Bosley bottom lock to Higher Poynton
Last night we watched a moon-rise over the hills from our lovely peaceful mooring at the bottom of Bosley lock flight. This morning we were breakfasted and ready to go at 9:15, into the bottom lock following two other boats up the flight. Unfortunately the first of the two was a single hander so progress up the flight was slow and labourious until we started meeting boats coming down the flight of 12 locks.
Ascending this flight is also more complex due to the top gates not having a walkway across them. I developed a process where I used Jannock’s long boat hook to pull the far side gate closed after the boat had left the lock.
Once out of the locks we made our way through the lift bridges to Macclesfield, unfortunately following a deep draughted trad style boat that had an unusual approach to passing through bridges – he would go into neutral to pass through the bridge, then into reverse once the bridge was cleared before slowly building up speed again. They pulled over to stop at bridge 38 which allowed us to continue on at a normal pace. We also spotted this guy doing some painting on his boat.
We continued on through Bollington, and over the now re-opened aquaduct, to continue on to Higher Poynton where we moored alongside the sportsfield, opposite the ‘wide’. We had been informed that the Poynton fete was on today but moored up at 5pm just as they were packing it all away. During dinner, taken on the foredeck, we watched Kingfishers and a canoeing photographer who was trying to take pictures of them.
We had a meet up with friends who live in Higher Poynton (and are soon to move into a canalside cottage – lovely) and the original plan was to visit the Boars Head for a drink but we ended up in the snug at Jannock. The view was superb as the sun went down. We watched a pair of Kingfishers flitting along looking for supper, there was a Heron fishing and Swifts catching flies. Large fish were coming to the surface.
We met Dave, every pub has a Dave but our Dave was in his inflatable canoe filming the wildlife on the canal. He came alongside for a beer and told us tales of adventure and photography. He did the drone photography for the TV series about the National Trust at Lyme House. He also has a Kingfisher video on Youtube here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gu4NcFK4XdA) Thankyou A & K, we had a lovely evening. We’ll have to save the Boars Head for next visit ;^)
Graham
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