Slow travel

 Normal readers should skip this page, as only weird canal obsessed folk like me find locks so interesting. Before the 18th C when the mitred lock gates allowed craft to climb up as well as down hills, rivers had flash locks. A barricade held back the current until there was a sufficient depth to overcome the shallows,  rocks ... Then the barricade was removed, and a flash flood carried boats downstream.  Imagine the mayhem. What could possibly go wrong? The locks on the UK canals can be hairy enough. Like getting the stern jammed on the cill or ledge that holds the gates. As the lock empties, the boat tips forward and floods. We haven't done that yet. However Santiago a few days ago caught on the side of the lock, and tilted an alarming degree before the Cap'n sorted it.  Or the front fender jam in the gap in the top gap on the gate.  Yes we tried to sink our boat that way. And yesterday the Cap'n slipped into a lock, wet shoes, wet boat, very wet Cap'n.  Very fortunat

 No heroics  we agree. That is we won't stand on the back of the boat, charging into pouring rain. Even gentle English rain is wet. Who would've thought  it. So we get a bit wet, then moor up, about 15 miles east of Chester, on the beautiful Shropshire canal. It wends nor west from below Birmingham towards the Mersey. On an earlier trip we pushed west from Chester to Ellesmere Port. From there you can 'ferry across the Mersey' to Liverpool.  We were organising this, using a pilot, some years ago, but bad weather kyboshed that. Moored up yesterday afternoon in Central Chester, 5 min walk into the ancient town centre, from the city walls 🧱 , second only to York for their intact remains. After dinner on the boat, plus a reviving GnT, we strolled into the melee of coronation madness. The odd, very, hens' parties. Bah humbug. A pic of boaters dressed up for the coronation. And 2 of the canal. The odd round building with a pixy hat was the lock keeper's hut when comm

 Where shall we go for our last Santiago voyage?😢 initially we thought Llangollen,  over that amazing unpronounceable aqueduct  the Pontcysyllte. But time is short, still Scotland, Portsmouth, Lancashire, Yorkshire and London to fit in to our last 5 weeks So we settle on Chester. Not so many miles or locks as Llangollen. Funnily enough the River Dee runs through both, in Chester close to the sea, in Llangollen high in the Welsh hills, feeding part of its flow into the canal, enabling the transport of stone. So we travel back through the Harecastle tunnel, approximately 40 minutes, the Cap'n  sensibly wearing a lifejacket. Falling into an unlit tunnel, banging your head on a metal boat...it has happened, but not to us.

Our last dance down the Macc, leaving the mooretwing that's been home to Santiago for 6 years.  A farewell dinner at our local pub, the Boar's Head, with fellow boater Linda. Our boats were built together in 2014. So on Sunday the Cap'n reversed out, and y into the Trading Post, the convenient kiosk/diesel/pump out store across from the mooring. And so we wended southwards, the canal hugging the contours of the Western flanks of the Pennines.  By midday we commenced  the descent through 12 locks. Between the 1st and 2nd locks a boat was moored. A woman suffered a head injury falling in the cabin, waiting transport to A&E.   Near the last lock an old orchard was showing Spring finery. And the sun was out. A good day.