August Bank Holiday

What a glorious bank holiday weekend we’ve just had. We opened Jubilee Fibres all three days, near Rufford Old Hall (NT house). The towpath encompasses the hall’s circular walk, so we had lots of customers.

The Sunday afternoon we had 9 visitors!! Samantha, my youngest sister was staying with Ada & Dale, so Heather & her crew came too. It’s so wonderful to be able to have our big family gatherings in ‘real life’ & not on the computer.

Out trip to Liverpool seems an age away. We stayed a few days at Litherland and strolled to Crosby beach. We’ve never seen the Gormley statues when the tide was in. It was a lovely sunny day, so the sea water was really warm to paddle in.

Our next stop was Lydiate as several boaters had told us how great The Scotch Piper pub was. It’s thought to be the oldest pub in Lancashire (now in the renamed Merseyside).

We celebrated our 39^th anniversary there with a massive cheese board.

The following day there was a vintage car meet at the pub, so it’d be rude not to go back to see the cars.

There were lots of huge blackberries where we moored, but they were pretty sour. So, we picked 1.5 kg, made a stock and naturally dyed lots of wool to sell.

It’s good to be able to have the wee ones to stay one at a time (unlike boat school where all 5 of us were crammed in). Lance came first. We moored close to Fairy Glen, one of his favourite places, near where they used to live.

 

We’d had lots of rain and the waterfall & steams were flowing fast.

We stopped off for a pint on our way back from the glen and also did some Himalayan balsam bashing.

On to Burscough, were our bit of towpath had lots of cherry-plum & damson trees. Lance made 5lb jam.

He was a great help when nan walked through the boat with dry mud on her boots, bless him.

He brought a big bag of Hunson’s fluff, which he drum-carded & we spun into yarn.

Being such a little lad he’s ideal to send into the engine bay to grease the stern gland.

John went to Manchester with our friend Colin, who’s a reporter for ‘Towpath Talk’, a monthly publication. Sadly, a boat had sunk in a lock and they went to watch RCR (the boat RAC) pump out the water and re-float it so the canal could be re-opened.

Magnus’ stay was great fun too. His favourite part was picking the cherry-plums and making…...yes, another 5lb of jam.

He was so eager to help with boat chores.

He opened the swing bridges, helped get water and moor the boat. Not only that, but he hammered the mooring pins in all by himself!!

He was fascinated by this sign in someone’s garden!!!

He enjoyed coming to knit & natter at the pub, where he French knitted himself a necklace. The following week at knit & natter I had a very proud nanny moment, when one of the locals asked where he was and said what a very well-behaved lad he was.

 

Tropical Liverpool

We spent last week in Salthouse Dock, Liverpool, it’s not our first trip there, but our first trip in tropical weather, school holidays and the first day all the lock-down restrictions were lifted!!! The local teenagers jump into all the locks at Stanley Flight, the day we went down hoards of them just sat and watched & I said hello to them. We’d heard very different scenarios from other boaters, however.

The weather was perfect for our cruise through the disused docks.

 

 

As we came out of the tunnel under the Museum of Liverpool, there were lots of kids swimming & jumping in. Most of them got out when they saw us approach, and lets just say, we certainly didn’t get a warm scouse welcome to the city. A handful of the lads jumped in the water in front of the boat as we headed for the last lock, and they hurled the foulest language I’ve ever heard and bottles and cans at us. The lockkeeper put a report in about it and the rest of the week the boats were taken into the docks early in the morning while the little darlings were no doubt still in bed.

As it was scorching hot that week, we took out all the portholes and slept with the bow doors open, quite safe as the pontoon didn’t reach anywhere near the bow.

The city was heaving with people, so we tended to venture there early in the mornings. One of the other docks that had a water sports centre was invaded by the kids, when it was closed in the evenings. Those docks seemed to be a magnet for the youngsters and we understand the police had a dispersal order for 20.00, so around that time in the evening we could see hoards of them heading into the city. Each evening there was a massive police presents over on those docks and there were stabbings on a couple of evenings!!

Down in Salthouse Dock, behind our locked gates we were in a different world of peace & quiet, with just the gulls and their anti-social behaviour!! One evening John rescued a baby gull as it was trying to flap out onto the pontoon.

I spent my special birthday Lush voucher from last October, that my whole family gave me at the huge Lush store's Spa. I had a head & foot massage, which was SO relaxing. Then I treated myself to lots of their toiletries with the rest of the money.

We visited Ten Streets Market (where John had his weaving lesson a few years ago). It’s a quirky little place, like a mini Camden Market.

Some narrow boating friends invited to their new boat for afternoon tea. They sold their narrow boat & now have a yacht that they moor in Liverpool Marina, a few docks along from Salthouse.

Heather & the family came for a day. We just had to go on the ‘ferry ‘cross the Mersey’.

One of the grandson’s had to make a list of things he wanted to do in the holidays. First on his list was, ‘go the pub’, which all did on the other side.

Each day there was a different cruise ship docked, with the stay-cation holidaymakers. The smallest ship we saw was the one we’d been on in 2019, when we were on the ferry.

The largest ship was towering over us as we cruised out of the docks.

John & I caught a train over to the Wirral to visit New Brighton, with it’s huge sandy beaches at the mouth of the River Mersey.

 

 

 

 

 

There are lots of lovely murals in the town.

And John fell in love with this beauty!!!

The tropical weather was just right for a spot of solar dyeing on the roof. We got some funny looks and some of the other boaters thought we were cooking our dinner up there. The yarn dried in no time at all.

We took lots of photos again on our way in and out of the docks.

Edmund and Ella came to stay for a few days, they arrived at Wigan & we dropped them near a station on our way into Liverpool.

Ed brought a ‘Dave the gull’, crochet kit & was struggling with the instructions. So off to knit & natter we all went for some help. I can just dabble in crochet. By the time he went home, Dave had a head, body & one leg!!

We saw some real live ‘Daves’ on our way into the docks.

Ella decided to knit under a tree, as we were still social distancing then with just 6 to a table, when we went to knit & natter at Burscough.

We stopped at some of our grandchildren’s favourite spots. The stone fishes at Lathom.

By the disused swing bridge near Burscough.