A brief visit to Manchester then onward we go.

Very late on Thursday we collected our friend Manel off his flight from Fuerteventura at East Midlands airport.

Taking advantage of having the car at the moment we had a day out in Manchester on Friday. It’s difficult to know where to call home these days as, like London the other day, it seems we’ve never been away.  Knowing where to park for £5 / day has it’s benefits and we were soon having coffee / beer in The Wharf at Castlefield.

As Manel hadn’t been to Manchester before we did a walkabout to see the sights ……..

………. then lunch in Tiger Tiger followed by a bit of shopping (and a quick pop into Whitewall Galleries where we were treated to a glass of Champagne and then sent away with another two bottles!) and then on with a bit more sightseeing ………

…….. including the magnificent Town Hall.

James just can’t resist drooling over a bit of first class design combined with first class engineering.

In the evening it was into Canal Street ……….

…. where we introduced Manel to the famous ‘Via’ with it’s distinctive and stylish interior adorned by woodwork and artefacts …….

……… reclaimed from an Irish church dating back to 1830.  (Yes this is a pub!)

Later in the evening we met up with friend Lewis “Nb One thing after another”  - James drew the short straw and had to drive back to the boat but, as can be seen, the others had a really good time!

Today we left MGM’ Boats for our journey through Leicester and beyond. Here we are entering Belgrave Lock with the National Space Centre looming above the trees.

Some of Leicester’s bridges spanning the river are very splendid.

Manel worked extremely hard on the 17 locks on today’s journey but here he is sitting down on the job.

He and Doug also managed to pick a bowl of blackberries while  Gee’s Lock was filling.

Before we could escape from Dunn’s Lock we had to retrieve a 40 ton C&RT working barge and put it back on its moorings. 

Anyway, after six hours of good cruising on a warm and sunny Saturday we arrived at the Kilby Bridge moorings at 4 o’ clock to find them almost deserted. Since settling in Doug has added the blackberries to some apples and made a superb pie, James has touched in two rather nasty scratches on the gunwales which he has to lay claim to and Manel – well Manel’s asleep!

This evening we hope to partake in the fare on offer in The Navigation – something we’ve been looking forward to for a while now.