Telegraph poles and a beached boat

Shelmore embankment

The Boat Inn

It was drizzling when Lottie insisted the Captain took her out. The rain was virtually stopped when he set off and over the next hour the deck dried out. although boats passed us regularly we never saw any ahead or following us. As soon as I took the tiller after the single lock it started to rain harder.

 

High Bridge with its telegraph pole

Before long I was steering down the mile long deep cutting carved through hard rock which was very narrow. Every now and then there was a widening long enough for two boats to pass. Towards the end of the narrow stretch the canal went round a long corner, where I met a boat. Fortunately my boat was short enough to slide into a short widening and the other boat passed easily. Then I passed through the high arched bridge and the canal widened out again.

useful duck perch

high and dry

We moored for lunch at Gnoshall visitor moorings. By the time we left the skies had cleared so the afternoon cruise was bathed in sunshine. However High bridge remained mostly in the shade as it is in a deep cutting. this bridge is famous for its masonry strut built across its high arch built to support a telegraph pole.

 

Most boats were moored which meant slow progress as we passed miles of them on tick-over speed.

 



Old working barge...

The sights of the later part of our journey included a narrowboat high and dry in a field and old working boats moored under the large overhanging roof of an old loading bay.

 

...under loading bay roof

When we moored for the night at a visitor mooring the Captain was flummoxed by the Shroppie shelf. This canal has a protruding shelf below the water line which just catches the chime on the boat’s bottom. The result is an annoying bump, bump, bump whenever a boat passed or one of the crew moved. The Captain tried everything he could to stop the banging but even his old front and back fenders were not fat enough to stop the problem. Eventually he pulled the ropes as tight as he could and hoped we didn’t get the bottom stuck on the shelf.