The Greys had a short Easter break on the waterways, cruising between Llangollen and Ellesmere on a 58′ steel hulled narrowboat. Most of Britain’s canals are an industrial heritage museum but the llangollen canal is a lot more rural and scenic than most, with some breathtaking views in the Welsh mountains.
It is a couple of decades since your Shadester held a Tiller but it didn’t take long to get back in the groove. I ended up Skippering most of the time as the first Mate and Billie no-mates seemed to be good at zig-zagging between banks (and occasionally into them).
There were only two locks on the stretch we covered which we locked down through on the Saturday and locked up through again on the Sunday. This meant that it wasn’t too strenuous for the crew.
We headed from our base at Chirk to Llangollen on Saturday afternoon, being on the world famous Pontcysyllte Aqueduct within an hour or so of setting off.
We went up to Llangollen on the Saturday morning, winding there and returning back, cruising steadily through the day and mooring up at Ellesmere. On Sunday we chugged along a bit further to look at some wildlife sanctuaries before returning and mooring up an hour or so south of Chirk (after a brief stop for a late liquid lunch).
On Monday morning, an early start gave us a clear run through the Chirk aquaduct & tunnel before returning the boat to Black Prince, intact other than a broken glass from the washing up and a few extra scratches on the hull (& a light coating of brick dust on the roof- those tunnels & bridges are tight…)
