Whatcroft Thursday 21 April 2016

Last night we ate in the Italian restaurant on the wharf, the Barchetta The food was good with good sized portions, we had a carafe of the house red wine which was also fine, I can’t say what the sweets are like because we didn’t have room to try them.

Again we woke to clear sky’s and bright sunshine, we hadn’t gone far when I saw a couple of unusual things, first there were four planes flying over quite close together, even discounting this 4 there were always lots of planes in the air with 8 visible most of the time. 
Then a Heron flew over the canal, turned and dropped bodily into the water with its beak entering the water at the same time, only to take off with a fish in his mouth. A lot of people will tell you that Herons always land on the bank and walk into the water to fish, I have witnessed them landing in water before but never dropping onto a fish.
One of the houses in Wheelock has a fancy duck house, how much the ducks use it with a dog at the front door I don’t know. The canal was very quiet and we only met two boats between Wheelock and Middlewich where we stopped for a bit of lunch. Just below Booth Lane top lock there is yet another sad sight, this sunken cruiser. Beside the lock is what looks like an abandoned fishery.

Just before we stopped for lunch in Middlewich we passed this boat, I am wondering if it belongs to The Canal and River Trust, as I can’t find any mention of it.

After lunch we locked down through Kings Lock Middlewich and was surprised there was nothing moving at what is normally a very busy junction. As we approached Middlewich Top Lock a boat was just leaving going down ahead of us so we were hoping to share Big Lock with them as that’s a wide beamed lock, but no luck and we passed them tucked up on the visitor moorings before the lock so we had to go down alone.

Our planed for mooring was Bramble Cuttings but there were 2 boats there already and one of the occupants told us they were part of a working party who would be there all weekend so we pushed on in the sunshine. On the way we passed a collection of CRT work boats, I thought the warning barriers were more suited to the motorway than where boats are doing 3½ mph. We finally moored beside one of the “Flashes” these are often quite shallow and in some cases the offside bank of the canal is only a short way under the water, they are caused by the land subsiding due to brine pumping taking place in the area. Today’s Journey  10½ miles, 9 locks in 4¾ hours.