Mini Voyage - Overwater Marina to Church Minshull and back!!!

Thursday 8th October

As the weather has become very pleasant we have decided to take Ella for a mini cruise. We felt it was important to practise taking the boat out of the marina as well as putting her back in!!

I negotiated our way out of the berth and then out of the marina and turned left onto the Shropshire Union Canal.  The weather was warm and sunny and the canal was very quiet and peaceful.

We cruised through Nantwich and on up to the junction with the Llangollen Canal, here there were a few more boats as this is a very popular canal even during October.

Cruising on the Shroppie

On the left hand side of this photo is a large reservoir and along the railings sit large flocks of gulls, a very impressive sight.

Beautiful red ivy.

A lovely house overlooking the canal with the ivy turning a vibrant red, stunning!

Cruised onto Barbridge and suddenly there was a line of boats, here we turned right onto the Middlewich Branch of the Trent and Mersey Canal.  We joined a queue of three boats going down the first lock, but it was lovely standing chatting in the sunshine.  A volunteer from Canal and River Trust was working the lock as this is one of the busiest locks on the system apparently!!

Toby on the stern

Until he is used to travelling on the boat, Toby is tethered by his lead to the back of the boat. Unfortunately whilst we were waiting to go through the lock, he jumped off the boat and missed the bank, splash into the canal where he paddled until I was able to haul him out!!!  A rather soggy doggy!!

Continued on our way until we reached beautiful moorings just past Aquaduct Marina, here there are picnic benches and barbecue stands available for visitors.  We moored the boat and set off for a late afternoon walk down into the village of Church Minshull where a pub called 'The Badger' serves a very pleasant glass of ale.  However the path we wanted to follow had a very heavy duty padlock on the gate and dire warnings of beware of the dogs!!
We decided to abandon this idea and walked back to the boat, the walk along the canal was very good though.

Instead we opened a bottle of wine and sat at a picnic bench and watched the sun go down, a beautiful end to a gorgeous day.

Evening drink

At the moment Ella is flying the Royal Air Force flag in honour of both our fathers who served during and after WW2 for many years.

Friday 9th October

Today we are going to turn the boat round and cruise back to our Marina.  As the boat is 57ft and therefore wider than the canal, we have to continue along the canal until you get to a winding hole (pronounced as in wind that blows) where we can turn the boat 180 degrees and return the way we came.  They are called winding holes because in the early days of canal travel the narrowboats were pulled by horses and in order to turn the boats the boatmen used to rely heavily on the wind helping the boat to turn.

Church Minshull

A view of the village we were aiming for yesterday afternoon, as we cruised past the gate we noticed that the heavy padlock had been removed - were we imagining it???

Another beautiful cruise back along the Middlewich Branch, left onto the Shropshire Union and this time we moored up outside the Barbridge Arms where we had a tasty lunch.

Cruised on to Nantwich to the Nantwich Canal Centre where we filled up with diesel and disposed of all our rubbish.

As we were returning towards the Marina we saw this heron just standing on the towpath.

Heron

Take off!

Dave took Ella back into the Marina and berthed her beautifully back where she belongs.  A lovely couple of days, enjoying some gorgeous weather and meeting some friendly boaters, brilliant!!!

Maiden Voyage

Tuesday 29th September

Our first night aboard Ella!!!  We were able to load all our belongings onto Ella at 6.30 in the evening and were able to make up a bed to sleep in and find the kettle to make a cup of tea!

Sandwiches from the local shop was our supper and then our first night's sleep aboard.  

Dave by Ella

Wednesday 30th September

Today was spent unpacking all our belongings and finding a home for them throughout the boat.  After a long and exhausting day yesterday, it felt initially a daunting task.  Where was everything going to go?  Would we have enough space?

Once we had started, it was really quite enjoyable and everything ended up being put away in all the different storage spaces cleverly built into the boat.   

Supper in the evening was in the pub, the Broughton Arms.  The boat had been launched from their carpark! 

Kitchen (Galley)

Thursday 1st October

Woke up very early this morning, highly excited as we were going to begin moving Ella from Rode Heath to her mooring at Overwater Marina just outside Audlem.

The boat was facing in the wrong direction, so we began our journey by reversing her 50 yards to the nearest winding hole and turning the boat round so that she was facing in  the right direction.  Sounds easy, but narrowboats are not designed to go backwards, so the whole procedure took a good 30 minutes to complete! 

First bridge

 We cruised from Rode Heath to Wheelock.

Dave and Toby

On arrival at Wheelock we moored up at the water tap and put on water.

Toby having a drink at the tap!

We spent the rest of the afternoon walking Toby and basking in the warm autumn sunshine. Supper was an Indian Takeaway from a splendid Indian Restaurant called Shampaan.

Day 1 - 4 miles, 14 locks, 4 hours.

Friday 2nd October

Early morning mists

Today we cruised from Wheelock to Middlewich.  Again the weather was kind to us and we made good progress.  

After we passed through King's Lock in Middlewich we stopped at the chandlery to buy diesel.  We met Steve who knows Daniel and got a good deal on the diesel purchase.

Diesel for boats is sold at two different rates.  One for propulsion and one for domestic, the government taxes the propulsion rate and is more expensive than the domestic rate.  As our engine heats our water and the central heating, we can get a good split in favour of the domestic rate.

We caught a glimpse of Dionysus, the boat that was launched on the Friday before us, passing under the bridge onto the Middlewich Branch.

We spent our night moored up on the Middlewich Branch of the Shropshire Union Canal, another excellent cruise.

6 miles, 6 locks, 4 hours.

Saturday 3rd October

Today we plan to cruise all the way from Middlewich to Overwater Marina.  Again the weather was good to us and we set off bright and early.  

We made a brief stop at a farm just outside Church Minsull which sells Yankee Candles and then continued on from there.  

It was a long day, and at the last two locks we got caught in a queue of boats.  It is amazing, you can cruise quite happily and see no-one, and then, when you get to a lock there are three boats ahead of you.  Where do they come from?? How does that happen?  We met a hire boat under tuition, full of New Zealanders over to watch the Rugby World Cup, narrow boating was a completely new concept for them.

We arrived at the marina just on dusk, moored up and Dave collected fish and chips from Audlem for our supper.

18 miles, 5 locks, 81/2 hours.

Total cruise:  28 miles, 25 locks, 161/2 hours.

Ella moored at Overwater

A successful end to our maiden voyage, and the beginning of new adventures on board Ella.