Wheelock Wednesday 15 February 2017

A little bit of admin work this morning with the bank online. We have our accounts set up to give Text alerts .if the bank balance goes outside a set parameter, This allows us to transfer funds before getting hit with overdraft fees. These texts come in at around 8 am from the Lloyds Group so you have all day to sort it.

We set off at about 11 am. in very light drizzle which didn't last long, as the morning went on things warmed up a bit as well. The first lock was not far ahead, you can see the stairs and grab rail to the off side of the lock for the boatman to have stepped off and gone to close the gate once his boat had gone in.

A little further on we passed an old wooden ice breaker, Shackleton they didn't cut through the ice but the bow was shaped so that they rose up onto the ice and then the weight of the boat broke down through it.

Over the years this area like lots of Cheshire has been effected by subsidence and this has meant that British Waterways Board as they where then, have had to keep building the banks up as the land level has dropped. This can be seen by the layers of concrete added one on top of the other. In some places the level is still dropping and will need attention from CRT some time in the future, there is a section below Middlewich much worse than this.

I have not seen cycle traps like this anywhere else on the system, this one isn't doing much good because the gate beside it is wide open, but there is no way you would just cycle straight through one.

Something I have never seen before and there is me a country lad through and through, it was a flock of Waxwings sitting in a bush. Not the best of photos as it was up against the light. This is only part of the flock.

We stopped in Wheelock to fill with water, luckily there are two water points as this boat had carefully moored right in front of one of them, he has even put white on his mooring ropes so people see them and don't trip over them. The best of it is that there were only two other boats on the whole length of the visitor moorings, all with rings to tie to. I am sure someone will come back and say I don't know the whole story and there was a good reason for leaving the boat there.

Once full we headed off up through lock 66 to wind as there is a winding hole between locks 65 and 66. These locks are all paired to speed up boat movements, lucky for us one was full but the left hand one empty which made it easier for us going up. After winding I came straight down again and moored on the visitor moorings. I moored back here at the end as I wanted to run the engine a bit longer to charge the batteries so didnt want to be next to other boats, I will move down shortly so we are further from the road bridge.

Today's Journey 3.55 miles, 2 locks one of them twice in 2hr 10min.