Following the Trent and Mersey

 It's a bit of a damp, grey and breezy Sunday afternoon, so a good opportunity to update our blog. We are now moored at Rugeley in Staffordshire and here is the story of how we got here:

When the sun shines the canal scenery looks wonderful. Here we are setting off on Tuesday morning heading for Swarkestone Lock. The last two of the wide locks are at Swarkestone and Stenson: the first is 11 feet and Stenson wins the prize at 12 feet 4 inches deep.

Helen has been experimenting this year with some shots looking along the length of the boat. This one is particularly good as we cruise towards the splendidly named Fine George's Bridge. No idea how it got that name. Any offers ?

Above Swarkestone Lock is the junction with the Derby Canal. We had seen the other end of this canal at Sandiacre on the Erewash Canal (see our earlier blog). Sadly the bit in between those junctions is not navigable. Indeed the section from Swarkestone into Derby is a cycleway that we cycled last year. In the picture above the Derby Canal goes left of the white house and the Trent and Mersey goes right (where we have come from).

The Trent and Mersey runs for 92 miles from Shardlow to Preston Brook near Runcorn. Actually it also runs beyond Shardlow for a couple of miles to meet the River Trent (the way we have come). A series of mileposts like the one above mark its progress. The mileposts were taken away during World War II and were replaced in the 1970s.

After Stenson Lock the number of broadbeam boats declines especially after Mercia Marina where many of them live. We are now entering the preserve of the narrowboat! Coming through Willington we spotted this house across the fields. It seems to have an astronomical telescope inserted in its roof.

Approaching Burton on Trent the canal comes alongside the busy A38 for the first time. The two then separate briefly while the canal crosses an aqueduct over the River Dove and alongside is the old road bridge over the Dove shown here. There was plenty of water in the Dove: not surprising given the rain we've had lately.

Just before Burton we reached Dallow Lane Lock which is the first narrow lock on the Trent and Mersey, seen here underneath a road bridge. Not only is this one narrow (one narrowboat at a time) it is also not very deep at just 3 feet 6 inches.

We cruised straight through Burton on Wednesday having sampled its delights (brewery tours!) before. After mooring overnight at Branston (of pickle fame), we reached Tattenhill lock. It is a lovely spot with a B&B in the old lock house.

Canal bridges are numbered which makes it easier to work out where you are. This bridge at Wychnor is now number 42 but, as you can see, it used to be number 46. Probably some old farm swing bridges have disappeared. Modern bridges for new roads tend to be numbered as 42a, 42b and so on.

Wychnor Lock took us up to the same level as the River Trent. The canal crosses the river on the level and travels up the Trent for a few hundred yards. This means if the river is very full and fast flowing then canal boats are advised not to travel. Fortunately for us the river level boards were on green so no problem though it was flowing pretty fast. In the picture we are just coming up to the river section. The floating barrier is to stop boats turning left and going over the weir. You might also notice that it was pouring with rain!

Here is the view taken looking back to the River Trent from the mooring just below Alrewas Lock. You can see the Trent coming in from the left under the pedestrian walkway. Alrewas Lock took us up a few feet off the River and to the pretty stretch of moorings which serve the village.

Alrewas is a popular stop for boats but we found a mooring after another narrowboat kindly moved back a little to let us in. We had a walk round on Thursday evening over the river meadows and through the village which has 3 pubs, a Co-op, a fish and chip shop and an excellent butcher. This message on a house by the canal sums up our life. It comes of course from the Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame.

We had booked online to go the National Memorial Arboretum at Alrewas on Friday. Though it is free (donations welcome), you have to book at the moment. The weather forecast for Friday was awful but we went anyway and enjoyed the day. We visited the restaurant for lunch and again for tea and cake to get out of the rain. We last went to the Memorial Arboretum in 2014 and it has developed a lot since then with more trees and more monuments. The monument in the picture is 'Shot at Dawn' for those in the First World War executed for breaking military rules. They have now been pardoned. Each stake represents one victim. We were surprised by how many were labelled "Age Unknown" and it is thought that some were 15 or 16 and had said they were 18. Very moving.

There is a lovely wood carving in the chapel, called 'the Storyteller'. The children all sit with rapt attention listening to the story.

But round the corner one little boy is not listening and he leans over looking at a snail.

This monument is to remember the evacuees during the war. The girl at this end is holding her teddy bear.

This statue recognises the role of horses in war. It has a fluidity of motion that we were really taken with.

Here in a monument designed by a 13 year old, we see a handshake between an English and a German soldier during the Christmas truce when they played football between the trenches in 1914. The encircling framework represents a football. You can tell which is the English and which the German hand by the buttons on their cuffs.

This just shows that the Memorial Arboretum is bang up to date. We really enjoyed our day there and would recommend it.

Back to the canal on Saturday with 8 locks to climb as we came through Fradley. The picture is a bridge at the entrance to Bagnall Lock as we came out of Alrewas. It shows how little clearance there is between the boat and the bridge and how some boats have chipped away at the edges.

And this is the view behind us as we came into Keeper's Lock. You can just see the previous lock below the arch. You may be wondering about the folk operating the bottom gates for us. There were plenty of volunteers on the Fradley Locks helping boaters through, including a party of trainee lock volunteers. Unusually, Helen had a ride on the boat most of the way through the locks.

This is the classic Fradley view of the Swan, a pub opposite to the junction where the Coventry Canal leaves the Trent and Mersey to go south. You can see the signpost behind the blue boat.

Here is another Helen 'down the side of the boat' picture as we crossed with another boat to enter Shadehouse Lock, the top one of the Fradley flight of 5 locks.

On Saturday evening we moored near Handsacre and went for a walk into the village and back a different route. It was a bit of an unsatisfactory walk as the footpath we were following went under a railway through an underpass which was flooded to a depth well over our boots. So we had to retrace our steps and follow a different route which turned out to cross the future HS2 route. Plenty of devastation and tree felling, some newly planted tiny trees and the odd house, like this one, deserted and probably scheduled for demolition.

Today (Sunday) we left Handsacre and came through Armitage Tunnel shown here. This very narrow stretch for 150 yards used to be tunnel but subsidence caused by mining round here meant the roof became too low for boats so it was opened out. You do still have to be careful in case you meet a boat coming the other way as it is only just big enough for one boat at a time.

It has been a day for jobs - do the washing, fill the boat with water and go shopping at Rugeley. We were disappointed to find that the excellent hardware shop at Rugeley has closed. Fortunately Wilco's met our needs - we now have new battery LED lights in our wardrobes. Coming through the town you pass the back gardens of houses. This one had some strange mannequins facing the boaters,depicting sheep, bees and ladybirds we think.

And here, to bring you right up to date, is our current mooring just on the edge of Rugeley with the washing under cover. Heavy rain is forecast so we've decided to stop here. We walked a little way up the canal to where it crosses the River Trent on an aqueduct. The Trent was coming under the canal really fast but there were a couple of people getting dressed after a wild water swim - they said they had stayed a calm bit by the side. We're glad we don't have to take Leo on it this time!

Probably tomorrow we shall come to the end of our travels up the Trent and Mersey as we turn left at Great Haywood onto the Staffs and Worcester Canal. Let's hope the weather improves so we can get some good sunny pictures.