Wednesday 8th June 2016
Earliest start yet as we had to have the pooches down at the pooch parlour for their 8.00am spa treatment. Whilst they were off getting pampered we went to a greasy spoon for breakfast. Oatcakes filled with bacon and cheese plus the obligatory cuppa tea. Oatcakes are particular to the Potteries area and consist of oats, milk and some salt and normally filled with savoury fillings. Reasonably healthy??
Breakfast at Tiffany’s – maybe not!
Fras went off and did the last bit of shopping whilst Di went and also got pampered in the form of a hair cut. Short hair is much more manageable on a boat and even though there is a hair dryer available it drains the batteries on the boat quickly.
The pampered pooches looking and feeling a lot better.
We went to the Canal and River Trust office prior to cruising off as we wanted to book our passage through the Standhedge tunnel which is on the Huddersfield canal that we will do after the Maccesfield. We will give you further information as we get there but it is the longest tunnel on the network and opened for only five months of the year with passage on Monday, Wednesday and Friday so booking is essential. We have booked that for the 20th June so we had better get a bit more of a move on to meet this deadline.
We cruised off at about 11.30am in hazy overcast skies but as the day progressed the haze burnt off and we were left with yet another magnificent day. Weather predictions were for 90% rain at 6.00pm tonight – they are 100% wrong again.
We did a little side trip off the canal for about a kilometer walk to the Little Morton Hall which is a wonderful example of the Tudor style. It was built in the early 1500’s by the Morton family who were wealthy land owners as well as having their fingers in many other money making enterprises. As you can see, they were not that good at using levels!! Probably more just due to it’s age. It belongs to the Heritage Trust and was £10 per person to go into so we decided to just admire it from the outside. It is rather expensive to go into a lot of these places so we are going to choose wisely.
Little Morton Hall
Went through some lovely countryside this afternoon with what looked like the ruins of an old Norman castle on the top of one of the ridges. Unfortunately no photo as it was too far away. Many beautiful old stone bridges along this section of the Maccesfield Canal. As per usual lots of people fishing which really surprises us as there is no way you would want to eat any fish that had been co-habitating in these canals with all the strange flotsam and jetson that is in them. We managed to pick up a car tyre on our prop today which fortunately just took a little bit of reversing and forwards movement with the throttle to dislodge it. The number of shopping trolleys, motorbikes, bikes, tyres etc that are dredged out of the canals each year is staggering.
Bridges within Bridges
We puttered along until 5 o’clock and have pulled up at a place called Congleton. Our task for tonight is try to find somewhere to deposit our rubbish as there are very few locations that are provided along the canals for this purpose. Hmmm, one might just break it down into smaller bags and deposit in bins around the town of Congleton. Not very kosher but not a lot of options.
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