It feels like summer.

Liz had to work on Saturday morning, so we didn't leave home until 1.50pm. We left the marina at 2.30pm and headed for Dunham. It was hazy, but very warm. It's a lovely time of year. The hedgerows are full of blossom - mainly hawthorn, but also some horse chestnuts. The rhododendrons have huge buds on them, they will be in flower soon. There was also an abundance of flowers along the banks. So many different colours. We must get a decent book of wild flowers so we can identify them all. The cottage gardens were full of cherry blossom, wisteria and lilac. We saw swallows and wagtails, there were several large broods of ducklings and we heard our first cuckoo of the year. We moored in one of our favourite spots - overlooking the old corn mill, which has now been converted into apartments. It was such a beautiful evening we sat out on the towpath until quarter to ten. We watched mist creep across the fields.

Another hot day on Sunday. Although there was a bit of a haze, the sun was already warm at 8.00am. We heard the cuckoo again this morning and then looking across the field through the binoculars, there it was sitting in a tree. I've never seen a cuckoo before! We spent the morning cleaning brass. There's something very satisfying about cleaning brass in the sunshine. The towpath was busy with walkers and cyclists. We turned round and set off back to the marina after lunch. There were lots of boats moving today. Everyone enjoying the first decent weekend of the year. Here's hoping for many more!

First Cruise of 2008

We've finally escaped! No work, no worries, no responsibilities for five whole days.

Wednesday 27 Feb.

The sun is playing hide and seek with the fluffy white clouds. There is plenty of blue sky. It's not too cold, reasonably warm when the sun comes out, but cooler when the wind blows. We set off from the marina just before 10.00am and headed for Preston Brook Tunnel. You can only go through the tunnel on the half hour from this direction, so we had a short wait. We followed Dragonfly, an Elton Moss boat, through the tunnel and we were through Dutton Stop Lock just after 11.00am.

This time of year, without the leaves on the trees, you see so much more than you do during the summer. There are some spectacular views over the River Weaver. Even though the trees have no leaves, there is still plenty of greenery - many of the trees are covered in ivy. There is also plenty of gorse in flower along the banks.

When we passed through Anderton, we were amazed to see the moorings practically empty. We have never seen so many spaces here before. We filled up with water here and then moved down to the country park, where we moored up for lunch.

We carried on until we got to Billinge Green Flash, where we moored for the night. This is a beautiful place to moor. Very peaceful, with plenty of wildlife. We saw swans, grebe, coots, moorhens, geese and mallard on the flash. Unfortunately, planning permission has been given for a new marina to be built at the next flash, so this part of the canal will probably get a lot busier.

Thursday 28 Feb.

It's Carl's birthday today.

Suzy always makes brilliant birthday cards and here is the one she made this year.

It was slightly frosty this morning, but it was lovely and warm on the boat as the fire stayed in all night. We set off at ten to nine, but didn't get very far! At 9.25, the engine died, just past bridge 178. We glided into the bank and checked the diesel - we hadn't filled up since May. We still had several inches left in the tank so that wasn't the problem. We have a small fuel filter that regularly clogs up. We waited for the engine to cool down and checked the filter - sure enough it was clogged again. We were surprised as we only changed it in September and have hardly cruised since. Anyway, Carl changed the filter and we were on our way again. A very nice man from the narrowboat Phoenix from Sale stopped to see if we were OK, he offered us some diesel if we needed it. Another example of how boaters will usually try to help each other if they can.

We stopped of at Kings Lock Chandlery to fill up with diesel - it took 198 litres! Diesel is now 64p per litre. It was only 48p in May. It will go up a lot more in November, when boaters are no longer able to use red diesel. We bought two more fuel filters as we seem to be getting through them so often.

We treated ourselves to fish and chips for lunch from the Chippy on Booths Lane, by Kings Lock. We carried on to Wheelock, went through the first lock, turned round, came back down and moored for the night.

Friday 29 Feb

It's dull and cloudy this morning. The fire stayed in again all night, so it was toasty on board.

Just as we were setting off, there was a lot of police activity in the area. Several police cars and an ambulance came along the main road into Wheelock. The next thing we know, there is a policeman walking along the towpath. He was looking for an Indian gentleman in a suit, but we had not seen anyone fitting that description, so we couldn't help.

We met a few more boats moving today. We actually had to wait at some of the locks. It's cold, wet and windy, so when we got back to the flashes, we decided to call it a day, even though it was only 1.30.

Saturday 1 March

There were very strong winds and heavy rain all night. Carl had to get up and move things off the roof as they were blowing across the roof and keeping us awake. He has to rescue one of the mops, which had blown into the canal. We didn't get much sleep last night. Every time we nodded of, the wind woke us up again.

There are still plenty of grey clouds around, but the rain seems to have stopped for now. It's still cold and very windy. Most of the waterfowl have stayed in bed this morning, with only the coots coming to visit.

We arrived at Anderton at 11.00am. There is some sunshine and blue sky, but it's still windy and cold. We met our friends, Anne and Ray, in the Stanley Arms for lunch. They have a boat, Jennyanydots, which they moor at Uplands marina. We had a lovely lunch and then went back to their boat for coffee. We hadn't seen them for ages and it was good to catch up with all the news.

Sunday 2 March

Another very windy night. Not a lot of sleep yet again. Even though there was not much on the roof, the wind still woke us up regularly during the night, howling and rattling the plank and poles.

The sun has come out today, but it is still windy and cold. The wind was against us all the way home.

We moored for a couple of hours just past bridge 211. We were through Preston Brook tunnel on the 2.00pm passage and moored up back in the marina by 2.35pm. Oh well, back to reality.

Getting ready to cruise

At last. We are actually going for a cruise, starting tomorrow. The first one since last November. We are only out for five days and don't intend to go far. We will head for Middlewich and when we get there we will decide whether to head towards Barbridge or Wheelock.

We have been shopping and bought loads of food, beer and wine. Just got to pack some clothes and we will be ready to set of bright and early in the morning. The BBC 5 day weather page shows reasonable weather at least until Friday.

Going to Suzy's for tea tonight, celebrating Carl's 61st birthday, which is on Thursday.

Geocaching

We spent yesterday Geocaching with Suzy (daughter), Bethany and Ben (grandchildren). For those who don't know what this is, it's like a treasure hunt. People hide the caches - quite often in plastic sandwich boxes - and then enter either the co-ordinates or a clue for you to work out
the co-ordinates on the website http://www.geocaching.com/ . You then use a GPS to find the cache. Caches contain a log for you to sign when you find it and some bits and pieces (treasure). You are allowed to remove an item from the box and replace it with another item that you brought with you. Some items can be kept, others must be moved to another cache to help them travel. Such as this coin that we found in a cache near the airport. It had been put in the cache by someone from Germany!



We searched for five caches. Three near the airport, one at Carrington Moss, between the training camps for Man City & Man United, and one in Broadheath, near Altrincham. We found three of them. We could not find one of the ones near the airport. It turned out to be extremely small, so we probably overlooked it. We did not find the one in Broadheath because there is a riddle to solve and we couldn't solve it. We will have to work on it. (Photos taken by Suzy - hope you don't mind me nicking them Suz!).

The adults enjoyed the day more than the children. They were OK with the first one, but soon got fed up with walking in the cold, rain and mud.

When we got home we searched the geocaching site for caches near canals. There are loads, so we may get ourselves a GPS and do some geocaching when we go cruising.

New Start

The last nine months have been sad for us. First Carl's Mum went into hospital with pneumonia and died. Then the day after Carls' mum's funeral, Liz's mum was taken into hospital. She died eight weeks later. We have hardly been out since May. We missed our three week cruise in September because Liz's mum died on the first day of the cruise so we had to go to Kent for the funeral and to help sort out Liz's dad, who is 85 and cannot really live on his own any more.

As this blog was originally set up specifically for Liz's mum, so that she could follow us whenever we were out cruising, we have not felt like adding to it.

However, Mum would have wanted us to continue with it, so here we are again.

We have not taken Blackstone out yet this year. The one free weekend we had that coincided with dry sunny weather, the canal was frozen solid! Still we went to the marina, lit the fire and ran the engine. Everything is still working OK.

It is Carl's birthday on 28 February. Liz has taken some time of work and we are hoping to cruise for five whole days. Fingers crossed that nothing happens to stop us. We need a bit of a cruise to get lots of hot water to spring clean the boat. It's surprising how mucky it gets over winter when it's not being used.

Wonderful memories

The holiday is over, but the memories will linger on. We had such a wonderful time. Plenty of sunshine, good food and laughter. We will have to investigate better ways to connect to the Internet while we are on the boat. There were too many days without a signal and even when we did have a signal trying to connect was very frustrating when it took 10 minutes to log into the blog and then the mobile phone disconnected and we had to try again. Anyway, here are a few of our memories.

Day 13 Tuesday 29 May 2007

Last day today. It rained all night again and the rain carried on all morning. We came back through Preston Brook Tunnel at 11.00 and when we got out the other side, the sun was shining! Back in the marina, filled up with water and moored by 12.00. The sky was blue with fluffy white clouds and the sun was out. A bit different from the last couple of days.