We've had two days of early starts on cracking mornings, with bright sun melting a hard overnight frost. Yesterday we were away just after eight and worked down Cholmondeston, Church Minshull and Stanthorne Locks, with some very pleasant boating in between them. In fact, it was the best cruising of the Middlewich Branch we've done for a while.
There was a time when we always seemed to be boating it in pouring rain, on one occasion so fierce that my (admittedly substantial) eyebrows filled up with water and drizzled down the inside of my specs, making it hard to see where I was going.
We got to Middlewich by around 11, and stopped on the visitor moorings before Wardle Lock to go shopping. The local Somerfield is one of those which the Co-op is having to sell off as part of its takeover, in this case being bought by Tesco, we understand. Due to shut at the end of the month for the refurbishment and rebranding, it already has closing down sale signs all over it, and about half the shelves were empty.
It was a strange experience going round the place, though we managed to pick up some decent bargains as a result.
Back at the boat, we ate lunch before setting off again, descending Wardle Lock and turning left on the Trent and Mersey. At the top of the three narrow locks, we caught up with two Empress boats, one towing the other, with which we'd been leapfrogging for a couple of days. It seems that one has a defunct engine, and was being taken to Wincham Wharf to be sold on brokerage.
There were couple of BW office types about, one of whom actually had a windlass and helped these boats and ourselves work down whilst continuing his conversation with his colleague and two other folk. It sounded as if they were discussing plans for the Towpath Tidy Week later this month.
Clear of the locks, we stopped on the Town Wharf to fill the water tank. The towpath beyond is being refurbished with crushed stone between retaining strips, but topped with tamped sand as the wearing course. I find it hard to believe that plain builders sand will last long as the top surface of a well used urban towpath, but there you go.
As we approached the Big Lock, we saw Braidbar 51, Cedar, tied on the towpath. As Sheila has been waiting for an address to send them some porthole doilies, we were able to deliver them on the spot: very handy.
Big Lock was the usual struggle, as the bottom gates are still leaking very badly. Shortly after, we stopped yet again, this time at the Council Tip at Croxton, where I was able to get rid of the used oil from the last change, the defunct Dyson vacuum cleaner and some more usual recycling.
We'd planned to overnight just the other side of the aqueduct, but there was no room, so we went on to Bramble Cuttings, another favourite mooring.
We finally finished at ten to four, a seriously long day by our standards, but great boating.
This morning was another start of the same order, with even harder frost and brighter sun. We'd only been going about half an hour, when the engine announced it was feeling unwell, coughing and spluttering, the revs surging up and down in the classic signs of fuel starvation.
I was steering and coasted into the side. Sheila then stood making a noise like a bollard whilst holding the centre line whilst I went through the drill for fuel supply fault finding:
- Fuel in tank: check
- Tank breather clear: check.
- Lift the engine boards
- Drain some fuel from the bottom of the agglomerator: clean and fast flowing
- Loosen the bleed screw on top of the filter and pump the button: clean, air free fuel.
Right, it's the filter, which must be blocked or perhaps collapsed
I changed the filter (what a good idea it is to carry a spare) and the air filter at the same time. The engine restarted at once, and ran at all revs without a splutter.
Half an hour later we were on our way again. I spent the rest of the morning listening to the engine noise with a paranoid ear, needless to say, but it was fine. This afternoon, I checked my service log, and found that the filter had been in place for just over 2000 hours, which I guess is trying it on a bit, even if we did get well over 3000 hours out of the first one.
Broken Cross and Wincham Wharf were passed without trouble, and we soon came to the Salt Barge at Marston. The collection of BW defying boats tied beyond the official long term moorings now extends for more than half a mile, the result of BW not being able effectively to deal with this kind of defiance.
Ivor had told us the other night that one of the boaters there is taking his case to the European Court, arguing that BW is breaching his human rights by expecting him to pay for a mooring permit when he chooses not to comply with the continuous cruising guidelines.
All of this, of course, costs BW money that would otherwise be available to maintain the system.
We passed through Anderton just before lunch time, and stopped in the bosky bit of widened cut between there and Barnton Pool. There's a footbridge over the cut here, across which we went after lunch. It takes you to a steep climb up the hill to the top of Barnton Village, coming out just by the Co-op.
We stocked up on some more of the excellent Fairtrade Argentine Malbec they are selling at 20% off at the moment, then walked down through the streets to Hormbreys the Butchers. Here we bought some chicken fillets to use on Monday when entertaining the Masons.
Having got back to the boat with this lot, Sheila did some of her online proofreading whilst I rechecked the work I'd done in the engine 'ole in the morning. When I've done an emergency repair like that, I find it pays to go back over it after the event, in calmer mood, checking that everything was properly finished off and tightened up.
In this case all was well. I drained a bit more fuel out of the agglomerator, being paranoid about diesel bug, but it's definitely looking clean.
Tomorrow we'll do the three tunnels in one day, Barnton, Saltersford and Preston Brook, aiming to stop at Moore on the Bridgewater for the night.
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