Head for Heights

Day Four: on the Cheshire Canals

Our journey today was to take us from just past Ellesmere all the way to Llangollen, our destination of choice on this trip (I say that, but there's not a whole lot of places you can go on a canal barge, although we do genuinely want to reach Llangollen). As locks are few & far between on this leg of the trip, much of today the crew spent reading, doing jigsaws, Blipping, eating; taking care of usual bargely endeavours.

The Admiral, once again at the helm all day, was on cruise control. The peace & quiet was broken occasionally by the news of oncoming traffic, at which point we might have to spring into action to prevent any (extremely minor & very like slow motion) collisions with other boats or the sides of the canal; or by the Admiral motoring blissfully & cluelessly into a narrowing, stony part of the canal while we all watched, braced & clenched, hopelessly waiting for the inevitable. What larks!

Two aqueducts loomed large today. The first at Chirk, with its very long, dark & dank tunnel immediately after. The second was the beast, the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct. Pictured is Ri on the Chirk Aqueduct. It's creeps right up on you & suddenly it's there right in front of you, growing closer & closer as you amble up to it. Quite strange, but brilliant. The train travels on the viaduct next to it & makes for a picturesque view looking through its struts over the sheep in the green fields.

Later on the day we made it to Llangollen & the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, built by Thomas Telford, between 1795 & 1805. I had been slightly dreading but also been quite excited about crossing over it. Think it might have had something to do with hearing about a 'jumper' the other day. Cruising across, with a path & plenty of walkers on one side, & a magnificent view & almost certain death on the other, you understand what a fine line you're treading up there. It's quite high but the views all around are incredible. Thankfully, it is route that has been used by so many people for over 200 years, so I don't think it's going anywhere just yet (which is also good because we were planning on making our return journey over it tomorrow!)

We moored in Llangollen overnight & went into the town centre for dinner & to catch up with all things Olympics (TV reception is awful on the barge, might have something to do with having a flower pot for an antennae, but I'm not an expert). We're all so thrilled with how GB are doing. Chris Hoy, what a leg! C'mon, 30 Golds, let's do it!

Early start tomorrow. The Admiral wants to beat the mass exodus. Tallyho!