chirk golf club

Another later start this morning, we were ready to cast off around 10:30 but a sudden rush of traffic meant we were delayed a little from moving off. This was not a problem as we had made sure we had plenty of time to cover the remaining distance on our last full day. Andrew spent quite a while driving at tick-over to build a gap to the boat in front.

After the junction for the Montgomery Canal we paused for lunch to give us energy for the two remaining locks a little further on. After lunch we dealt with these locks like a well oiled machine. We targeted Chirk Bank for our final mooring but a combination of road noise, pubs and other boats meant we pressed on. So we crossed Chirk Aqueduct back into Wales, Andrew on the boat and Sarah on foot, and then bumped and scraped the 459 yards through Chirk Tunnel (with Sarah back on board). There is a 2mph flow on the Llangollen Canal; when travelling through constrictions such as bridges, aqueducts and tunnels this flow slows the boat considerably and makes steering very difficult.

Our next choice of mooring was full and the next one was right next door to a large timber factory, very noisy. Thankfully we found a mooring right outside the marina where we need to return our boat tomorrow morning. At least we don’t have to worry about getting the boat back on time.

Vegetable update: Today we spotted quite a lot of lettuce leaves floating down the canal, accompanied by a couple of leek leaves. Sarah is a little disappointed not to have seen any carrots!Read more