It was dull and grey when we left the Westport Lake moorings yesterday morning.
With just 20 minutes to go to Harecastle Tunnel, I hoped we wouldn’t have to wait in a queue. We passed a boat going the other way about 10 minutes from the tunnel, so I thought we might have missed the north-bound convoy, and the moorings were empty when we arrived. But the CRT tunnel guy said that if we were ready to go we could follow them straight in.
Into the wormhole…
We had a quick run through the 2926 yard long bore, emerging into daylight after just over half an hour.
Light at the end of the tunnel…
Out at the northern end
We dropped down the first three locks of the Cheshire Flight, passing the junction to the Macclesfield Canal above the top one, Lock 41.
Hardings Wood Junction and Lock 41 ahead
Lock 42 with Poole Aqueduct carrying the Macc back across the T&M
We topped up with water at Red Bull services then pulled in on the moorings just beyond for the night.
This morning dawned bright and sunny, no hint of rain and that wind that has plagued us for the last few days had pretty well died out.
We had a fine but short trip, dropping down the Red Bull Locks, then Church Locks, followed by Halls Lock and the three Lawton Locks. We stopped at Rode Heath, although we were tempted to push on a little further but we’ve plenty of time at the moment.
Red Bull Locks
Church Locks, two very close together with the later duplicated chambers on the offside both derelict.
At the top of Lawton Locks the widening in the channel marks the point where the original line went, dropping down through a triple staircase.
This caused a major bottleneck and was quickly replaced with the three individual chambers in use today.
Below Lawton Locks a 15 minute gentle cruise brought us to Rode Heath. We tied up at around 12:15 after a very pleasant morning. I do like the Cheshire Locks. I think the girls do too…
A day off tomorrow, then carrying on down towards Middlewich on Monday.
Locks 12, miles 6, 2 days.
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