A few strange noises in the night, it always takes a while to get used to sleeping in a new environment. I had been unable the previous evening to get the boat next to the side, and I was imagining that the water level in the canal was dropping to leave us stuck on a mud-bank. Waking in the morning revealed everything was OK, and it looked like we were going to have a fine day
We had arranged to meet Philippa in Wrenbury at 5:30, and everything takes longer than you first imagine, so I set off early to cruise down to Nantwich. This took about an hour or so, we had clearly made the right decision to stop last night as we would not have made it before dark.
We head into Nantwich to buy a newspaper and some breakfast
It's a lovely town, full of old buildings, many leaning at odd angles. We had breakfast in a bookshop cafe, which was in a 700 year old building, wood panelled walls, sloping floors and a fascinating attic full of wooden timbers and the accumulation of many years of assorted random items.
But no time to linger, and we head back to the canal. We plan to explore this town further on our journey back
We pass a burnt out boat. Clearly there are people less competent than us, though I guess the owners of this boat are not on the canal any longer
We reach the junction of the Llangollen canal, which means we have to make a sharp right turn and ascend through four locks.
Narrowboats, as you might imagine, are not the most manoeuvrable of vessels and this involved a lot of going back and forth as I lined the boat up to be able to enter the bottom lock
Luckily for us there were two volunteers helping with the locks here, and the gates of the lock opened without us having to moor up, get off the boat, or do anything.
Getting into the second lock was not so easy. The wind from Storm Kathleen was blowing across the boat and pushed us onto the far bank. I had visions of being stuck for half an hour, like yesterday, but managed to push off the bank without too many problems. I am learning that the key to handling the wind is to use plenty of engine revs
We get through the rest of the flight without incident. The sun is shining, it's warm and I'm down to wearing a T shirt. After travelling a short distance moor up for lunch. We realise that we cannot linger, as we have another five locks and several miles to do before meeting Philippa. And the wind is getting stronger, and although I am learning to cope with this I am conscious that we might be forced to stop
In the end it is not the wind that stops us. At this lock our plan was for Vera to hold the boat in position at the exit to the lock while I closed the gate, jumped aboard, and continued on our merry way. However, there was a flow of water down an overflow slipway at the top of the lock and this swept the boat onto the edge of the slipway. We were stuck, and unable to move.
I climbed into the shallow water and tried to shove the boat off. Stuck
I tried using a wooden pole to lever the boat free. Stuck
Vera went off back down the canal to get help, returning with Ron and Roz who had been out walking their dog. A combination of Ron pulling on a rope attached to the front of the boat and me levering the boat off the edge with the wooden pole managed to get us free
My boots and feet were soaking, but the feeling of relief at our escape eclipses all of this.
We are amazingly on time at our rendezvous point to meet Philippa, and we cruise a little further and moor up near one of the Wrenbury lift bridges. These will be part of tomorrow's entertainment
We walk the half mile or so to the pub, The Dusty Miller, for our tea. Philippa and I make the fateful decision to share a sticky toffee pudding, which means we have to walk back by the lights of our phones. It is raining hard, the path is muddy, wet, and very slippery. When we get back to Sceptre we are also very wet and muddy
I get the fire going, this stove throws out an amazing amount of heat
Looking out of the front doors it has now stopped raining, and we have a beautiful late evening sky
We chat and play games by the heat of the fire and it's nearly midnight before we turn in for bed. The sky is now clear, with a myriad of bright stars in the dark sky
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