (Hard!) & Johnson's Hillock (Much Easier!)

(Boat Chalice- text by Cath, completed by Alan)
Retrospective post for Tuesday 5th August.

Most of the locks are deep, and many leak badly.

We got up at 6 am, as Derek and Pam had indicated that they would set off at towards Wigan at 7:30.
However, as we found we had very little milk, breakfast consisted of cheese and Marmite rolls, with coffee. The canal was attractive towards Wigan, with large flashes on both sides of the canal. We probably could have moored here safely, especially as we had spurned the pub the night before.

It is a very large climb at Wigan, as the distant view makes clear.

A small boat that had been moored just up the canal from us the previous evening, with two men rollering green paint onto it had disappeared. We found it again at Poolstock locks. The men had absolutely no idea how a lock worked, and were setting off towards the notoriously difficult Wigan flight.

Some have more elaborate tail bridges.

"I just bought it last week, my mate did all the locks." I suggested that this might have shown a lack of foresight. I was concerned for the possibility of serious injury.

Slow but steady progress up the 21 locks at Wigan

We had a conference with Derek and Pam, and I set off back to the partly green boat to suggest that we went ahead of them, and set all the locks behind us, so that we could teach them what to do. However, we hadn't been given the most important part of information - they were going to pull over and wait for the 'mate who knows how locks work'. So we went ahead, and didn't see them again.

It leaks so badly you'll never open the gates unless you do!

The 21 locks in the Wigan flight are very deep, much deeper on average than the locks we are used to in the South and the Midlands. They are shorter and wider too, so that there is a gap of two or three feet beside the boat and stepping on and off becomes much harder. There is no way of crossing the head of the lock, so if you want to open paddles on both sides you have to walk around the lock and cross the bridge at the tail of the lock. This isn't a problem if you have enough crew to work both sides of the lock at the same time, but it was a problem for the couple who were moving one boat up ahead of us. The paddles and gates are heavy. Some paddles went up very easily, but others took all my strength and weight to get moving. On at least one occasion I just couldn't move a gate at all, and Derek had to come to help me.

Reason why signs like the one above are necessary.

Typical reason why many ground paddles don't work

David got the bike off the boat, and started to set locks ahead, but there were also a lot of boats coming down the flight, so we were often waiting for them. Derek and Pam said that they had often done the flight seeing no other boats at all, so this was very unusual. There were some very large widebeams moving down the flight, on their way to Manchester or Liverpool.

Johnson's Hillock - tackled at the end of the day

David came back to report that the crew ahead were flagging. The man had had heart surgery, and the woman was beginning to get hip pains with all the walking around the lock. They were looking to pull over and try to team up with another single boat. David went off on the bike to see if there was any viable boat coming up the flight, but quickly reported back that they were on their own for the time being at least. They decided to pull over, but a CRT employee set the next lock for them, and they went into it anyway, only to find that above that lock the pounds were all very short, and they wouldn't be able to moor up in them. They carried on, aided by the occasional boat coming down, and by David, who was still working a lock ahead of us. Near the top they found a longer pound, and decided to moor up for a while, only to be told by some stroppy fishermen that they couldn't moor there, because it might affect their fishing.  The moral of this story is that if you have health problems and are intending to do the Wigan flight, then team up with another crew. To be honest, even with David ahead, and with Derek and Pam sharing the work it was very hard work. The flight took a long time, much longer than expected.

Possibly the least effective lock repair ever done?

After the flight we set off into attractive countryside, aiming to get to at least the bottom lock of Johnston's Hillock. This flight of seven locks is set in glorious scenery, and are mostly very close together. They were also much easier than the Wigan flight, although the same size, so we decided to head up them. David discovered that he could cross the top gates here, much to our consternation.

Johnson's Hillock

We moored below top lock, where there is a flower-bedecked pub of the same name. I investigated it and it seemed very welcoming, although all the food on offer was very heavily meat orientated. We decided that we would visit the pub after dinner, but tiredness overcame us, and we headed off for a very welcome bed.

Johnson's Hillock locks were much easier than those at Wigan.

We imagine that being soft Southern vegetarians in the North might mean that we have to do a lot of cooking on the boat, and far less eating in pubs - perhaps that's not such a bad thing.

Dover Lock Inn to Johnson's Hillock
Miles: 15.5 (Chalice), 0 (Sickle), Locks 29

Total Miles: 447.0, Locks: 229

A shorter day than expected - to a lock that isn't there

(Boat Chalice - text by Cath, completed by Alan) 
Retrospective post for Monday 4th August.

These unusualmodern buildings seemed to be housing rather than office space.

With the need to put in quite long days we set off early, with the intention of putting in a lot of miles. However, some time during the morning I persuaded Alan to go and ask questions on Canal World Discussion Forums about safe moorings near Wigan, and where sensible overnight moorings on the Leeds and Liverpool would be on our journey. The firm answer was don't moor too near Wigan, but somewhere like the Dover Lock Inn - about 3 miles from the bottom of the Wigan flight.

We knew that we would need to cross the Barton Swing Aqueduct, which crosses the Manchester Ship Canal, but we were lucky enough to find it closed when we arrived. We were told that they would be swinging the caisson soon, for the 'Mersey Ferry' to go through. There was remarkably little leakage from the canal, or the caisson, once swung.

Barton swing aqueduct being opened

Fully open

Then the road bridge is opened

"Snowdrop" passes surprisingly fast.

Having passed the swung aqueduct it then passes equivalent road bridge.

Once swung back, the gates that seal the aqueduct are opened by hand cranking.

Followed by the gates that seal the canal

Chalice is finally able to cross the Manchester Ship Canal

Worsley

There is something curiously continental about the trip since we got onto the Bridgewater canal. Some of the canal side houses look distinctly Mediterranean, some of the bars and taverns could be lifted from France, and the lift bridge at Plank Lane looked like it was from the Netherlands. The canal is lifted about the surrounding land - a result of mining subsidence, with the canal being built up with pit waste. Much of the land around is wet, with many large 'flashes', but the scrubby vegetation also adds to the continental appearance of this landscape.

Not strictly the birthplace of English canals, but often said to be.

We found out from Canal World Forum that  Derek and Pam were also planning to go up the Wigan flight on Tuesday morning, and would also be mooring at the Dover Lock, so, despite this being a shorter day than we had anticipated we stopped early. We got to Dover Lock, to find that there was, in fact, no lock there. The locks had been moved nearer to Wigan at some time in the past, due to subsidence caused by mining. In the late afternoon sunshine Derek from nb Free Time sat down with us and went through our planned journey, suggesting places to stop, and other places to avoid.

Plank Lane bridge - scope for creating large traffic queues!

Alan and I investigated the pub. 'Food every day' declared the notice outside, but a banner also said 'Under New Management'.  Alan asked about food.

"We aren't doing any at the moment, we are under new management."
"But it says outside that you are."
"No it doesn't."
"Yes," replied Alan, "it does."
"Oh, well, it shouldn't."

The music was loud - it was to my taste, but too loud - the beer was not 'real'. We didn't stay.

After a pleasant walk with Odin we got off to bed early, with the alarms set for 6 am.

Little Bollington to Dover Lock Inn (Bridgewater Canal)
Miles: 22.5 (Chalice), 0 (Sickle), Locks: 0

Total Miles: 431.5, Locks: 200

Along, long day, and lots of miles.

(Boat Chalice - posted by Alan)

Sunday 3rd August.

Wardle Lock - First of the day

We are very much hoping that we can squeeze enough time to do a big trip to the North that takes in much of the Leeds and Liverpool canal - far further than we have ever managed to travel up from the South before.  We spent more time yesterday with the excellent CanalPlanAC website, trying to convince ourselves we have enough time.  I guess if we are strictly honest, we do not, as it comes out as consistently long boating days, with really little contingency time to offset any delays, or anything "breaking", (whether that be part of the canal system, part of our boat, or any combination of the two!).

Descending the Trent & Mersey narrow locks in Middlewich.

However we have decided to go for it, and to see what is possible, have put in a long day today, (although admittedly not a hard day, as very few locks were involved).

"Big Lock" is a broad one, unlike the others

The locks at Middlewich can be very busy in August, but a reasonably early start largely allowed us to escape the mayhem that was clearly only going to get worse as things got busier.  In the middle of the Middlewich locks where there is a 90 degree bend between locks, a hire boat decided to try theapproach of just powering out of a lock, carrying on straight at the 90 degree corner, with no attempt to steer around - it made a particularly impressive bang!  At one lock Cath got so concerned by a lady who insisted on sticking her fingers in the pawl mechanism of one set of paddle gear as a very confused young man was trying to wind, that I thought she might actually confiscate the windlass!  This crew in particular really did look like the proverbial accident waiting to happen - I'm a bit squeamish, so if fingers are going to get amputated, I'd prefer not to be there to witness it.

One of the "flashes" - the result of salt extraction.

Once away from Middlewich, there are no more locks on the Trent & Mersey until you pass through the shallow Dutton Stop Lock many miles later, and close to the end of this canal.  However you do get lots of other features, including three tunnels, none of which boats can pass in.  Two of these tunnels, Saltersford and Preston Brook have timed operation, and going North you have a period, starting on each hour when you may enter - miss it, (as we did in each case), and you have to wait until the next hour.  (Soutbound boats go on the half hour, which should avoid boats ever meeting in ther middle, if people stick to the rules).

The industry at Northwich is impressive, but not attarctive.

Steering into a Trent & Mersey tunnel

After Preston Brook, you join the Bridgewater Canal.  This canal is generously sized, and without locks - not at all what one would expect of what was effectively the first canal built on the network that grew from it.  You can make good speed on this canal, but it does have a huge number of linear moorings - in fact I'm always staggered by just how many boats are tied up on it.

The stop lock at Dutton

We made an impromptu stop to check a potential problem that may be developing with the alternator that charges all our batteries, (remember how I said we had not built in adequate contingency for breakdowns!).  Not finding a cause, we then continued a few more miles, bujt I wonder if we may be in trouble already?

Preston Brook Tunnel, as we are waiting for our timed entry.

In the meantime, this is certainly the most miles we have done any day of the current trip.


Middlewich to Little Bollington (Bridgewater Canal)
Miles: 30.7 (Chalice), 0 (Sickle), Locks: 6

Total Miles: 409.0, Locks: 200

Consolidation, then onwards in very variable weather.

(Boat Chalice - posted by Alan)

Retrospective post for Saturday 2nd August.

We spent the night aboard "Chalice" in Overwater Marina, near Audlem, having arrived there by train and taxis the previous evening.

Now modern marinas are a thing about which boaters have very mixed opinions, some thinking them the best thing since sliced bread, others never wanting to enter one, (ever).  However where I think you would probably find more consensus, is that if you consider the sheer numbers of leisure boats now on our canals, many of which rarely or never move, if they were all moored bank-side along the canal. you would spend most of many days doing nothing but passing mile after mile of moored boats, (if often feels like that anyway - but that's a different story!).  So the spread of modern marinas has taken large numbers of boats of the canals themselves, and made cruising a lot more pleasurable than I believe it would be if they did not exist.

Good to see this bridge at Hack Green locks has been rebuilt since last here.

I have to say that if I did ever take a berth in a massive modern marina, on the face of it Overwater would take some beating.  It really is a very attractive setting, and, in as much as you can, a lot of effort has gone into landscaping and natural features to blend the boats into their background.  It is certainly far less austere than many of the new ones, some of which rather blight their surroundings in my view.  It is also immaculately kept.  We were able to enjoy hot showers, and to process large amounts of washing in a pristinely kept facilities block, and could even enjoy comfy chairs and coffee whilst waiting for the washing to complete.

All that said, after only half a day, I felt my usual wanderlust, and couldn't wait to set off on the next part of our journey.

The day that followed was certainly an odd one, as the weather repeatedly quickly altered from brilliant sunshine to very heavy showers, only to quickly toggle back the other way, each time.

After the storm - still in rainwear, but not needed here.

As we progressed further up the "Shroppie" you could never predict if you were going to need heavy waterproofs, ot a tee shirt.  After we turned off the "Shroppie" main line at Barbridge Junction, and started heading along the Middlewich Branch, things got a whole lot more dramatic.  Torrential rain would set in, accompanied at times by lightening and thunder, where we calculated the storm was close enough that Cath banned use of my umbrella, in case it acted as a lightening conductor.  The back deck of Chalice has large gaps in the cants and should drain more or less instantly, but at times I was in about an inch of water.  We worked through at least one of the deep locks like this, only to have the rain stop, and the sun return minutes after we had done so.

After very good progress, often in adverse conditions, we moored above Wardle lock, nearly at the end of the Middlewich Branch.  Because we had arrived on "Chalice" after a week away, we had few supplies, so I knew a heavy supermarket shop was unavoidable.  Even if the Supermarket doesn't seem that far when you walk to it, it always seems a hell of a lot further back, if you are lugging several very heavy bags!

Overwater Marina to Middlewich
Miles: 18.6 (Chalice), 0 (Sickle), Locks:5

Total Miles: 378.3, Locks: 194

Two boats, two taxis, one train, several lifts, but a distinct lack of a toilet.

(Boat Sickle - posted by Alan)

Retrospective post for Friday 1st August.

An unusual day!

I try to read a book, but Odin has other ideas.

Our target was to deliver "Sickle" to Grendon Dock on the Coventry canal, where she is going to be blacked, (for those who don't own canal boats, this entails being put in a dry dock, the hull cleaned, and fresh coats of bitumen based material applied).  We were closer than original plan, and now reckoned we would have enough time to do this, then get ourselves back to Overwater Marina, near Audlem, to continue our travels with "Chalice".

Neither Grendon nor Overwater are near rail stations, so we would need taxis at both ends, happy to take us, Odin, and quite a lot of our belongings.  But David also needed to rejoin us from our home, so we needed to try and end up with us all on the same train, but with David starting far further South than us.

That was the plan - we allowed plenty of time to avoid any panics, and checking at Alvecote Marina, (who operate the Grendon dock), all we needed to do was to leave "Sickle" on the bank nearby.  We even thought we had enough time for a pint, some "puddings" and some coffees in te Samuel Barlow at Alvecote.
However, when we got to Grendon, the owner wanted us to actually get "Sickle" in the dock, something that proved very hard because....

1) I couldn't hear a word anyone was shouting at me over the engine.
2) I'm not much practiced at throwing ropes
3) Poling the boat proved impossible because of large amounts of silt outside the dock
4) Even trying to "welly" it in under its own power was a struggle.

Passing the fuel boat "Auriga"

The end result was that all our planned excess "slack" time to ge ready to be collected by taxi evaporated, and instead of logically gathering up all we needed, the final departure was a mixture of chaos and panic - goodness knows what we left behind we will find we need!

After the panic, we were nearly an hour early a Atherstone station, to catch a train to Crewe.  Incidentally, if anybody knows how to use the wretched ticket machine there to buy tickets for multiple people, each with railcards, please advise, because every attempt we had defeated us, and we were forced to do it as two transactions, the second of which it would only accept if we used a different payment card.

The good news was that David was on the train we caught, as planned.  The less good news is all the toilets were out of order, and shortly after we left Atherstone a drunk thought it a good idea to pull he communication cord, resulting in an already late train being even later.

The stop at the Samuel Barlow to complete our "lunch".

At Crewe, I was most relieved that the first taxi driver I approached would take a dog, although he was a bit reticent, as he was using his bosses brand new vehicle. I'm less convinced about the route taken to get us near Audlem, and the bill was considerably higher than another firm I had earlier phoned to enquire.

As we arrived at Overwater, the heavens opened, and we got really quite wet, the boat being a long way from where the taxi could drop us.  However all was in good order, and, unlike earlier in the trip, the gas fridge lit first time - result!

Most impressive person of the day was Odin, though.  He travelled on one boat, in lifts (which don 't phase him, but he gets slightly confused by entering a window-less "cupboard" in one place, and leaving it somewhere else!), in two different taxis, and on a very crowded and delayed train.  He takes it all in his stride, and was probably less concerned by the lack of toilets than we were!

Huddlesford to Grendon Dock
Miles: 0 (Chalice), 14.2 (Sickle), Locks:2

Total Miles: 359.7, Locks: 189