I had been really looking forward to this morning and the weather forecaster had kept saying that Sunday would be a nice day but I woke up wondering which Sunday he had meant! It was pouring down and really depressing. By about 11am we could see brighter sky coming in and slowly the rain stopped and it turned out into a beautiful afternoon J
We went through Appley Lock and Appley Bridge. Appley Lock is a deep lock of 12 feet and originally one of two ways down to the lower pound. To the right of the deep lock is a parallel channel with two locks with falls of around 6 feet each, but these are currently disused. The deep lock is the original and the two shallower locks were built during the first half of the 19th century, partly to conserve water and partly to speed up traffic, as the deep lock took a while to work through and probably led to boats queuing.
Next was Parbold which is really pretty. There is an old windmill overlooking what was a wharf though the sails are no longer in situ. The windmill was built in 1794, about 20 years after the canal was opened, but stopped being used as a windmill around 1850. We pulled over for lunch an
d I went visiting! I knew from Navvygator which I use in conjunction with Water Explorer that another boat whose blog I have been following was moored close by – in fact they were two boats in front. John and Fiona live on their narrowboat Epiphany and Fiona writes her blog which is much more than just a blog - it is full of really interesting boating information. I’ve been following the blog as John and Fiona have been up on the Lancaster Canal for 2 months. I knocked on the window and we had a long chat and it it is obvious that they are really enamoured with the Lancaster Canal. I am so pleased to have caught up with my third fellow blogger this year and my first fellow Navvygator J
We went through Appley Lock and Appley Bridge. Appley Lock is a deep lock of 12 feet and originally one of two ways down to the lower pound. To the right of the deep lock is a parallel channel with two locks with falls of around 6 feet each, but these are currently disused. The deep lock is the original and the two shallower locks were built during the first half of the 19th century, partly to conserve water and partly to speed up traffic, as the deep lock took a while to work through and probably led to boats queuing.Next was Parbold which is really pretty. There is an old windmill overlooking what was a wharf though the sails are no longer in situ. The windmill was built in 1794, about 20 years after the canal was opened, but stopped being used as a windmill around 1850. We pulled over for lunch an
d I went visiting! I knew from Navvygator which I use in conjunction with Water Explorer that another boat whose blog I have been following was moored close by – in fact they were two boats in front. John and Fiona live on their narrowboat Epiphany and Fiona writes her blog which is much more than just a blog - it is full of really interesting boating information. I’ve been following the blog as John and Fiona have been up on the Lancaster Canal for 2 months. I knocked on the window and we had a long chat and it it is obvious that they are really enamoured with the Lancaster Canal. I am so pleased to have caught up with my third fellow blogger this year and my first fellow Navvygator J
After we had had lunch we had to go and sample the ice cream at the local ice cream parlour – it was delicious. I had got some washing drying in the lovely sunshine so Richard decided to change the engine oil before we set off again.
It wasn’t far to Lathom Junction and the Lancaster Canal but we decided to continue on to Burscough though we didn’t really like it for mooring when we got there so went on out of the town and moored up for the night.
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