nb Bridge Street

Monday 27 th January 2020 All 111,000 tons of Matt’s ship is passing through the Panama Canal today. He has been sending photos and videos of his progress. We have both applied for jobs as lock-keepers during the winter months, stating we would be willing to work for food and board only! Well, the principle has to be the same! British Contributor passing through locks on the Panama Canal with a huge Container Ship ahead and 2 locks up                                                                           Kenny had wanted to fuel up at Venetian Marina and we were to have breakfast at the...

Sunday 26 th January 2020 With Kenny and Sue having to be back in Middlewich for Wednesday, we started the return journey. It was a drizzly morning. Brenda went to the laundry in the marina while the boat was taken the mile down the canal to the winding hole beyond bridge 91. On the way we passed the new Braidbar Boat, ‘Eh-Up’, the first Braidbar Boat we have seen without the full panel advertising Braidbar along with the Braidbar build number. When we were looking into a Braidbar, we almost had a fight with the then-owner when we requested not to have this panel. We also witnessed the older, restored working boat, ‘Leopard’, open their side doors and deposit their rubbish directly into the canal. We picked Brenda up at the service point with the finished laundry and watered, dumped rubbish and emptied the loo. Brenda was pretty annoyed when she found the machines in the laundry were industrial sized and would have taken both sets of bed linen. Passing below the villag...

Saturday 25 th January 2020 The whole idea of coming to Nantwich was for the Battle of Nantwich Celebrations held today, to commemorate the Civil War Battle of 1644, which was an important battle and a turning point of the First Civil War. The English Civil War lasted from 1642-1651 and was actually a series of three Wars. The country was divided between those supporting the King and those supporting Parliament. Unlike other civil wars in England, which focused on who should rule, these conflicts were more concerned with the manner in which the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland were governed. The war ended with Parliamentarian victory at the Battle of Worcester on 3 rd September 1651. The outcome was: the trial and execution of King Charles I in 1649; the exile of his son Charles II in 1651; and the replacement of the English Monarchy, first with the Commonwealth of England from 1649-1653, then the Protectorate under the personal rule of Oliver Cromwell from...

Friday 24 th January 2020 We walked into Nantwich with Kenny and Sue for a look around and a bit of shopping. The easiest route from the canal to the town centre is down Welsh Row, a fascinating road with many buildings of interest from all eras, from Tudor times to the present.         Welsh Row, Nantwich and some of the many interesting buildings        Nantwich is just 10 miles distant from Middlewich, our old home, and yet, like most things on your doorstep, we rarely visited and never explored. The town has a lot of shops and some very interesting architecture. According to plaques mounted on benches in the town square, Nantwich, similar to a lot of mainly wooden-built Medieval towns, was devastated by a fire in 1583. The fire lasted for 20 days, destroyed 150 buildings and rendered half the population of 900 people, homeless. Concerned, Queen Elizabeth I ordered a nationwide collection for funds t...

Thursday 23 rd January 2020 While Brenda cleaned the inside of the boat, I made myself scarce and went to the chandlery at Nantwich Marina. The marina was originally the home of Nantwich Wharf and today supports a number of businesses, as well as the chandlery and boatyard, there is a cafe, launderette, cratch cover makers, gift shop and general store and a dog groomer. Probably next to B&Qs, a chandlery has to be my favouritist kind of shop. You go in for one thing and emerge with several others and quite a few £’s lighter in the pocket. I also called into the cratch cover makers to ask if they could make new seat covers for the front cratch. After just one year, ours have started coming apart with the material cracking and allowing water to soak into the foam. While they don’t make seat covers, they put me onto a company at Beeston. I rang these to arrange for new seat covers to be made and was told the canal is closing at Beeston Iron Lock for 3 weeks in February. ...

Wednesday 22 nd January 2020         A drizzly start to the day had given way to fog by the time we left the mooring. At times the fog was so bad visibility was only just as far as the front of the boat. So the headlight was on and speed kept to tick-over. Work is still progressing at the Hurleston Junction with the Llangollen Canal where one of the locks is being rebuilt due to the sides moving towards each other preventing passage for some wider boats. There had been a lot of oil on the surface of the canal but much worse here and smelling quite badly. Presently we came to Nantwich where we first stopped at the service station for water, dump rubbish and empty the loo. We met Plum here who we had bought our solar panels from, a great character. He explained a fix to prevent the formation of tar deposits on the roof about the chimney. An inner liner that passes from inside the chimney flue and through the removable chimney on the roof...

Tuesday 21 st January 2020 A hard frost accompanied the darkness last night, but this had completely disappeared this morning although it was still cold and the towpath had turned muddy. We left the mooring at 9:30 but not before Chris and Lesley on Rosie II passed by. We had first seen them on the G&S Canal and later on the K&A. They too, are spending the winter in this area and we had seen them a few times. We passed through Minshull Lock and stopped at Venetian Marina for fuel, coal and engine filters in readiness for the next service, due shortly. This section is of interest as, in the past, a steam engine used to run on rails, towing boats between the two locks, although there is no evidence of it at all today. At Venetian, the canal passes below the Crewe to Chester railway line. A few weeks ago, we took the grandkids into Chester on the train. From the Venetian viaduct to Chester took just 15 minutes. It took us 1 ½ days when we went into Chester in ...

Monday 20 th January 2020 We had first arrived back in Middlewich for the winter on 31 st October and have been in the town since then apart from a few runs to Anderton and an extended trip into Chester. So a total of 59 days of the last 83, have been spent here. We have coined a phase that we seem to just ‘live on a boat’ whenever we are stationery like this for extended periods, and neither of us particularly enjoy it. While it has been convenient, and made easier being able to use the facilities at the Middlewich Narrowboat site, we are well ready to move on. It has been really good being close to the grandkids and catching up with the friends we have seen, but we have overstayed a lot, although with CRT approval. There are still a few jobs to do at Tracey’s and we are still waiting on medical appointments for myself, so we will have to remain in the general area but we now regard ourselves as cruising again. After accompanying Tracey to a builder’s merchants and a...

Saturday 4 th January 2020 We left for the short move through the three Middlewich Locks to once again, moor at the Middlewich Narrowboats site. And here we will stay for the foreseeable future with nothing much to write about whilst here. Weather: cold, but bright and sunny. Day Total: 3 locks; 1 mile; 0 Tunnels; 0 Swing Bridges; 0 Lift Bridges; 0 Boat Lift; Day’s running hours 0.8                           Overall Total: 861 locks; 1489 miles; 53 tunnels; 61 Swing Bridges; 17 Lift Bridges; 2 Boat Lifts; total engine running hours 971.0

Friday 3 rd January 2019 Before leaving Bramble Cutting we did a good turn and replaced one of the picnic tables. Some toe-rag had dragged it down to the edge of the moorings and it looked as though they might well have been readying to cut it up for fire wood. People obviously have, and do, put a lot of time in to maintaining Bramble and how some people can misuse and abuse such a wonderful place is unbelievable. We left the mooring, wondering when we will return, and had a very slow cruise into Middlewich stopping at the dump to dispose of rubbish. The sun was very low in the sky, directly ahead of us and very bright, making seeing where you were going, very difficult. After watering up, we negotiated the Big Lock. The bottom gate opened easily enough, but then Brenda couldn’t shut it. After climbing up off the boat, it took the two of us to close it. Then, once the lock was filled, the top gate would not open despite trying both sides. Pushing the gates with the boa...

Wednesday 1 st – Thursday 2 nd January 2020 The two boats moored with us at Bramble Cutting had left by 11am on New Year’s day and, for the rest of our time spent here, we had the place to ourselves which was a pleasant surprise. While a few jobs were done, a metal edging strip fitted to the front step and the sailing ship oil painting hung, the days were spent lazily reading and watching TV. We bought ourselves a few games for Christmas and played quite a lot of Dominoes. We have eaten well on the remainder of the Christmas fare with a Roast Pork dinner on New Year’s day and a lovely curry with the left-overs. There had been a steady procession of boats although most seemed to be heading to wind at Middlewich before heading back to their marina’s and work after the New Year. We were treated to the sight and sound of ‘Rudd’ in the old blue and yellow BW livery and her distinctive Bolinder engine, towing the butty ‘Ilford’. The Bolinders have a very distinctive sou...

Tuesday 31 st December 2019 Brenda cleaned the boat through to have her looking nice for seeing in the New Year. I baled out water that had entered the engine room. Unsure as to how this had got in other than overflowing the guttering during the recent rains although the new rubber matting stops a lot of this. There was also blue coloured water, engine coolant, laying under the engine bed that was probably expansion from overfilling the header tank. All had to be cleaned up, a messy job but it seemed quicker to finish this time.     We then sat in the front cratch pinching ourselves over being at Bramble for New Year. There were two other boats moored behind us and the couple off one joined us for a few drinks before dinner and we met with them later to see in the New Year. The occupants of the other boat were battened down long before midnight, although it transpired that the wife is disabled with MS. We could hear the fireworks at Holmes Chapel and Middlewich ...