Skipton at Last!

 Thursday 26th May 2022 in Skipton.

The weather did not look promising (one could even say a trifle threatening!), so we treated ourselves to a leisurely breakfast in the Dalesman Café. As it looked like the rain and wind was set in for the day, we thought we might as well get going. To get to Skipton involves three locks, five swing bridges and about five miles, but we need to be there tonight as Richard and Annette have to return their hire boat "Carleton" early tomorrow morning.

Luckily, there were still C&RT volunteers on the first two locks, which made life much easier. Finally, after six days, both boats side by side in the locks!

The three locks were soon dealt with and we set off towards the first of the five swing bridges. The rain was a drizzle on and off but the real problem became the wind, which made manoeuvring the boats extremely difficult. M got off to do each swing bridge (no photographs on account of the rain). A couple of times, Richard got pinned to the offside and on one occasion it was all that R could do to get MM back to the towpath side against the wind. M, while on the far bank operating one of the swing bridges, saw to her horror, that the wind had taken Robin's favourite boating hat and blown it into the canal! With her on the far side, and Richard being on a different boat, there wasn't a lot either one of them could do to help. Fortunately, Robin managed to retrieve the hat with the long handled boat hook!

On thing M did photograph was a line of traditional horse drawn Gypsy Caravans going slowly down the main road, followed by a very long line of crawling traffic!

After being battered by the wind, we finally arrived in Skipton to find that almost all the moorings (which had been empty yesterday) were now taken. Richard moored up Carleton on the last available space and R moored MM alongside him.

Later, Pennine Cruisers told Richard that he could bring Carleton in tonight, which he did, so MM moored up in Carleton's space.

After Richard had moored Carleton in the Pennine Cruiser moorings, Richard and Annette invited us for a drink in the pub next to their mooring. On the way there, we passed two of Pennine Cruiser's day boats with famous names.

We spent a very pleasant evening with Richard and Annette before returning to MM.

Today:5 miles, 3 locks (plus 5 swing bridges) and 14.0 hours, which includes 7 days power only.

Trip: 152 miles, 103 locks and 85.3 hours.