A break in the weather at Cowley, Annie visits and I have a right rant

Cowley to Gnosall, Shroppie, A mile or so

I was able get out yesterday afternoon in the end after the heavy rain earlier in the day.  I sneaked out between the two weather fronts, and had a dry walk.. mind you it might have been dry, but it sure was a difficult one.. but it wasn’t all difficult, here walking along a track beside some newly sown winter corn..

The high winds during the morning stripping those trees on the left of their leaves. This was easy going, but, as is typical of walking the countryside near the Shroppie canal, things soon became not so easy!.. Here a rickety old ‘bridge’ which I had to negotiate..

To get to it I had to scramble down a bank.. Meg is being very careful coming back to see where I had got to, you can spot Lucy waiting for me .. it was very slippy too!.. But having negotiated that safely, next was another steep bank to face this!..

Err yes that is the err stile!  Now this was a challenge.. it was bent towards me up that bank.  I took a deep breath and teetered on the brink of balance, finally hauling myself over more in desperation than anything else, well it was a long way to go back the way I had come!

But having got over it, I was then faced with that huge field with no waymarkers giving me any idea at all as to which way to go!  Ah but then I had my trusty PDA with gprs and an ordnance survey map of the area on it.. the pointer showed me which way to go across the field following the line of the footpath.. without it I would have gone miles out of my way!

Annie of NB Moore2Life visited today after a two hour trip across country combining buses and trains from Ansty on the Oxford Canal.  She was here to meet Meg, and to pick up a new computer for Chas that he had ordered to be delivered to daughter Wendie’s house. Wendie visited last weekend and fetched it with her.. It is the only way to get big stuff aboard sometimes.  For sure the package for Chas was far too big for Royal Mail to deliver.

It was nice to see Ann again after parting our ways a few weeks ago as Moore2Life needs to be further south for her Xmas mooring before the BW Winter Stoppages cut them off.

We are staying in Gnosall ‘till Tuesday afternoon, and after picking up a few groceries from Mr Tesco at the bridge by The Boat, we moved to the 5 day moorings at the other end of Gnosall.  Well they WERE 5 day moorings, and Waterscape’s boaters guide for the Shropshire Union Canal (pdf file 220kb) SAY they are where we are..

3 Gnosall: Maximum 5day. Total 440 metres.

4 Gnosall: Maximum 48hr. Total 545 metres.

NOW there are boards up saying 48hr moorings.  On the big sign which says Gnosall Visitor Moorings the mention of 5 days has been painted over in black.. I wonder why on earth BW has done that!  It is out of the way here, not in the main part of Gnosall.. hey down the other end by the pubs there is 545m of moorings at 48 hours.. work that out.. errrrr average boat size ish 58ft (16.75m)?  OK so how many boats in 545m.. That’s 32 boats!

Now then, add that to the 440m that are NOW 48hr moorings and that allows 58 boats to moor here for 48 hours.. I am having trouble typing now, because the tears are coming down my face with laughter!

I know it is busy on this canal but that is ridiculous.. they obviously don’t like boats or people visiting in Gnosall.. “Move along, move along”.. Anyway I had planned this stop I am staying on the 5 day moorings because I had planned to do that.. I had no idea that the moorings for this area had been changed.. I am also wondering if BW can do that, just change moorings and put up different signs without any notice.. I will email and ask them why they needed more 48hr moorings, their reply should be very interesting!

Rant over.. anyway, the walks are good round here especially along the The Way for the Millennium, a long distance path from Newport to Stafford which follows the route of the disused railway.