Softies

As we started out from Wheelton this morning, so did the rain, earlier than the Met Office website had forecast. Two miles on we were pretty soaked and had decided that going up the set of six locks in Blackburn today would probably be a miserable experience. In Withnell Fold we stopped briefly at the visitor moorings…

to capture two examples of local architecture – one an example of how to spend your money…

and the other a left over from how, in the past, you might have made it.

By Riley Green we'd had enough of the weather, and moored up. An hour later the sun came out and has been doing pretty well by us ever since. Perhaps we should have gone for those Blackburn locks.

Be that as it may, we wandered off up the road to find the village to see if there might be a shop. Fancied some new potatoes to go with a couple of steaks I bought for the barbie on Sunday, but didn't use. There wasn't a shop, just the pub.

When she heard what we were after, Lorraine in the Royal Oak went out the back and came back with some potatoes in a bag. No charge!

Class act, Lorraine. A honourable mention on this blog is duly conferred!

Company

Stagecoach Company bus service 125 runs every 10 minutes from Chorley to Adlington. This morning we'd moved the boat a kilometre up the canal and walked down to B&Q. Then, seeing the bus coming round the corner we ran to catch it – good exercise, though it wouldn't have been long till the next one. We wanted to get the visit to Adlington Post Office done and dusted. We were there to pick up a package – some washers I need to help secure the sound insulation I've bought for Erin Mae's cruiser stern. Coming out of the Post Office we saw the return bus coming, and ran to catch that as well. My best beloved's replacement knee was doing really well! Overall this meant it was only a couple of hours before we were back at the boat.

After an early lunch we set out again, heading for the flight of seven locks at Johnson's Hill. As we came to the first we found NB Firefox going in ahead of us, so we were able to share the flight with Peter and Janet.

It's much easier in these wide locks if there are two of you. You don't bump around in the same way with the currents from the water flowing in.

 The locks in this flight are close together.

Peter and I steered the boats side by side between the locks – first time either of us had done this. It was relatively straightforward – and we used the opportunity to keep on chatting!

The crack continued over a cuppa on board Firefox once we'd tied up.

Peter is a wood-turner by trade, and is fitting out the boat himself – some very nice work. There's an unusual feature in that the cratch is constructed as a living area.

So – very good to meet you, guys, and hope everything goes well as you push on up ahead of us.

Chorley

Well, it wasn't St Something's in the something (see last Sunday). It was St James, Chorley. Not a robe in sight.

Carpets, chairs, a worship band (rather older than last week's, playing songs considerably more slowly), and a visiting preacher who went down a bomb with most of the congregation as he negotiated in a lively way some bits of the Bible about anger and what to do with it. We had a chat with a few nice people afterwards, who were mostly a bit surprised to get visitors who'd walked to the church from the canal.

This wouldn't have surprised Nicholson's, which thinks of the canal as skirting Chorley. We'd walked to the supermarket last night, and couldn't see any particular reason to visit the town for anything else. It has its share of abandoned industrial buildings, one reduced to being rented out as a phone mast. It certainly isn't a TV mast, judging by our lack of reception.

As we came back to Erin Mae, it appeared that the Wigan flight had followed us here.

Well, we'd decided it was time to have a barbie, and figured there was just enough time to fit one in at lunch-time before the rain. Unfortunately we found ourselves engrossed by the first half-hour of the British Grand Prix (via broadband). By the time the meat was cooked the skies were beginning to drip, and we retreated indoors. It was very tasty, but a lost photo opportunity.

During the second world war (and before I was born), my dad was involved in aerodrome construction in various places around the country. At one point he and my mum and my two older brothers lived in a house called Chorley Hall. There's a local house that goes by this name, but the internet makes it look far too grand to match the few photos that I remember seeing – I'm sure they pumped their own water and generally lived pretty close to the earth. So I think it must have been another Chorley. They seemed to have looked back on the period with some affection, and I must ask the brothers what they know about it all.

Tomorrow we have one more visit to the town – a walk down to B&Q to return some unwanted items and then catch a bus back to Adlington to pick up the item we missed on Saturday. Hope it's arrived. I don't feel in the mood for spending yet another night here.

Encounters

Before coming up the Wigan flight we'd posted on the BCF FaceBook page to see if anyone else was doing the same and wanted to share the locks. The only one to respond was Robert on NB Blue Iris, who said he was coming down, so maybe we'd have a fly-past. We didn't see him on Thursday, but moving on today from our Haigh Hall mooring we met him. So we both went into reverse and pulled up for a chat. Nice to meet you, Robert!

We didn't stay long as we were due to pick up a package from Adlington Post Office. Unfortunately, by the time we got there, they'd closed for the day. So that'll be Monday, then. What to do in the meantime?

We called in on the White Bear Marina office and they, although no longer running a chandlery, had a supply of anti-vandal/water-conservation keys. We'd lost one of ours coming up the flight, which had left us very nervous – you have to have one to open the paddles, and it was definitely the sort of day on which you could drop the remaining one in a lock. We bought two!

We decided to go ahead with our plan to move on to Chorley for the night, and the marina manager offered some advice about where to moor. It's very shallow, which makes it hard to get close into the side, but eventually we found a spot where we managed it.

The run from Adlington to Chorley was excruciatingly slow with serious stretches of moored boats. Most of the interest was provided by squadron after squadron of towpath cyclists, who apparently were out for a charity bike ride. My default behaviour is to wave at cyclists, but they were coming so thick and fast that my arm got very confused – couldn't work out whether it should just stay permanently raised. This wasn't helped by the ones who plain ignored us, which left the arm uncertain whether to stay, drop, or flap around somewhere in-between. Anyway, we're reluctant to go back to Adlington on Monday for our package, and do it all again. It occurred to us that this might be an occasion for a bus pass. This spot has no TV signal apart from a single shopping channel coming in loud and (too) clear, and something called POP. But the mobile broadband is working fine, so we can research local buses. Haven't been on a bus since last September – what excitement!

Haigh Ho

After yesterday's energetics up Wigan flight in the rain, it was a day for Erin Mae to stay put and for us to go on a gentle ramble in the sun and shade through the grounds of Haigh Hall, just across the canal from us.

It was built in the 19th century by the Earl of Bacarres, to replace an older house. Peter, our CRT volunteer from yesterday, informs us that the Earl was obsessive about the project, to the point of hiding up trees to watch the work to ensure it was being done as he wished.

These days it's in the hands of Wigan Council, who let out the house for events, and who are developing the grounds and other buildings as a leisure resource.

We went up via bridge 61 and found the usual café and children's play areas, and a small group of arty-crafty shops in the stable courtyard.

We nearly had a round of putting, but settled for a very nice home-made Bakewell tart, and then wandered out towards the walled garden.

It was a pleasant space, mixing lawns and bedding…

with hedgerows and perennials.

Further out into the woods we came across a wildlife conservation pond…

and a miniature railway which seemed to have quite an extensive run.

Following our noses we eventually found our way down to bridge 60,

and back onto the towpath,

 to make a nice circular stroll, just what was needed today.

Tomorrow we'll move on (though not far), but for today it's been good to stop for a bit.

Wigan flight

Here they are – the Wigan flight, enjoying the sunshine.

It was a wonderful evening for enjoying the water…

and, for some, for getting wet to deal with the heat.

But that was yesterday, and we set out early this morning, towards the first wide lock we've encountered this year. We shared it with NB Narrow Escape, whose owners are off to Liverpool.

So at Wigan junction where they turned left, we turned right,

then swung left round the corner…

towards the first of the 21 locks that comprise the Wigan flight.

Now these locks are not everybody's favourite. Many of the gates leak, and at one point Erin Mae's well deck was flooded from the water pouring onto the front of the boat.

Some the gate mechanisms were unorthodox without being any easier, and my best beloved was glad of help from a passing cyclist.

After the first eight, the locks begin to get closer to each other and the flight bends away up the hill.

They weren't getting any simpler, and then it began to rain.

And then some wonderful CRT people came along to help. Lee was helping to organise things and see us through each lock…

while his colleague Jason went on ahead to get the next lock ready.

Up and up we went, looking back at the town through each set of closing gates.

Then Lee and Jason were replaced by Peter, who helped us through the last five. We were so grateful for the uncomplicated assistance we got from these guys today.

So there we are, we've done it. Soaked to the skin, but we're up into the Pennines – all new territory from here on in. And the Met Office are promising wall-to-wall sunshine for tomorrow.

In-between

In spite of the heroics of its rugby league team, Leigh always seems a sort of in-between town. There are various buildings like this to be seen as you approach.

That was expected. This was not.

Police divers were under the water searching for objects in connection with an incident in the town last week. I don't think we've ever before been stopped on the canals by the police.

It didn't take all that long, and it gave us the chance of chatting with Derek and Shirley on NB Hoops 100. Nice to meet you, guys! Hope you got everything you wanted in Tesco's.

Leigh is where the Bridgewater Canal finally gives way to the Leeds and Liverpool (the Leigh branch – now there's a surprise!).

Some day we'll stop here, too. But the Leeds and Liverpool was where we were heading. We've tied up at Scotsman's Flash, just short of Wigan. The stretch of weed between canal and towpath is goose-poo alley, but otherwise the spot is delightful, looking out over one of these subsidence flashes that is now well utilised for water-sports and other recreation.

So much for our two days in-between Manchester and Wigan. Tomorrow we hope to turn right and start up into the Pennines. That's the adventure we've been planning for some months.