Along the Sankey Valley

Sunday 15th November 2020

The sun was so nice when we finished the service I just had to go out for a walk. My bubble friend came too. We were just going to walk down one side of the canal on the Sankey Valley trail and back up the other, a little walk I've done before. 

Who would have thought you could get lost doing a there and back canal walk! We missed where I had crossed the canal before, perhaps because we were talking and walking faster than I did when I was on my own with the camera. When we did cross I knew I didn't recognise it. We started back the other side but then the path started to move away from the canal. It got very muddy and wet. We persevered a bit and then came out into a field with no obvious way out. THEN we checked the map on my phone ... and discovered there was a break in the path and it didn't join up the rest of the canal side walk. We didn't fancy the muddy walk back so we crossed the field to a marked footpath exit ... muddy would be an understatement and we couldn't get out. We thought we would have to retrace our steps but then we found a way through the trees that a lot of people had obviously taken. We made it back to dry tarmac land in the centre of an estate. 

Another look at the map said we could walk through the estate, on to a main road, and then drop down another road to pick up the Sankey Valley trail. We did that and started down the footpath, only to be told by a man coming from the canal how muddy and slippy it was. My friend is still nervous after her fall so we retraced our steps and went the long way back to the car along the road. Not quite what I had planned!

It took us longer than intended but the sun was out and we shared lots of laughter, which did us the world of good. It did start to rain just before we returned to the car though.