Last of and Leaving Liverpool

Well, I suppose the good thing about rubbishy weather is that you sometimes get a great sunset, and Liverpool was no exception in this stake.
 

Sunset over Salthouse Dock

Having dispatched Aunty Nancy and Jane back up to Edinburgh on Thursday, the boat was back up to full capacity on Friday with the arrival of Mike back from work and my cousin Diane for the weekend.

On Saturday we had a wee scoot down the docks to fill up with diesel at the marina.  It was quite windy and there were lots of canoes out and about so we had to keep our wits about us - those of us that have wits, that is..... ;)
In the evening, Mike's friend Dickie came to take us on a pub crawl, but in true Quaintrelle style we started off with cocktails on board.

Dickie and Mike and a Margarita

Contrary to how we look in this picture, we were actually enjoying ourselves!!  Dickie takes a lot of snaps and we were never quite sure when he was or wasn't doing so ;)

 And then the pubcrawl; The Baltic Fleet, The Bridewell, which was an old police station, complete with cells - and surprisingly, I can't remember the name of the third one.....oops!!

Queenie and I having a wee laugh to ourselves in the Bridewell

Well-oiled by the last pub - time for pizza and kebab!!

 Sunday was spent recovering and seeing Di off back to Edinburgh again.  It was very wet and windy.
It was an early start for us on Monday as we had to leave Liverpool and you have to be at Mann Island Lock for 9am.  We were sad to leave our neighbours of the last 12 days, Jayne and Mike from NB Dawn Owl, who were great company, and got up to wave us off!  Unfortunately the wind and rain were still with us and we were soaked within minutes of leaving our pontoon.

Waiting to get up through Mann Island Lock

 Once up the Stanley Flight which takes you out of the docks and back onto the canal, the rain stopped and we had a pleasant cruise.  We had a moment of excitement as our engine reached the milestone of 1000 hours running!!!  This is the equivalent to a cars milometer, but we measure hours our engine has done on a narrowboat.

The convoy going through bridge 6 on the Leeds Liverpool canal.

 

Reaching 1000.0 hours on the engine.

We moored up through Bridge 10 next to Clinton and Sharon on Tacet.  We'd been in a bit of a quandry, as we had planned to do the Lancaster Canal next, crossing the Ribble Link on Friday 31st.  However, a collapsed culvert at Rufford put paid to that, as the canal is now closed and we can't get on to it.  Canal & River Trust are estimating it will be closed until the end of August :(  We decided to continue our journey up and over the pennines heading for York, but just go very slowly (not that you go anywhere fast on a narrowboat!) as we now have an extra two weeks to do it.  Mike decided to go back to work this week for three days, leaving me home alone on Quaintrelle.  Last night and tonight I'm in Parbold (which we keep wanting to call Parboiled, like our potatoes before we roast them!).  It's a lovely wee place.  Tomorrow I'll head on and pick Mike up at Appley Bridge and on Saturday we will do the dreaded Wigan Flight!!!
If we survive that, you'll hear more from me next week ;)