Car shuffle day.

Graham started the day with a 32 mile run on the DiBlasi back to Burscough via Warrington, St Helens and Rainford. He was amused to pass through a village named Clock Face on-route. He then drove our car down to Barnton, near Northwich, returning to Lymm on the Di Blasi again.

Brenda decided that whilst moored in Lymm for the morning she’s seen more boats moving than at any time whilst the other side of the Poolstock/Wigan restriction.

We set off with the intention of stopping at bridge 15 to dispose of a weeks worth of rubbish at the canal side waste recycling unit immediately before the bridge. Luckily there was a gap in the line of moored boats that we could briefly stop in.

We then planned visiting the Heritage Centre, shown in Nichs’ map the other side of the canal to Walton Hall. We moored up at bridge 13 and then walked down the road past all the lovely 1880s estate cottages. We passed the crematorium and went all the way down to the pub and village hall on the main road – no sign of a Heritage centre anywhere. Graham then googled ‘Walton Hall Heritage centre’ to find that it is actually the Walton Hall estate on the other side of the canal, where we stopped and visited on the way up to Liverpool on 13th June.

Brenda’s penance for getting it wrong was to buy the ice-creams during the walk back to the boat. Plain vanilla for Graham but smothered in sherbet and sauce for her. Excellent ice-creams – very creamy and filled right to the tip of the very crisp cornet.

 

We then continued on towards Preston Brook and had to wait 15 minutes to enter the tunnel as this one is time controlled. We had a good rummage at the ‘book and sick’ library that one of the tunnel end canal side cottages has set up. We managed to leave more than we took as we’ve got through a lot of books this summer.

 

Through Dutton stop lock we then moored for the night alongside Longacre wood. In the evening we went for a walk through the woods and back along the towpath, spotting some lovely blackberries on our way. We also spotted a local cat that had caught a mouse and was playing with it on the lawn.

G&B