M Returns and a Delay to the Blog.

 Monday 12th June 2023 near Kidsgrove.

R took MM from Westport Lake through the Harecastle tunnel as the last boat in a very slow convoy of five boats. At Kidsgrove he moored up to await M's return. The mooring was next to the entrance to Kidsgrove Station, very convenient.

M arrived back at Kidsgrove Station soon after and, after a reviving cup of tea, we set off on foot for the nearby Tesco for provisions.

By then it was mid-afternoon but we decided to turn off the Trent & Mersey Canal and on to the Macclesfield Canal just a hundred yards further on. It is an unusual junction as the route takes you left at first but soon after it does a sharp right hand bend and then crosses over the T&M on an aqueduct.

 While M had been away, R had struck up a friendship with a very interesting couple, Sandrine and Chris, who were on their first ever hire boat holiday. Just past the aqueduct, we saw that they were moored up and so we moored behind them and joined them on their hire boat "Burslem" for a very enjoyable evening. We had started sitting in chairs on the towpath, but moved into their boat when a huge thunderstorm arrived. However, the rain was very welcome as it cooled everything down a bit.

Apologies for the delay in posting this! On 14th, we went home for a week only to find that the house PC had crashed and had to be replaced. Luckily, all the data was safe but it meant reinstalling all the software and, as we could only get Windows 11 in the time, there were changes which meant that we never got round to posting what we had written. Then we returned to MM (as you will see later ) and found that there was a problem with the batteries, which had to be changed and that took up more time. So, now we are trying to catch up.

Today: 3 miles, 0 locks and 2.0 hours.

Trip: 16 miles, 15 locks and 10.3 hours