Friday night we are back in Middlewich for the night went into town this afternoon topped up with food at Mr Tesco`s had a browse round the rest of town but not much caught our eye

Coming down the Trent Mersey the lock side is covered with rust sediment and the water is rusty red with iron oxide which is washed out of the tunnel upstream 

Back at Poynton Good Friday courtesy of Enterprise ( we pick you up and drop you off ) really good so no car with us this time left our mooring  on Saturday morning and travelled down to Gurnett aquaduct ready for the lock flight on Sunday. Twelve locks down  nearly five miles and one day , tonight moored at Dane Aquaduct . Monday onwards to Congleton on the Trent Mersey ready for Tuesday twenty two locks and seven miles down to Wheelock for a well earned nights rest .
Wednesday onwards to Middlewich and turned onto the Shropshire Middlewich branch ready for our meeting with the safety inspection engineer at church Minshull on Thursday .
Fantastic , survey passed that`s it for four years now , £150 pound well spent  so turn around and head back to Middlewich and then to Anderton and the lift down onto the River Weaver to complete our tour of the river starting tomorrow  .

Today has been declared the first day of summer after yet another long sunny day , I went for a shower and shave tonight  and then  broke out the shorts , might regret it yet , 

We both are well sunned ie pair of red traffic lights .

Spring has sprung lamb chops on legs get the mint sauce 

This years spring flowers including Hilarys birthday basket ,  looking good 

A misty start to Tuesday

Sunset on Gurnett Aquaduct

Thursday evening we have left Bugsworth as our 48 hours of mooring time has expired it was still very windy in the  basin area making moving interesting but as soon as we left it we were into shelter and the wind was not a problem and we travelled on to our mooring for tonight just past new Mills of the sweet factory fame .
We are in the woods ,no roads near just a very very muddy tow path with the occasional dog walker or cyclist there is a railway line on the hillside above us one just below and another over the valley
but there is only a subdued hum from the nearest when a train passes .
Tomorrow we will move a little further , our target is to back at Poynton on Saturday as Hilary would like to be back at Kirkby for mothers day.

Looking up into Bugsworth basin , Sybil just through the bridge,the narrow part in front is where the boats leaving were gauged ie measured to see how deep they floated and therefore how heavy the load was

Whaley basin  , the town at the head of the navigation 

Yesterday we decided a test run out was called for so we disconnected the land line , emptied waste tanks , filled with water untied and off we went .A few hours , a few swing bridges ( no locks) and a trip round the back of the loveheart factory at New mills  , gorgeous aroma coming out enough to make your mouth water !
Today was sunny this morning so a walk into Whaley Bridge was agreed on , only half a mile on the tow path , a previously unexplored (for us) town small but interesting , unfortunately  Wednesday was half day with some shops  making a day of it .
This afternoon became wet and windy, two boats tried to reverse out of the arm we are moored in , the first was blown sideways and ended up cross over against us with the lady owner stuck on the opposite side and loosing the rope so her boat finally  came to rest alongside us and she had to cross the foot bridge to get back on board her boat  ,
the second was a little more lucky but they gave up till the wind dropped and tied up in front of us

Marple junction Tuesday morning  gorgeous sunshine

                          
                                                 Helps to keep trespassers out ??

A delay at the swing bridge for works going on to the canal side , note there are two narrow boats bolted together with girders to make a stable platform for the crane 

The horse tunnel near Bugsworth instead of a bridge the horses passed under the canal at the junction to enable the to continue on the other side

Tuesday and Wednesday nights mooring pictured at five o clock tonight , looks nice and calm now

We are back onboard again the last two days being spent getting a start on all the little jobs that need doing after a winter sat moored up, freeing off the bathroom drain pump ,painting out the gas locker , the stern mooring equipment locker , bow lockers and a few other bits , still got the fuel system to check out and the heating boiler exhaust to fix luckily it is really too windy to travel very far yet .
Hilary has lost a filling yesterday so I think we will be making a visit back to Yorkshire sooner than later and it will soon be her 60th birthday when we had hoped to be at home anyway.

This is what we achieved last year in seven months starting in Nottingham then meandering round by Coventry and back up through Birmmingham with a few sideways diversions to finish up just below Manchester We shall continue onwards shortly this year and start on the northern most canals after first finishing the river Weaver and possibly get back round again to Birmmingham

During our visit to Sybil in December we had to pass Joderal Bank on the way to the chandlery

and got this picture of the giant dish glowing pink in the setting sun

Just after Christmas we visited Nottingham and had a good day out at Rufford Park 

The wild fowl there all looking a little lost in the snow and ice

More ducks at Rufford

Boxing day meet at Kirkby  a good turn out of followers perhaps because of the dry weather!

A fine looking pack of hounds

Sybil today , we have been over for a couple of days , she is frozen in , but despite having no heating on until we lit the fire we were soon warmed up and last night was grand and warm.

Nothing much moving on the canals

The ducks do look a little perplexed as to why there world has gone solid 

We have just crossed over the Pennines this afternoon with heavy snow on the way,M62 outside lane becoming impasable over the moors but once over to Leeds virtualy nothing much at all