Change of Plans - nothing unusual there.

Sunday 11th January 2015

In what is becoming the norm rather than not, we seem to have made a dramatic change to our cruising plans for this year.

Our main plan is to cruise up into Manchester and then head up the Rochedale Canal and along the Aire and Calder Navigation and head up to York and Rippon. Returning from there we will be heading down towards, in order, Sheffield, Chesterfield and then to Lincoln and Boston.
This is where we have our deviation - we were going to then cruise to Nottingham and onward down the Leicester branch to the Grand Union (main line) and head south.
Now we are probably going to do The Wash from Boston.

When we were chatting to Howard on Friday, it became apparent that we would most likely be in Boston about the time he would be there about to cross the Wash, so it got us thinking and we are almost certain we will go that way and then work our way across to Northampton.

We will keep in contact with Howard to finalise this part of the plans - there are still a few things to be sorted out, but we are keen to do it.

With that stated, today's weather predictions indicated that the morning looked better than the afternoon - as we only had 4 miles to go we thought it best to get that done.

From Congleton to the bottom of the Bosley Locks with a waterpoint stop at Bridge 68 was just a 2 hour trip with nothing of much interest along the way.

whilst time was not an issue, this guy decided that tick-over all
of the way was what he would do - later we passed him heading
back after winding

CRT have been doing a great job reducing the off-side scrub

Love the bridges on the Macc

Who said winter cruising wasn't nice -just less leaves

well some of it isn't nice - but only if you are walking -
muddy towpaths

oooohh - cow sitting down - a sure sign of impending rain

The omnipresent "Cloud" - always around in these parts

The railway viaduct

Phone and TV signal won't be a problem

The sky and  cloud  confirm the cow story

...and the "Cloud" is hanging above us

What was more important was the need to clean up a bit of diesel that we had spilled in our front fuel locker - not much but it was finding it's way into the canal - we really hadn't known it was even there until the tell-tale signs showed on the surface of the water.

So everything out and the diesel soaked up using "puppy nappies" and a good wash down with soapy water - all sorted.

We noted from the blog by Tom on nb Waiouru that he had some tar leakage from his chimney - we also have a Reflecs and checked the chimney - there was a bit of tar inside, but it was easily removed with a stainless steel cleaner that we already had on board - almost as clean inside as it is outside - Thanks Tom for the information.

We cruised along the Macc 2 years ago in March -compare the following 2 photographs.

March 2013 - snow in the background; blanket
to keep Diane warmer

January 2015 - no snow; no blanket; same hat; even a bit of sun

We will be heading up the lock flight tomorrow (Monday) once our lockies arrive in the morning - Paul and Elaine will be setting the alarm for a time in the morning which I am sure only exists in their worst dreams and have volunteered to help us up the locks - and of course we get to catch up with both of them as well as we head towards Bollington to spend a lot more time with them.

4 miles
YTD: 27 Miles, 13 Locks, 1 Tunnel
Totals: 2921 Miles, 2134 Locks, 99 Tunnels, 34 Lift Bridges, 151 Swing Bridges