Llangollen Canal - Day 1

We've just returned from a week cruising the Llangollen Canal in North Wales. It was such a wonderful experience - and so relaxing. And it gives you such a different perspective on the countryside.

We thought that it would be best to blog the holiday day by day. That way you can share our learning the ropes - including lock and lifting bridge operation, recovery of the boat after running aground, and the finer skills of manoeuvring our 15 ton boat in the canals...

Our week cruise started at Chirk Marina just inside North Wales. We arrived about 3pm and after checking in were shown to our boat - the Lucy. She's a beauty. At 69ft it is about the longest canal boat afloat but easily accommodated us all configured as three double berths. She also has a well equipped kitchen, a dining area, two toilets, a full sized shower (although hot water is best a night after having run the engines all day), and central heating.

We unloaded all our kit but as we were keen to get underway most of it landed on the nearest bed! Vic, our instructor, ran us through the boat's operation which included the steering, engine control, basic maintenance (such as greasing the prop shaft each night!), and lock operation. We picked his brain for some route options and then, after fitting James out for his life vest, was handed over to another chap who reversed the boat out of the mooring, out into the canal, and then handed over control to me. After making sure I wasn't totally incompetent and didn't ram the boat into the first thing I saw, promptly jumped onto the bank with a wave and we were off!

One focus of the trip was Llangollen which we were told is a very scenic part of the canal - although very shallow and narrow. There is also a steam train that I knew James would love. So rather than follow the pack and head upstream, we had planned to head downstream returning later in the week to tackle Llangollen.

It takes a while to get used to the boat. Its heavy - 15 tones - so you have to be careful of the momentum. But going with the current (which runs about 1 mph) makes life easier.

So it's over to me (Lynne) now to continue with the rest of day 1. With Martin at the tiller and Merrilyn and I thinking we were out for a few days of laid back cruising we came across our first challenge... the Chirk Tunnel. We could just make out the opening at the far end and could see no other boats in the tunnel so turning on our headlight and sounding our horn chugged our way through the 459 yards (goodness knows how long that is in metric) of darkness to emerge at the other end into brilliant daylight and glorious old oaks, ash and birch trees overhanging and reflecting their autumn colours in the canal. An absolute photographer's delight.

Before we knew it we were approaching the next wonder. With nerves of steel (Martin's, not mine), hearts racing and adrenalin flowing we were committed to crossing the fantastic Chirk Aqueduct, which carries the water in a narrow iron trough from England into Wales. Towering above us to our right, the immense arched railway viaduct windowed the brilliant green fields of the Welsh valley and 70 feet below, a jolly long way down, the River Ceirog flowed across a rocky riverbed. We were able to step off the boat (with jelly legs I can tell you) and walk alongside on the tow path as "Lucy" was slowly and carefully steered by our intrepid helmsman who had only been on the job a few hours but handled the cross breeze extremely well. Of course we weren't able to see how impressive we looked as we sailed across the aqueduct that has been serving the communities along these rivers, but the sense of wonder was still there. With cameras clicking and videos running we have recorded our crossing of an engineering marvel opened in 1801 that still continues today to impress.

Today we clocked up around 4.7 miles but as canal boating law states we have to moor before dusk we decided on a peaceful stretch of the canal bordered by hedges on one side and lush green fields on the other on St. Martin's Moor.

Dinner cooked on board our home for the next 7 nights, was followed by close examination of a whole range of bruises, hot showers and an early night. What adventures are in store for us over the next few days. One never can tell!!!

Here is a google map of our route. Photos are here.