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Big tour on a 60ft narrowboat some route advice please


Lizzy

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19 hours ago, 36national said:

the motorway bridge is flat. I cant remember Lumb lane bridge but AMAZINGLY theres a photo of it on wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashton_Canal#/media/File:Ashtoncanal2.jpg  and yes its flat

Wow. That's not a bridge it's a trap!! I hope that narrowboats have a kind of standard airdraft and that that boat is like mine. In which case the racks are fine. 

I guess I will take the flowers and bike down and cross fingers. 

And thanks for the compliments on the picture. I have plenty of them with the boat in it too :D 

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1 hour ago, Lizzy said:

Wow. That's not a bridge it's a trap!! I hope that narrowboats have a kind of standard airdraft and that that boat is like mine. In which case the racks are fine. 

 

Sadly no, they do not. Narrow boats are NOT like cars. Each is made individually according to the whim of the builder.

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22 hours ago, 36national said:

the motorway bridge is flat. I cant remember Lumb lane bridge but AMAZINGLY theres a photo of it on wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashton_Canal#/media/File:Ashtoncanal2.jpg  and yes its flat

There are photographs of just about every bridge, lock and other notable feature across the system in the gazetteer section of www.canalplan.eu .

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Lumb Lane, and the railway bridge below lock 4 are very low, saying that we have been up there on various boats over the years with no trouble. Don't be put off its a great trip into Manchester and it gives you an easier route to from Brum via the Shroppie. You also get a chance to see the birthplace of canals in Worsley and have a trip over the Barton Tank if you have a day for a side trip. You also go past and could go down Anderton lift on the way back to Middlewich

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Thanks for this @captain birdseye, I hadn't heard about these places before. It looks like Worsley and Barton will be on the route anyway leaving Manchester to join the L&L to Liverpool? Why do you say a side trip? Anderton Lift is definitely on the list as a visit, if not by boat.

Just checking out the route through Manchester. It sounds like Manchester can be rough in areas. I have seen recommendations to do the 18 lock flight on Ashton and also the 9 locks on Rochdale early in the morning. That's not possible in one day. My thinking is:

- Moor Portland Basin

- Day 1 - 18 Ashton locks

- Moor Thomas Telford Basin or Ducie Street

- Day 2 - 9 Rochdale locks

- Moor Castlefield basin (visit Manchester from here, only 48 hour moorings though?)

Does this sound like a good plan? Is there generally space in these places? Also am I reading this correctly that the Ashton locks are narrow and the Rochdale locks are wide? This area seems even more complicated than Birmingham to me!

Also am I out of trouble with air draft after the Ashton locks? I.e garden back on top?

So many questions ....

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That is basically what we are doing, we moored last night at Portland and then it took 5 and a half hours down to Manchester.  There are also mooring rings outside The Perl, after bridge 19 Audenshaw Bridge.

We are in Manchester now and  there was nothing moored on the Offside as the signs say private I think the small print says you can stop for 24 hrs, but you cant get out as it a gated community. I will go and check when I have finished my cupper with the binoculars. (its very small print)

There is room for 3 boats where I am and another 1 just before Jutland St Bridge, just through the bridge there is room for one more but its right in front of a bar. There are also spaces just up the Rochdale if you back up there.

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Ah that's good to know thanks! Was the area of the locks horrible? I met a lady from Liverpool, who said it's all horrible there and you should go at 6am to avoid everybody there. I am not that concerned really as I am used to relatively rough areas from London, but would be good to get a general idea what it feels like.

If you are still there in a few days when I'll be arriving, we should have a drink. You were the first and only member of this forum who I ever met in person. Last year, remember? :) 

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22 minutes ago, Lizzy said:

Ah that's good to know thanks! Was the area of the locks horrible? I met a lady from Liverpool, who said it's all horrible there and you should go at 6am to avoid everybody there. I am not that concerned really as I am used to relatively rough areas from London, but would be good to get a general idea what it feels like.

If you are still there in a few days when I'll be arriving, we should have a drink. You were the first and only member of this forum who I ever met in person. Last year, remember? :) 

Well apart from the rain I would say it was lovely, there are a couple of locks that only have one paddle working top and bottom. It is nothing like it was 20 years ago and that's for sure. I understand there was some drug dealing going on at Portland Basin in the junction but we stopped just before the junction, between the swing bridge and the railway bridge. If the purple boat is still moored there , there are two rings, 2 boat lengths behind them just right for a 57 foot boat

 

If you get completely nackerd doing the locks there are now mooring rings between locks 5 and 6 by the stadium,they look brand new

I have just been out in the rain and this is the notice on the offside in Manchester below the footbridge.

DSCF8331small.jpg

Edited by ditchcrawler
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How 'rough' it is round Manchester is very hyped up I think. I didn't have any problems doing the Ashton flight at all except for some small problems with rubbish (someone had chucked some big foam slabs into the cut). Some of the paddles were very stiff though and there were some where only one side worked so it was quite hard. Tbh I think mooring on portland basin would probably fine-there were a couple of boats there when I was there and they seemed fine. I moored round the corner on the LPF after the swing bridge-there are actually quite a lot of rings there, but they seem to have been buried over when the towpath's been redone so the ones you can find are a bit sparse and again, totally fine.

Mooring on the offside in Picadilly village and in Thomas Telford basin is 24 hours, there's also rings/bollards after Store Street aqueduct on the towpath side. Again, I moored there for a couple of weeks and had no problem at all (although it was a little noisy at weekends/when there was an event on at Etihad). Last I checked (a few weeks back) mooring at Castlefield basin is 72 hours.

I was thinking of doing a trip down the Rochdale 9 to Castlefield, but it was so grim walking down the canal (it gets better once you get past where it crosses Oxford road in my opinion), especially where the locks went under buildings-dark and dank, smelly, some less than savory activities going on-that I decided I did not want to do it by myself so I gave it a miss. That's the only bit I'd say was not very nice.

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7 hours ago, Lizzy said:

Ah that's good to know thanks! Was the area of the locks horrible? I met a lady from Liverpool, who said it's all horrible there and you should go at 6am to avoid everybody there. I am not that concerned really as I am used to relatively rough areas from London, but would be good to get a general idea what it feels like.

If you are still there in a few days when I'll be arriving, we should have a drink. You were the first and only member of this forum who I ever met in person. Last year, remember? :) 

The "lady from Liverpool" would say that about Manchester!

We set off from near the  low-bridge Lumb Lane at 10Am  wednesday, behind Mr D. Crawler. We didn't need to avoid everybody, they were all quite pleasant even though it's been raining all day. Please consider that I have "done " this flight of locks probably over a hundred times in the last forty years and I'm still here to tell the tale. There was a time when the area of the locks might be thought "horrible", a time of industrial decay in a once massive manufacturing area which I found very interesting and dramatic. Now, it's all trees, grass and infernal Canada Geese, which you might like.

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2 hours ago, Nick D said:

I appreciate that there is no standard air draught for narrowboats but is there an average rule of thumb?

My estimate is that for a typical modern leisure narrow boat, the roof will be about 5'6" above the water. But this will vary, and on top of that allow for whatever's carried on the roof, or for many boats the height of an engine or stove chimney will be the deciding factor, depending on the profile of the bridge or tunnel in question. If in doubt, approach slowly (but under control especially for an arch) and be ready to reverse, but this may not be much of an option when going down a river. Or chicken out and remove the chimney or other item in advance.

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18 hours ago, Lizzy said:

Thanks for this @captain birdseye, I hadn't heard about these places before. It looks like Worsley and Barton will be on the route anyway leaving Manchester to join the L&L to Liverpool? Why do you say a side trip? Anderton Lift is definitely on the list as a visit, if not by boat.

 

Sorry I forgot you were heading towards the L&L and thinking you would be going south.

If you stop in Telford Basin which is within Piccadilly Village and gated, usually one of the residents will give you the gate code so you can get in and out, saying that, the last time we did the run into Manchester; that's me my wife and our two primary school aged children we went straight down to Castlefield in a 8 hour day and then had a couple of nights there. I have as Billh says done this route a hundred times over the last forty years, sometimes with him.

I hope you enjoy our city

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Very reassuring thank you. I am sure it will be all fine. Have just booked myself into the Liverpool Canal Link, too. Glad I heard before that it's necessary to book! I am looking forward to visiting two more big cities. The only thing that worries me is that there's 20 swing bridges between Manchester and Liverpool. I have not really mastered these yet but this will be plenty of practice :-/

I measured my air draft at 5'9'' at the front on the side handrail with a half full water tank. On top of that there's the curved roof and mushroom vents in the middle! It's strange, my boat doesn't look higher than others when I compare.

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On 6/28/2017 at 16:20, Lizzy said:

Ah that's good to know thanks! Was the area of the locks horrible? I met a lady from Liverpool, who said it's all horrible there and you should go at 6am to avoid everybody there. I am not that concerned really as I am used to relatively rough areas from London, but would be good to get a general idea what it feels like.

 

Well, did you find the area of the locks horrible?  You were sighted at Stockport Junction (lock11) apparently making  good steady progress down the flight. I hope you arrived safely at Piccadilly and enjoyed your trip through East Manchester

Bill

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I was sighted! Ah ... really? :D Where you on the boat coming the other way? I did make it through the Ashton locks fine, helped by the people behind me on a hire boat in the second half. They were under the impression I was holding them up so they came to help me move faster (their plan was to continue on to the rochdale 9 locks in the same day. Holiday boaters on a mission!). To be honest, I don't think I held them up that much, the locks were just very slow to fill and as was said before on many only one paddle worked and in one my anti-vandal key didn't work at all but theirs did!

The locks area was not horrible at all. I don't really know what that was supposed to be all about. There was hardly anybody there and it wasn't even very dirty. Some rubbish yes, a dive into the weed hatch is needed before I continue, but nothing more than what you would expect in London.

After the locks I found a fantastic towpath mooring near Ducie street. No time limit. Have done a little reconnaissance trip today by bike further down today.

Two issues: my impression is that the rochdale flight is indeed slightly grim. I have actually asked crt for help but have got nothing confirmed yet. If there is no help, I will do this early in the day sat or sun. If anybody is around to share, let me know ( I assume two narrowboats fit into these locks??)

Second issue: The ecanalmaps app shows facilities near Castlefield basin, sort of under the railway, but these don't seem to exist. I found a water point behind some private moorings, but not an Elsan. It seems there are no facilities around the whole central Manchester area at all. A boater there told me that the next one is in a marina near the waters meeting junction. A bit of a problem, but hey, not everything goes to plan all the time. I am picking up a friend who comes into Manchester Picadilly on Monday so will have to make a trip out and back to Castlefield, unless somebody knows some secret Elsan somewhere?

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Me again. I am now heading towards Liverpool. Have booked into the canal link for Saturday. The entry is at 13.00 below Stanley Locks I believe. I'd like to be as close to the meeting point as possible the evening before, just to be sure. Does anybody know what are advisable moorings before? Possibly before the 4 locks there?

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Thank you all. I found out that the approach to Liverpool is more managed than expected. Just in case somebody comes across this, I am putting it here. Bridge 9 Hancock Swing Bridge only opens at certain times (currently at 9:30-10:30 and again 13.00-14.00). This is the only time when you can continue toward Liverpool (or get out the other way. When coming FROM Liverpool wait at bridge 6 Netherton at the same time). The place to stay overnight before entering the Liverpool Canal Link is Litherland (bridge 2J). All facilities and a huge Tesco. And it's only about 1.5h to the meeting point TOP of Stanley locks.

The canal link and the moorings in Salthouse Dock are simply amazing! I am loving it so much here. Fortunately I did book a 4 day stay. So worth it.

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