Meaford Bottom Lock to Brook House Winding Hole
Subjects on the Geraghty zoom included kilts, pulses, baklava, Rusholme, and a little yellow train. Those last two sausages needed eating up so Mick did the honours and added in the last of the cauliflower cheese, which already had bacon in it so no need for any extra rashers.
Boats had already been moving, we moved up to await a boat coming down the bottom Meaford Lock then in Oleanna went. Mick was joined by two athletic teenagers who vaulted over lock beams and were a little bit too eager to lift paddles without checking with me first. All the intermediate pounds were quite low, making entering and exiting locks a slow business.
Coming out of Meaford House Lock I could see crew opening the bottom gates at Meaford Road Lock, then their crew vanished not to return. This was because it was a single hander who was very pleased this next lock was in their favour with gates open.
Meaford Top Lock looked empty, Mick walked up and I trod water. Unfortunately by the time he’d walked up to and over the bridge someone was already filling the lock, walking up to peek over the side of the bridge for oncoming boats isn’t a natural thing for some people. Mick came back and tied Oleanna up, this is one of the things that doesn’t go down too well with my knees, at least Mick is doing more steps now!
The walkway on the top gate is at a very unhelpful angle and has been taped off so walking round the lock is required until Oleanna was high enough to step across the bow.
I managed to turn a sock heel before the rain started. It then continued all the way to Barlaston. Todays starting point hadn’t been that helpful. To Barlaston a little bit too short on hours, but a good place for Tilly. Etruria, the next place we’d stop, at least another 3.5 hours cruise. We didn’t fancy getting wet for that long so pulled in near to the winding hole, another short days cruise.
Another go at planning the next few weeks was made. Canal Plan is a handy tool, but if you’ve put in start and end dates then want to add in a stop of a couple of nights somewhere it adds these days onto the end date, so not helping to calculate how many hours we need to do between A and B, then B to C etc. Mick had to start again anyway and decided to do each leg as a separate journey. Trying to get us to useful stations on specific dates is proving difficult with our chosen route. It turns out we’d have been better heading northwards along the Shroppie then returning down the T&M. There are still other options for returning to Yorkshire before the end of the year, some more appealing than others. More work on the route plan required.
A catch up with my brother was had, a very proud Dad. Josh is going to Manchester University where Andrew went, I can hear Andrews excitement at being able to visit his old haunts with Josh from 40 plus years ago, they will all have changed. He’s already visited The Ducie where even I remember the lines of pint glasses filled with Guinness on the bar. The Ducie Arms has had a make over and wouldn’t bat an eye lid at you requesting something other than Guinness.
The day had been quite chilly and damp. Time to light the stove. Tilly immediately took up residence at the warm end of the sofa, my fox hunting afternoon required several hours of relaxation and warming up.
4 locks, 2.7 miles, 1 slightly soggy day, pair 34 cast off, 2 mains 2 sides M&S curry night, 1 packet poppadoms, 4 hours rounding foxes, 1 stove lit, 1 fight over the end of the sofa, 1 Mrs Tilly stamp of approval.
