Straight through Stoke

Boating through Stoke is a bit of a curate's egg; parts are classic heritage type canal, with the remains of the old potteries giving a very clear idea of the original purpose, and parts are recovering, post-industrial land, like the stretch through the site of Shelton Steelworks, but parts are just urban grot, nothing like as bad as the worst of the BCN (Garrison Locks, for example) but still pretty discouraging. On the other hand, the water is pretty deep and wide for most of it, and Sanity Again did a steady 3.8 mph for much of the morning.

For once in Stoke, the weather was pleasant; cool, admittedly, but dry and sunny for some of the time. I needed the coolth to keep me awake, it not having been the most undisturbed of nights. At around two, I was rudely awoken by a condensation drip from the Houdini above the bed going straight into my left armpit, and it took a little while to get off again.

Then at four, a burglar alarm went off somewhere in the housing estate over the canal, and  it was again a while before slumber returned. Indeed, as so often after being woken after you've had the essential first five hours, I never really slept deeply again. That said, Westport Lake continues to be a handy stop between Harecastle and the Wedgwood moorings; we'd still recommend them.

We got away just after half seven, and took just an hour to get to Etruria and the top of the Stoke Locks. Another hour's work (mostly by Sheila) saw us down them; some of the top gates leak quite badly, and number two in particular managed to cascade not just onto the stern deck, but over the closed back doors, soaking my legs and the floor of the engine 'ole.

A boat coming up warned us that Barlaston was having a mini music festival this afternoon, with live acts performing from a trailer in the Plume of Feathers car park, so we stopped at Wedgwood a bit after eleven, having taken almost exactly three and a half hours from Westport.

We walked into the village to shop, then returned to the boat to eat toasted bacon sandwiches for lunch.

We've had a quiet afternoon; Ice Breaker passed by while we were eating so Martin is now ahead of us. I just hope that he either went on beyond Barlaston, or else likes quite loud sixties and seventies music; we didn't get a chance to warn him.