Day 16 Monday 6 October
Church Minshull to Hack Green
Today has been the first day that I've had to wear my waterproof trousers & groovy hat! I'm not at all keen on the waterproofs look & had been hoping I would be able to avoid it. Before you ask....no, there are no photographs!
We set off around 09:30 from our rural mooring at Church Minshull on the Middlewich Branch in heavy rain & shortly afterwards reached the 11' deep Minshull Lock, followed by the 11'3" Cholmondeston Lock both of which were in our favour. With the poor weather this morning we didn't see any other moving boats on this stretch of water at all.
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| Barbridge Junction SUC |
By the time we reached Barbridge Junction the rain had eased & we passed another boat just before going under the bridge at the end of the Middlewich Branch onto the Shropshire Union Canal (SUC). The Canal & River Trust describe the Shropshire Union Canal as being a charmingly rural and isolated waterway for much of its length. With stretches where there are no towns for miles, it is a great place to get close to nature.
We joined the SUC just before bridge 100 & are heading to bridge 1 where the SUC joins the Staffordshire & Worcestershire Canal at Autherley Junction
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| Bridge 100 SUC |
Just before Bridge 97 we reached the familiar site of Hurleston Junction which is where the Llangollen Canal meets the SUC. Our very first Eos trip back in 2012 took us up the SUC canal & onto the Llangollen Canal to Wrenbury so this brought back memories of that trip.
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| Hurleston Locks, Llangollen Canal |
The Llangollen Canal rises sharply up the 4 deep Hurleston Locks but we continued on the flat along the SUC heading towards Nantwich where the canal crosses a road on an aqueduct
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| Nantwich |
As we came into Nantwich we passed this new horse sculpture which was made by artists from recycled lock gates to commemorate The Battle of Nantwich in the English Civil War which was fought in fields on the town side of the canal.
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| Nantwich Horse Scupture |
Once through the town of Nantwich we were once again out in the countryside & heading for Hack Green where the canal goes up through the 2 Hack Green Locks, there is another former stables from the working horses here also. Just before the next bridge we saw a sign towards the Secret Bunker so we moored & after showering we went off to investigate
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| Not sure if I should be telling you this! |
The Hack Green secret nuclear bunker was declassified in 1993 & now holds a collection of memorabilia from the Cold War.
As we went round, I realised they have an interesting collection on mannequins too!
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| It appears a Nuclear blast can also give you a severe perm. |
Once we'd finished at the Bunker we debated for a few seconds on whether we should continue on our journey while the weather was good or overnight at Hack Green
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| Eos on the SUC south of Hack Green Locks |
With such a beautiful spot we decided to stay put!
Today we travelled for 4.5 hours on 2 different canals through 4 locks
Today's Wildlife Pics
Today we've seen at least 13 Kingfishers, one of which caught a fish from the canal which we saw it eat! I managed to get a few pictures which I hope you'll enjoy
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| Kingfisher holding the fish we had just seen it catch |
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