Wednesday 6th October
We have really got a wriggle on today and travelled 11 miles from Llangollen to St Martin’s Moor. It has been mostly nice weather, except for a few showers.
We had quite a good trip from Llangollen to Trevor, not meeting too many other boats and only getting grounded once again, but not in the same place as we did on the way up. We came out into the basin at Trevor from the relative calm of the tree lined part of the canal to discover the wind was really quite strong. The sharp right hand turn needed to get on to the Pontcysyllte aqueduct was seriously hampered by this wind and a rather hefty crash occured! No damage was done although we have taken a bit of the basin with us!
On the aqueduct, of course, the crosswind was really noticable and we scraped along the side all the way across! Fortunately for Ken it was the towpath side! As the weather was bright I thought I would take some more pictures of the Chirk aqueduct when we got there but we emerged from the Chirk tunnel on to the aqueduct into a squally shower so I didn’t bother!
The sun soon came out again so we decided to go to the Bridge Inn at Chirk Bank. We managed to moor up, despite the danger of sliding into the canal from the muddy moorings, got George over the dangerous road and walked down to the pub only to find it didn’t open until 6pm! Why don’t they put their opening times on the canalside sign advertising their pub so we don’t go to the trouble to go there when they are shut?
The next pub, The Poacher’s Pocket at Gledrid Bridge, had been recommended to us by Jim and Sheena and as it is right by the canal we could see it was open! We had just got the beers in and got settled in the garden when another one of those squally showers came over. Dogs are not allowed in the pub and they have no handy covered smoking area, so I had to take George back to the boat. By the time I had done that and wrestled my umbrella out of the hedge I got caught in on the way back, it had stopped raining! Ken and I went in the pub anyway.
After that we moved on another couple of miles to some nice open moorings here which we had spotted on the way up. Tomorrow we are hoping to get back to Ellesmere.
