Back to Sandiacre.

After spending a nice long weekend at Langley Mill we cruised back down the eleven locks. All these double locks need handcuff keys to unlock the top gates and paddle gear, some of them are rather heavy to operate too. There are some very low bridges below the locks in places, as you can see here at bridge sixteen. The wheelbarrow wheels are very useful as the sides of the Erewash Canal are lined with large stone blocks which slope inwards quite dramatically. If we didn’t use them, when moored, we would have been scrunching on the stonework.

  This is the little church on the hill as we came back down towards Sandiacre. This is a very quiet canal with not many boats on the move, so we had it mainly to ourselves.

The same cannot be said about the towpath however, which is busy with cyclists and walkers non stop all day long.

  

Bottle has been busying himself rubbing down the weathered woodwork of the cratch and giving it a couple of coats of Sadolin. I have walked back to the handy Co-op in the village and wandered around taking a few photos for the blog. I have been taking it easy as I had a fall backwards and got a bump on my head, which has now gone down.  This is our idyllic mooring spot opposite the entrance to the Derby Arm on the pond above the lock.

  

I spied these lovely deep coloured Hollyhocks and some unusual double pink flowers on a Blackberry bush. The weather seems to be pleasing itself, sometimes a shower of rain, then hot sunshine to dry it all out again. It’s not doing Bottles varnishing much good and there is lots of sighing going on here!