Wigan

Finally after 18 days waiting at Adlington we cruised to near the top of the Wigan Lock Flight and moored up ready to tackle the 23 locks when they reopened the following day.

So few boats had passed this way recently that invasive Pennywort had thrived, covering the breadth of the channel in places. Will needed to be very careful because it could easily get caught in Rainboat's propeller, requiring us to stop, open the weed hatch and stick our hands down into the water to untangle it. He did well in this respect, building up momentum then putting the engine into neutral to gluide over the blockages. Unfortunately at one point the weed was so thick that the we ended up grounding ourselves on it and coming to a complete stop. No amount of hard reversing or acceleration would move us so Vicky took to the bow with a sickle and pole, cutting the mess of intertwined roots from the hull, then pushing them further away. Will had another pole at the stern. 20 minutes later we were knackered but free.

There were 15 boats moored ahead of us but when Will got chatting he discovered that not everyone was planning to descend right away, some preferring to wait a few days. Daisy, Paul, their dog Trixie and Chinchilla Tim were moored in front of us on Mallard. Will arranged for us to team up with them for tomorrow's challenge.Leggi altro