Huddersfield Canal - lots of locks

Sunday, 13 June 2010 16:59

13 Locks - lucky us! The first 9 .......

We left Grove Road Bridge behind and began the climb towards Uppermill, at the foot of Saddleworth Moor. To begin with we were still in"Greater Manchester", although that was difficult to believe as the western Huddersfield Narrow Canal is wooded and secluded.

Black Rock Lock 9W, our first lock of the day

I had a wee bit of trouble getting out of this lock - the pound was very shallow and John had to let a couple of lock fulls of water through from Avenue Lock 10W. I finally crept through the pound, keeping dead centre and gave Epiphany plenty of "wellie" to get her into lock 10W!

One lock later, we were at the south portal of Scout Tunnel. This short tunnel (205 yards) is hewn out of the rock and has a towpath. It was a good rehearsal for our passage through Standedge Tunnel.

The view as we entered

A closer look at the very rough hewn roof

We were told by the BW men at the north portal that a cyclist has sued for damage to his head as he cycled through. They were putting up a notice warning cyclists of the low head room! What about the narrowboaters heads? Who needs their head examining over this!

The industrial Mossley began to intrude on the canal - old mills, light industry and Oakwood Church high on the hill above. We ticked off the locks - Wharf Cottage Lock (13W), Woodend lock, Roaches Lock, Gas Works Lock and Division Lock 17W.

Oakwood Church from Wharf Cottage Lock

Woodend Lock, with building work beside it

Roaches Lock at Mossley has a good pub beside it, so we were told by fellow NABO members, (Andy and Di from nb Diandy) our neighbours at Uppermill for the weekend!

Roaches Lock 15W and pub

Gas Works Lock (16W) has an attractive approach under Roaches Bridge (87)

We encountered a number of shallow pounds as we continued the climb - but nothing we could not deal with by keeping the revs low and keeping to the middle of the channel.

Mossley was well behind us by now and we began to see glimpses of the moors ahead. Division Lock (17W) is followed by Division Bridge 85. This is where the boundary between Lancashire and Yorkshire used to, so this seems a good time to break our journey blog! The next bit of our journey is to come .....