Meeting people

Last evening we had dinner on board “Eleventh Heaven” with Chris and Les,  celebrating both their wedding anniversary and Chris’s birthday.

We’ve had to give this photo the ‘star’ treatment – James, Chris, Les and Doug starting the evening with a glass of champagne.

Today we set off from Sandbach and made our way along the canal side by side with the busy A533.

Getting closer to Middlewich we approached the massive  factory belonging to British Salt.  Not such a surprise as these parts are historically famous for salt production.

The massive pile of salt outside the building was dwarfed by the heap we could see inside!

With the road still just as close but now on our left, King’s Lock is the first of the deep Middlewich locks.  The locks through Middlewich are usually very slow and tedious to pass through but ……..

….. not so today! – we sailed down through the locks with very few boats around.  We met nb “Four Bells” coming in the opposite direction (haven’t seen them for two years) and then blog follower Andy on nb “Diligence” introduced himself and we shared both conversation and Big Lock with him.

Having got out of Big Lock we were immediately confronted by two people madly waving at us.  A brilliant surprise (as we didn’t know they were around) it was Emma and Nick on nb “Marpessa 2”.  We’ve had some great fun in the past with you guys (great to see you again if only for a few seconds) ……..

………and we’ll look forward to catching up later in the year with you both. 

Excited by the rush of seeing and meeting with so many people in such a sort time, nature calmed us down when we saw this lovely old jack heron, who was quite willing to stand his ground as passed by.

Leaving Middlewich and, following the valley of the River Dane for a few miles, we headed for “the flashes” and our mooring for the night.  Created by subsidence due to all the underground salt mining, these large areas of reed-fringed water provide just what the doctor ordered at the end of a days journey.  Someone here is taking full advantage!

Twenty minutes later Chris and Les on “Eleventh Heaven” arrived and moored with us.  From the rise in the adjacent field we get a great appreciation of how lovely it can be to just settle down ‘in the middle of nowhere’  for the night.