Another Wonder of the Waterways - the Bingley Five Rise

 We are now barely 10 miles from Leeds so another posting seems overdue. As we came down the Bingley Five Rise and Three Rise locks yesterday now seems a good point to update you about our travels, so here goes.

Our last posting took us to the Foulridge Tunnel on the summit of the Leeds and Liverpool and since then we have been gradually dropping down into the Aire Valley and towards the River Aire itself in Leeds:

Having come through Barnoldswick we dropped down the three Greenberfield Locks. The picture shows Leo in the middle of the three locks.

Oddly the Greenberfield Locks were moved a short distance to one side of the canal's original course. Here beyond the house you can see an old canal bridge which now does not cross anything. The original canal included a staircase lock. This means that the top gate of one lock is also the bottom gate of the next higher lock without an intervening pound or stretch of water.

At East Marton the road bridge has two arches one above the other. The lower arch was a packhorse bridge built in about 1790. The top one was added to make the passage of motor vehicles easier - presumably less 'down and up'.

East Marton Church sits in isolation on a small hillock above the canal. Graves include a few for navvies who perished in building the canal.

Beyond East Marton is a section of the canal referred to by boaters as "The Bends". To cover about half a mile the canal travels about three times that distance. It zigags around several intersecting valleys and you can see boats coming on another zigzag even though it may be 15 minutes or more before they reach you. We moored in this delightful spot and walked back to a restaurant in East Marton called Abbots Harbour for Sunday lunch.

Soon after the Bends we arrived at the top of the Bank Newton Locks. These six locks drop boats down to an aqueduct where the canal crosses the River Aire for the first time as it joins the Aire Valley. This superb view of hills near Skipton is taken from lock 37, the penultimate one.

And here is Leo in the bottom lock. You might be surprised to see that we are alone in these locks. There seem to be very few boats travelling around here.

There is a short gap between the Bank Newton  locks and the six Gargrave locks and it is here that the canal crosses the Priestholme Aqueduct over the River Aire which is quite a little river at this point.

We went down three of the six Gargrave locks on Monday 15th into the centre of the village and the following day we had intended to get a bus to Malham and walk back along the Pennine Way which crosses the canal at Gargrave. Whether the bus did not run or whether we were waiting at the wrong bus stop we're not sure but we didn't manage this. So instead we did a circular walk from Gargrave. This view of the church at Gargrave was taken as we climbed up into the hills south of the village.

On Wednesday we continued for five miles into Skipton. This took us down the other 3 locks at Gargrave. After these locks there is an 18 mile lock free pound to reach the Bingley locks. While there are no locks on this stretch there are loads and loads of swing bridges like this one at Niffany Farm. At each we  have to stop while Helen gets off to open the bridge. A few have been very stiff and need Ian and sometimes also passers by to lend a hand!

Coming into Skipton we spotted a steeplejack repointing this chimney. Quite a task and what a journey to work.

We don't often have religious interludes on our blog but Ian was very taken by the sunlight coming through this stained glass window in Skipton Church. The scene is of the presentation of Jesus in the temple in Jerusalem.

There is a canal junction in Skipton. Here under the bridge is the Springs branch which goes for about half a mile finishing under the walls of Skipton Castle. Unfortunately there has been a rockfall and there is nowhere to turn round a boat as long as Leo. So, on Thursday, we carried on out of Skipton heading for Silsden.

We had arranged with another boat, Violet Clare, to share the operation of the innumerable swing bridges so one boat swings one and the other does the next one, with the boats leapfrogging each other each time. This undoubtedly reduces the work. The picture is of Milking Hill Swing Bridge near Farnhill.

So finally we reached the end of the 18 mile lock-free pound at the top of the Bingley "Five Rise" locks. Here the canal plummets down a very steep hill going down five consecutive staircase locks, each of them very deep at 12 feet, so 60 feet in all. This is followed by the Bingley "Three Rise" which, you've guessed it, is a staircase of three locks which are not so deep dropping another 30 feet. The top lock is in the background of this picture. We shared the locks with Violet Clare, the boat in the foreground. This boat with Eddy and Judy onboard is 60 feet long and so pretty much at the limit of this canal. So it was difficult sometimes to get the downstream gates open to let their boat out. Leo is 57 feet long, so much easier.

I'll bet you're wondering why this photo is in black and white. Is it a historic photo? No it is simply because somehow Helen managed to switch the camera to black and white. Still it is rather artistic I think. The picture is taken looking down the Bingley Five Rise from near the top. Quite vertiginous!

Here you can see both boats near the bottom of the Five Rise. As you can see we had plenty of CRT staff and volunteers to help us down.

And here is another shot (in colour this time) looking down the locks.

There is some interesting paddle gear on the Five Rise shown here. The handle pulls the paddle across, opening a hole in the gate.

The height of the gates in this flight is astonishing. Sitting on a tall cill the gates must be nearly 20 feet tall. They do not seal particularly well and the poor helmsman (Ian on Leo and Eddy on Violet Clare) gets quite wet. And the water was pretty cold. Perhaps not so bad because it was a hot day.

This view was taken looking back up the flight from the bottom.

And here we are at the bottom of the Bingley Three Rise. No lock keepers to help from here on.

Right at the bottom of the Bingley locks is the Damart factory making thermal underwear to keep us all warm.

We had hoped to moor at the Fisherman's Inn a mile beyond the Bingley locks but sadly there was no space for one, let alone two boats. So we carried on down the Dowley Gap pair of staircase locks and here we are shown crossing a second aqueduct over the Aire just below these locks. We moored just the other side of this aqueduct last night and walked into Saltaire for a look round.

So that takes our story to the Bingley locks which are like nowhere else on our waterways. From here we will be going down the remaining locks, including several more staircases, to Leeds where the canal joins the River Aire.