An early and somewhat dodgy start as we were aground, it took Toby’s steering and my brute force to push us off!  I had great fun stopping the traffic at the road bridge which included a great big lorry and many a car, you forget that these folk are in a rush and on their way to work as we gently meander along the canal.

Excellent progress on to ‘The Shroppie’ and then an abrupt stop at Tilstone Lock and a queue of 5 boats.  CRT had closed the lock for a ten minute job and a broken paddle, it was some two hours before we managed to get through and on our way.

My highlight was meeting a boat called Yorkshire Pudding, apparently the owner was from Crewe!

We decided to go for it and have a longer day on the way to Christleton on the promise of a lie in the following morning.