Parked at Marbury

We’d estimated around 3 hours for the trip to Anderton/Marbury park, so got away at half seven this morning along another very familiar stretch of canal. It was looking particularly good today in the cool first thing sunshine, I must say.

It was Sheila’s turn to steer so I spent some time doing boatkeeping type jobs ranging from the breakfast washing up through starting a wash load to grilling some wild boar sausages to have cold with salad tonight.

Much of the run from Bramble Cutting to Marbury is rural, with just the occasional intrusion of industry to remind you why the canal got built in the first place. Wincham Wharf was looking very quiet but there's a lot of activity around the Lion Salt Works these days where it’s being renovated, hopefully.

There’s also the usual flotilla of lurkers hanging around there; CRT have made some Long Term moorings for some of them, but others still seem stubbornly to hang around on the open moorings.

We had a fast run and by ten had found a good mooring spot in Marbury Park; we had a stroll through the woodland area this afternoon. Sheila regretted not taking her binoculars; we hadn’t realised what good bird watching terrain this is, especially on Neumann’s Flash.

After a interesting walk in increasing heat we finished up at the Lift where we bought and ate some restorative ice cream before ambling back along the towpath, giving that old stager Sanity a wave as we went by; Ian Stockton, the nice guy we sold her to, is in Bahrain this week, so we won’t be able to catch up with him.

Never mind, maybe when we come back…

We’ll have another quiet night here, hopefully and potter on to somewhere beyond Barnton and Saltisford Tunnels tomorrow.