Among the broad locks.

Although the Trent and Mersey Canal is classed as a narrow canal, either end it’s actually broad. In the north-west Big Lock in Middlewich allowed salt barges to trade up to the Bridgewater and the Weaver, south and east six broad locks take the canal up from the Trent to Burton, carrying raw materials and Burton’s finest product, ale, to and from the town.



Ne'er tell me of liquors from Spain or from France,
They may get in your heels and inspire you to dance.
But Ale of old Burton if mellow and right
Will get in your head and inspire you to fight.
(19th-century rhyme)

These six locks were added by Brindley during the construction of the waterway, and were bitterly opposed by the Burton Boat Company, who owned and managed the Trent Navigation and warehousing on the riverside. The Trent, at the time, was navigable from Shardlow to Burton, although subject to closure in floods. Brindley's new cut bypassed the flood-prone river, and the warehouse owners were afraid that the ditch would take business away from it. They unsuccessfully petitioned Brindley to end his new Grand Trunk Canal at Horninglow, ensuring that traffic to and from the east would use the river.
They were right; soon after the canal opened trade dwindled on the river, the locks deteriorated and the navigation ultimately closed.

The Bond End Canal was built to link the two routes, from Bond End on the river to Shobnall on the cut. But the T&M company refused permission to make the connection, so goods travelling from one canal to the other had to be transhipped.
Finally, in 1794,  agreement was reached, a 3’9” lock was constructed on the Bond End, and Shobnall Basin was connected to the T&M. But the Canal Company were wily. The connection was through a narrow stop-lock, ensuring that barges using the broad Bond End couldn’t also use the less hazardous Trent and Mersey back down to Shardlow. Sneaky, eh.

The Bond End Canal was pretty much disused by the 1870’s, succumbing as many canals did, to the introduction of rail transport. The final insult was the infilling of the canal for a line to be built on it. This left just the upper basin at Shobnall in water, a situation which still exists today.

Entrance to Shobnall Basin, actually the chamber of the narrow stop-lock
The basin was never adopted during the British Waterways Board introduction in the 1930’s, and still remains private water for which boats don’t need a licence. Unsurprisingly there’s a waiting list for moorings in the marina…

History over, back to today. After a very pleasant weekend at Branston (known as the home of the pickle, but also a machine-gun factory in WWI), we pushed on towards Shardlow. Our first lock, Branston Lock, was just a few minutes down the canal.

Approaching Branston Lock.
If it’s not anglers on the lock landings it’s Canada geese!

From here the outskirts of Burton upon Trent start to fringe the canal, and the malty smell of the breweries occasionally drifts tantalisingly on the breeze.

There’re lots of chicks along here, coot, moorhen and duck.

Spot the moorhen chicks…

There’s three in the picture.

Shobnall Fields moorings were shunned as being a bit dodgy at one time, but now they’re well used. We’ve stayed here overnight a couple of times; great for dogs!

Dallow Lock is the last of the narrow locks, beyond is Horninglow Basin and the stretch of broad canal to Shardlow.

In Dallow Lock

It sits discretely under a road bridge.

I’m on the tiller instead of Mags because we’ve gained a helper. The chap on the left had just left a boat at Shobnall Marina to be blacked and needed a lift back to Willington. He offered to do the lock for us in exchange. It’s a pity there weren’t more to do…

Out of town now, and about to cross the River Dove Aqueduct.
The WWII pill box on the left formed part of one of the defensive lines built in the event of an enemy invasion.

Despite the proximity of the railway, Willington is always a popular spot for mooring. Pubs, shops and take-aways make it a good overnight stop. It was fairly quiet as we came through today, though.

Willington
Then again, it was only lunchtime.

We dropped our erstwhile hitchhiker off near Mercia Marina
Lloyd had been interesting company for an hour or so..

The steady stream of boats coming the other way seemed to dry up as we headed for Stenson and the first (and deepest) of the broad locks. As we arrived two boats were just going in to go down ahead of us. Typical. So we pulled in at the end of the moorings opposite the marina for a bite to eat, hoping that a) someone would come up the lock, filling it for us, or b) someone would arrive to share the lock.
Of course, neither happened, so I refilled the chamber and we went down on our own.

Filling the 12’4” deep Stenson Lock

Going down, not the place to cock-up your locking technique with a popular cafe right alongside!

Another three miles of steady cruising brought us to Swarkestone Lock. On the way we’d had to pause for a couple of minutes while the dredging crew moved their gear.

Dredging. Offloading near Bridge 17…

..and the target area near Bridge 16

Once again we had to refill Swarkestone Lock and descend on our own, mooring just below.

Moored below Swarkestone Lock

Apart from a gaggle of anglers at the far end, the length of piling here is unusually empty.
Spoke too soon, we’ve just been joined by a Canaltime boat with two couples from Pontypridd…

A long day today, but we didn’t want to have to do all of the broad locks in one go. Now we’ve only three before stopping at Shardlow.

Locks 4, miles 12. 

Watching the boats go by.

They’re all out this weekend. Old and new, plastic, steel and aluminium, long or short. The fine weather has brought out the boats this weekend like midges around a Scottish loch.

We’ve stayed put, not doing anything particular, just trying to stay cool. I did have a look at that small diesel leak that was mentioned by the BSS examiner, but I can’t do anything till we’re below half a tank of fuel, due to the syphon effect of the positioning of the pipework.

Friday evening, after I’d finished writing and posted to the blog, I heard an increasing cacophony of tweets and squawks coming down the canal, then this lot gathered below the side hatch, hoping for a tasty titbit.
Canada geese seem to be attentive parents, gathering their offspring into crèches for safety. There were half a dozen adults chaperoning this little lot on their Trick or Treat outing down the row of moored boats. 

Meg and I have spent a little while walking around the large pool at Branston Water Park, she’s taken the opportunity to have a cooling dunk whenever she could.

Branston Water Park

Coot having a scratch…

…And tufted duck, err, having a scratch!

Outside the boat, in the evening, this female thrush has been gathering food for probably a nestfull of demanding beaks…

We’ll be toddling on tomorrow, aiming to get to Shardlow in two days. That’ll be good going for us.

Now then, Tom set me a challenge recently, after I’d calculated the number of bricks used to line Harecastle Tunnel, he suggested I should to do the same for The Great Wall of China.
http://www.china-mike.com/china-tourist-attractions/great-wall-china/history-facts/

At first glance, simples. Assume it’s a couple of courses thick on each side, filled with rubble. The average height is around 6.5 metres and the length, according to China’s State Administration of Cultural Heritage (and they should know…) is officially set at 8,851.1 Km. That’s a lot of wall.


http://www.china-mike.com/china-tourist-attractions/great-wall-china/history-facts/

Tom kindly furnished a link to a website that informs me that a Ming Dynasty standard brick is 375x95x187mm, a volume of 0.0067m³, and the brickwork volume for the wall is 6.5x8851100x.4(guess) x2 (two sides to the wall) = 46025720m³, therefore the number of bricks is 46025720/0.0067 = a mind boggling 6,869,510,448 bricks! Yes? No!!

The wall was built over a couple of thousand years, with techniques ranging from tamped earth to dressed stone, and even wood and vegetation reinforced gravel in some places. The fired bricks only made an appearance during the Ming Dynasty, when a century-long improvement and repair project was undertaken. And even then stone was used as well as brick if it was handy.
So the answer is, anywhere between a couple of million to 7 billion! And that’s not including the watchtowers.

It remains the biggest civil engineering project in history, but it was never directly assaulted by the people it was built to defend against. Until it was improved during the Ming period marauding armies from the north could actually go around the ends of the disconnected sections, following the improvements betrayal by border guards allowed the Manchurian Army through, who established the Qing Dynasty which lasted for nearly 300 years, until early in the 20th century.

The only time the wall was actively defended was as a precursor to the second Sino-Japanese War. In 1933 Japanese troops were held back at Shanhaiguan Pass for three days before overrunning the defenders.

There you have it. No definitive answer, but an interesting bit of research. Thanks Tom. There’s an excellent website that I came across on the subject (and others). The two pictures I’ve used were gleaned from this site.

Thanks everyone for the comments about the Mags picture. You’re right, I don’t know how she does it. I hope I look as good as that in *# years!

Carol, we’re heading down through Leicester to Norton Junction, then either down the GU, along the Thames and back up the Oxford, or vice-versa. So we’ll catch up with you at some point.

KevinToo, mmm, pie! Sorry we’ll miss you this time. We’ll be through Shardlow Wednesday, all being well. Give our regards to your Mum.

Locks 0, miles 0

A taste of the Trent

Leaving our mooring on the edge of Alrewas this morning, we dropped down Bagnall Lock, through the village, then Alrewas Lock, down onto the short river section.

Bagnall Lock, another beautiful morning.

The moorings are always busy through Alrewas, the village must do quite well from boaters, but then it does make us welcome.

Someone wanting water will have to shift this guy. Two water taps, and he’s right between them!

On the River Trent.

An awkward bridge to negotiate part way

The peace and quiet of this pleasant ½ mile interlude is soon shattered as we return to the canal at Wychnor.

Wychnor Lock.

The busy A38 runs right alongside.

With 35 minutes before Barton Lock there was time for elevenses…

Mug of tea and a bacon butty made with dry cured back bacon from the farm shop at Great Haywood. Lovely.

The jubilee clips on the neck of my aluminium windlass are so I can fish it out with a magnet should I lose it in the cut.

Barton Marina, our enforced winter domicile 2012-2013 while Mags recovered from her “bit of a do”.

We topped up with water below Barton Lock before swinging away from the road and negotiating Bridge 36. This is reckoned to be the narrowest stand-alone bridge on the network, just wide enough for a narrowboat.

We gave way to an approaching boat…

…before skittling through ourselves.

Tattenhill Lock was left open for us by a boat coming up, but we couldn’t return the favour, there was no-one waiting below.

Leaving Tattenhill Lock
Yes, the offside gate swung open as soon as I’d left it.

We did meet another boat a couple of minutes later, so they’d have had to open only one gate…

Magpie on wire

Moored just beyond Branston Bridge
There are moorings both side of the bridge, but these are more open, with a wider towpath.

That’s my girl!

She’s certainly caught the sun these last few days!

We’re going to have a day off tomorrow, you never know, maybe even Sunday. Next stop will be above Stenson Lock, all the narrow locks will be behind us, 6 broad locks ahead to take us down to the Trent at Shardlow.

I‘m getting to like the new camera. Leaving it on auto seems to work well, and it boots up just a bit faster than the old Samsung so you can catch snaps on the fly. The image stabilisation, important if you’re using zoom from the back of a moving boat, is excellent. And I’ve pretty well sorted out the colour balance, too. Finally I’ve rooted out a USB cable that fits the camera mini-D socket, so now I don’t have to remove the memory card to dump the pictures. Battery life seems to good, too. I’ve taken over a hundred pictures and it’s still showing well charged. After my initial reservations I’ve come round.
A good buy, especially at the discounted price. I don’t think I’d have paid the full list of £180, though.

Hi Lesley, Wozie. Yes Lesley, I'm really going to be careful with my comments about "The Doughnut Queen". Now's she's got an iPad she can check up on me...!
Wozie, thanks for the comment. Comparison shots with the old and new cameras show the difference. A worthwhile investment.

Locks 5, miles 5.

Fun in the sun at Fradley Junction

Well, to be honest, not a lot of sun… But it was warm.

It was always going to busy through the locks at Fradley, so we waited till 10 to get off, letting the first flush of eager boaters get going. Once again we were passed by several boats in both directions before we got underway.

Taking Meg for her morning perambulation gave me the opportunity to have a play with my new toy. I downloaded and read the manual last night, not a “man” thing I know, but I’m a bit more aware of what it can do now.

Taken from about 40 feet away, blackbird in a willow tree, handheld on 16x zoom, enlarged and cropped. 
So the image stabilisation works!

Zoom once again of ducklings on the canal

Foxglove on macro…

…and flag iris, close but not macro 
It seems to be sharper than the Samsung, but the colours appear a little washed out. I can change the default colour settings, so maybe that’s the solution.

All of today’s pictures were taken with the camera set on Auto.

Back at the mooring

Anyway, we pulled pins and set off, heading past Kings Bromley Marina and into Ravenshaw Wood.

One of the boats passing this morning, and old Springer towing an equally venerable “plastic” both piled high with odds and ends, had pulled up in the woods.
A passing C&RT patrol officer was taking an interest…

There was a boat ahead of us at Woodend Lock when we arrived, so we tied on the landing while waiting for our turn.

Woodend Lock 

The lock refilled, Mags tried to set off but there was no forward thrust and the engine wouldn’t rev. I hopped on  and managed to coax the boat into the lock, but had to pull her out onto the lower landing to investigate the propeller. Someone was missing a bedsheet, probably drying it on the back of the boat and it blew off into the cut, to be collected by our prop.

Secondhand bedlinen, anyone? Slightly soiled but well rinsed… 
Having shut down as soon as we realised we had a problem the sheet wasn’t inextricably combined with the prop and shaft, only needing a good pull to drag it out through the weed hatch (what a misnomer, I’ve only once pulled weed through there!) before we were on our way again.

Shade House and the following four locks were occupied by boats coming up, so we made good progress down the flight.

Leaving Shade House Lock

Lock 18, Middle Lock, was particularly quick to fill, with a damaged cill liner allowing copious amounts of water in at the top.

Where the gates meet the structure of the chamber, vertically up the lock wall and horizontally against the concrete or brick cill, wooden strips known as liners are fixed to make a seal. The lower one, on the cill, has become dislodged in this case. C&RT are aware, and are scheduling a stoppage to repair it. Difficult though, with this many boats about…

Junction Lock, just below the junction with the Coventry Canal.

The lowest of the Fradley Locks, Hunts.

Common Lock was our last for today, less than half a mile below Hunts

For the first time we saw no other boats here, so I had to refill the lock, open the gates, empty the lock and open and close the gates behind Mags all on my own! Shame!

We pulled in above Bagnall Lock, on the outskirts of Alrewas.

Moored outside of Alrewas.

It’s busy here too, we’re a bit closer to the road bridge than we’d like, but it’s only for the one night. Take-aways tonight, Mags is having fish and chips, I’ll patronise the Chinese.

The new camera must be pretty foolproof, Mags managed a picture of me without chopping any bits off!

Must trim that beard…

Locks 7, miles 4