The rusty canal

We were confronted with possible evidence this morning that BW really do clear some of the rubbish and weeds from the canals, as we encountered two working boats. Having said that of course we’re not in a BW area at the moment, so maybe that’s why it’s the first time we’ve seen such activity?!

This morning’s weather was dreadful with a howling gale and driving rain - we even put the radiators on to keep cosy! We took our time leaving Astley Green for our next stop in Worsley, before heading into Manchester tomorrow.

Saw a boat for the Fox clan on the way

It was just a short three mile trip, but a pleasant one as the weather improved a little. As the canal approached Worsley the water became an orange colour, known as ‘ochre’ due to the seepage of iron hydroxide from the underground coal mines of the area.

The coal seams ran under the higher ground to the north. The Duke of Bridgewater's land agent, John Gilbert, saw that it was possible to connect the canal directly to the mines by way of an underground canal, which could be used to help with draining them, and also provide a source of water for the canal.

The underground canal was constructed from Worsley Delph, an old sandstone quarry near Worsley Brook. At one time a million tons of coal a year passed through here. Around 47 miles of underground canals were constructed, on four different levels, connected by a water powered inclined plane and lifts. Specially designed boats were used in the tunnels which were only four and a half feet wide with protruding ribbed sides, and so were given the nickname of 'starvationers'. These were loaded with coal at the coal face, hauled from level to level on the inclined plane, and eventually brought it out onto the canal: www.penninewaterways.co.uk/bridgewater/bri2.htm

The area known as 'The Delph', contains one of the openings to the mines, and also the quarry where the rocks were obtained to build the Bridgewater Canal - it’s a fascinating place.

However the conditions and pay for these men weren't too good, and a collier was quoted in a local newspaper in 1843, after the accidental death of one of his colleagues, as saying:

“Who would be a collier to be exposed hourly to death: to have his head split in two and his brains dashed out: all for four pence a day?”

 As we approached the main bridge in the town the water changed colour

The entrance to 'The Delph' at the top right of the picture - no longer navigable - and left to Leigh and Wigan

Worsley itself is just a small hamlet with a few random shops and a couple of pubs, but the homes in the area seem very affluent with a variety of top of the range cars apparent; BMW’s, Mercedes, Audi’s, Porsche, etc. We suspect it’s mostly populated by people who commute to Manchester, but don’t want to actually live in the city.

There are five information boards scattered around a circular walk which show the heritage of the area.  In the now very flash village green, there was a boat-building yard, nailmaker's, basketmaker's and wheelwright's workshops, timber yard, warehouses and railway siding craftsmen.  There's evidence remaining of the work carried out there.

 The oldest building in Worsley, originally the nailmaker's house

A walk through Worsley Woods revealed the first signs of Autumn, some of the leaves are starting to turn yellow

Continuing the lovely walk, which follows the stream for some way

 

 This culvert was coming out of the hillside; not sure if it's one of the old underground tunnels or just a drain

 The village 'Green' which was once covered with all sorts of industrial workings. You can just make out where the railway sleepers were by the patterns on the grass, and there's an old mooring pin at the left side

 

It's said that workers were persistently late returning from lunch, giving the excuse that they couldn't hear the clock strike one above the general noise coming from the yard. The Duke cleverly had the mechanism of the clock altered, so that it struck thirteen instead! This clock is now situated in St Marks Church and still rings thirteen times at 1 o'clock.  Hilarious!

Another story was that one man was late arriving at work and The Duke challenged him.  He told how his wife had unexpectedly given birth to twins during the night, and the worked said that instead of an abundance of money like the Duke, he had too many children!  The Duke gave him a guinea. 

Some of the lovely houses surrounding 'The Green', and the monument built to honour the Duke of Bridgewater

It was quite a busy canal with boats passing us in each direction, and we’re wondering if our luck of not encountering too much boat traffic may be about to run out. The Shropshire Union Canal is closed in parts due to a breach (commonly known as a leak where the sides have literally ‘burst!), so hire boaters have been transferred onto the Macclesfield Canal which is where we’re heading. Unfortunately at that point we’ll be back onto a narrow canal which could make it more of a challenge; we’ve been on rivers and broad canals for as long as I can remember now! There’s only a week or so left of the school holidays so we may be lucky; we shall see …

The orange/ochre colour is very obvious here

 Left: The oldest dry dock on the canal system, and still in use            Right: The granary building, now offices

 A boat for Tom

Worsley Packet House and 'Northern Pride' in this afternoon's rain ...

... and once more this evening - what a stunning setting!

Through the park alongside the canal, looking at the main street of Worsley

Birds, baroque buildings and big engines

Despite today’s heavy rain forecast, it was a beautiful sunny morning so we headed for Pennington Flash before it changed its mind! The area is basically a flooded coal mine with an abundance of wildlife, walks and play areas for the children. There are bird-watching Hides scattered all around, and in the Visitor Information Centre there’s a list of the variety of feathered friends that have been spotted at one time or another. We only saw a few: Heron, Magpie and Lapwing! The Lapwings were the ones we’d not seen previously, and were very impressive viewed from one of the Hides with some fellow bird-watchers.

 The teenage swans all hissing and grunting to get some bread

Sandra checking for any new species

 View across the 'Flash' which is used for a myriad of activities, including sailing

All sorts of birds seemingly getting on all right together

Of course there were also many ducks and swans around, and Barry got up close and personal with a few of them, teasing them into believing that he had food to share whilst allowing them to peck his fingers as is his want! He even stroked one brave swan’s feathers more than once without it hissing at him; I think he has a bit of a thing for young birds!

Barry being used as swan food

Look at the size of this swan foot, similar shape and texture to Barry's

Sandra following blindly in a trance, outside one of the Hides

   'A flock on a rock'

The beautifully coloured Lapwings

Next stop was a visit to Leigh as we’d read that there’s a fine Baroque Town Hall in the Market Place. The town centre was a little tired looking, lots of pubs for sale and derelict buildings, but the Town Hall was indeed an elegant building inside and out.

There we read a series of information boards telling the story of The Spinning Jenny, that was reportedly invented by Thomas Highs of Leigh and NOT James Hargreaves who Sir Richard Arkwright credited with it – Hargreaves improved on Highs’ design that he’d built years before, and it's said he is the true genius of the Industrial Revolution cottontimes.co.uk/hargreaveso.htm

 

 'The Boar's Head' an attractive pub in town

  

 Plenty of flowers scattered round the town centre

 Lovely baroque style stairway in the Town Hall

Information boards and tile painting of the original 'Spinning Jenny' on display

 The main shopping area in Leigh

  The taxi stand must have been designed around the time the 'Jetsons' were on TV

We didn’t prolong our visit to Leigh, and returned to the canal by lunchtime. The water there is so clear you can see the bottom in most places which was quite surreal – it’s probably best not to know what’s down there – we spotted a few bikes, a metal bowl, pushchairs and children’s plastic toys, traffic cones, the springs of a mattress, round wooden tables from the pub across the way and an array of indistinguishable metal objects! A positive aspect was that there were also plenty of small fish swimming around.

 

The 'stop plank crane' that marks the border between the 'Leeds & Liverpool' and 'Bridgewater' canals at Leigh

The Bridgewater Canal is not ‘owned’ by British Waterways but is run by The Manchester Ship Canal Company and boats with a BW license can use it for a limited period – Nicholson’s suggests only seven days but we haven’t noticed anyone restricting usage so far . The canal was built over 250 years ago and was the brainchild of Francis Egerton, the 3^rd Duke of Bridgewater, who’d seen a canal in France and been inspired by the concept (http://www.penninewaterways.co.uk/bridgewater/bri2.htm). It took a lot to persuade the powers that be of the merits of a canal, and swallowed a large chunk of his personal fortune, but he persevered and it revolutionised the transport system in the north of England (and he made all his money back and then some!). It was also the first canal that James Brindley worked on, a famous canal engineer whose statue we photographed in Coventry Basin.

One of the great things about this canal is that there are no locks. Unfortunately however, we’re only staying on it as far as Manchester where we’ll encounter more than enough to make up for the break!

 Leaving Leigh - plenty of disused or partly used old buildings around here that haven't been turned into apartments yet!

 Quite majestic really!

Lovely new housing along this stretch

 'Leigh Spinners', the sign across the front of this mill says

    Looking back towards Leigh and one of the Mills

 A little boat for Monique complete with a set of creatures 

Nice to be back with bridges you don't have to swing or lift

 The aerials we saw way back when? Still in view now

 Amazing peacock just meandering along the side of the canal as we passed

We moored for lunch at Astley Green so that Barry could visit the Pit Museum there. I tried to get out of it, but after he’d left the boat he called to say he’d left his memory card in the laptop so I had to take it to him and have bit of a look around (as it was free!). Unsurprisingly I was the only female around, apart from the models of the women who were unfortunate enough to have worked in the mines. We think we have life hard today, but boy the women and children of those times must’ve worked so hard as well as the men. One woman’s narrative told of how she’d worked up until the day one of her children; in fact she gave birth in the pit and brought the baby up with her wrapped in her skirt! Luckily she wasn't wearing the handed down male trousers on that day, or it would’ve been a different story! Another told of how she’d given birth to eight children but only four of them were born alive. The children worked in the mines from the age of five or six; it’s inconceivable today isn’t it? Barry will regale you now with tales of big engines …

The main entrance to the colliery which must have been a dreaded sight each morning to the workers

 The 'Pit Head'

 The ginormous (yes it IS a word, we've checked!) 3300HP Yates & Thom steam winder built in 1912, the largest in Europe, that drove the winch to bring the coal to the surface

 

Apparently they were able to bring the coal up 800ft in two minutes 

 Both engines would be able to run if they could get enough steam or compressed air to fill their vast cylinders

Prior to mechanisation, horses, women and children were used to haul huge loads along the tunnels and to the surface. The horses spent their entire working life underground in virtual darkness, never seeing daylight.

It was an interesting little museum with machinery in various states of renovation and free entry, though only open at limited times. agcm.org.uk/museum.shtml

The pub up the road was advertising a quiz night this evening, so we thought we’d stay put. As we approach Manchester we’re aware that we’ll be back in a large city, so want to make the most of the remaining countryside and not rush our journey. We’ve also heard on the radio today that there’s been some gang related problems in Manchester, which is a tad disconcerting!

 Jim & Chris from Ivybridge, Devon (though we have to point out that Jim is originally from Truro in Cornwall!) in the hire boat moored opposite us, joined us for the quiz night

The quiz night was fun and it was a great little pub (Ross's Arms).  Following the quiz there was a game of 'bingo' played unusually with six playing cards, and I won the second game and got 20 quid!  Yaay!  That paid for our night out.  A local trio also had their practice session later on, and sang some tantalising harmonies; they even managed a chorus of 'There'll be bluebells over, the White Cliffs of Dover' on request from Jim!

Narrowboats and Fishermen

Firstly, grateful thanks to John (johngarghanphotos.blogspot.com) for emailing us with information on an improved method of posting and editing our blog which also enables viewers to click onto links without losing your place (windowslivewriterspaces.live.com).  We’ve tried it out on Sunday’s and today’s blog and it's much quicker to post and the links seem to work!  And Barry is also happy that the photos are a better quality on the screen - I’m sure you’ll agree …

Our aim today was to leave Wigan and get to the junction of the Leeds/Liverpool and Bridgewater canal, only about seven miles away. There were three locks to do (alone again!), but nothing too strenuous. At the third lock some passing cyclists stopped for a look and we got chatting. Ian had been brought up in Wigan and fondly recalled how, as a boy, he’d travelled the canals with friends on their bikes hitching long rides on strangers narrowboats. Not like the few yards we’ve been taking the odd child on! Ian is now living in California and had brought his American wife back to see his hometown. We showed them around the boat, and the map of where we’ve travelled on the canals and rivers of Britain since mid April. Unfortunately Barry missed getting a photo of them, but they did get the obligatory blog card …

If only happy English wrote graffiti, there wouldn’t be so much of it!  Or maybe this was one of the seven dwarves passing by?

The landscape changes just outside of Wigan, with the canal sitting above the rest of the countryside due to severe mining subsidence in the area. The canals have been built up using pit waste and seem solid enough, but it was a little disconcerting to imagine coal mines beneath us that could potentially give way at any time!

As we approached Plank Lane Swing Bridge (which is actually a lift bridge with an inaccurate name!), I drove rather too close to a fisherman who shook his head scathingly. Now I’m usually very courteous to fishermen, despite the fact that they choose some very random and hard to see spots, and know I'm supposed to move to the other side of the canal and slow down, but this man and his mates were right next to the mooring pins for the lift bridge that I needed to drop Barry off at, so to have to move over and then negotiate back in seemed to me too ridiculous (and I may not have made it!). There really needs to be a bit more reciprocity in these fisherman/narrowboat scenarios, and I personally believe they should respect our challenge of steering a heavy boat into moorings and not fish in stupid places!! Barry was on the fisherman’s side (being the expert driver who would’ve found it no problem to steer around and back again!), so I was a little miffed with him to say the least …

After all that palaver, the lift bridge was manned by BW (and if we'd been paying attention to the Nicholson's Guide we'd have been aware of that!), and we stopped immediately before it for a pump out and water pump in. The facilities were right in the entrance to the bridge, so if there was another boat waiting they’d have to sit there while you get rid of your s--t!  Yet again a bizarrely situated but invaluable nonetheless, pump-out station!

 Through the swing/lift bridge over a very busy road …

… and out the other side swiftly

Shortly afterwards we drove past Pennington Flash Country Park, a 200 hectare area that we’ll probably go and visit tomorrow, if the weather is kind to us!

Pennington Flash, one of the ‘flashes’, or lakes formed from the flooded coal mines

A mile or so later and we moored up for the night at the mill town of Leigh, on the changeover of the two canals (though the only sign of the difference is a ‘plank crane’ at the side of the canal; not your normal junction!), and visited the ALDI supermarket right on the side of the canal. I have to say I was impressed with their range of food, maybe these ‘cheap’ foreign supermarkets are improving.  I find it fascinating to go round them and see what delights they have from Europe that you wouldn’t normally find in Tesco’s or Sainsbury’s (or maybe I just don't look hard enough?). Today I found some Bratwurst sausages from Germany, and a zywiecka pepper sausage from Poland, amongst other things! They say variety is the spice of life …

 'The Waterside Inn' opposite our mooring

Geese against the railings of the pub