Plenty of rain again last night but fine when we set off this morning at 10 am but very cloudy. There is no way you should miss sing this pipe bridge.
As Diana brought Harnser into the bottom of the Hazlehurst 3 locks I could see people and a boat at the top lock and before we had lock up the first I could see a boat heading for the middle lock, so that’s one we can leave open. They told me there was a work boat following them down the top lock and by the time Harnser was in the middle lock they were waiting above. It was a Rothen boat with a small dredger on board heading to clear the mud bank further down that stopped us yesterday. The steerer who I know has seen me waving my windlass and she told her partner to leave the gates for us, as he wouldn’t have been able to see us. Once clear of the locks it was a very tight left hander onto the Leek branch, the Marsh Marigoldsare well out but no Bluebells yet.
We met one hire boat on this stretch, thankfully a wide bit and even the sun decided to pay us a visit. Next on the agenda was Leek Tunnel, this has been repaired at some point with pre cast concrete sections. The rest of the construction is large stone blocks, the tunnel is unusually high for a narrow
tunnel, much higher than lots of the bridges on this canal.
Looking up the field on the offside just after the tunnel Diana spotted something white, it turned out to be a large white rabbit, there were another couple further up the field as well as several common coloured ones which were smaller.
Of course we had to go to the very end of the navigation, I think it has silted up a bit since last time we ventured down here, there isn’t room for us
to wind at the end so I had to back up to the winding hole by the bridge, we then moored for the night with no other boats here.
Today’s Journey
5 miles and 3 locks in 3 hours
If anyone is interested in seeing everywhere we have been this year all our travels are on a Google map HERE The latest is always the blue one
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