Bits and Pieces

After this mornings walk, this afternoons drive was a bit easier. We went to Parbold first to get a photograph of the newly refurbished Windmill pub, I didnt have time to go inside, but will be back.



Next we headed to the former Walton Summit Branch to take a photo of the bridge next to the Duke of York pub. There is a photo of this bridge with the pub in the background, and a boat on the canal.



The canal is now grass, the pub was open but still has an advert for its lease. Again I resisted going inside, and headed off to another pub, the Lord Nelson. The pub has a canal mile post by the front door from the Walton Summit Branch, showing just one mile from the terminus.



I had planned to stop off at the boatyard in Tarleton but the sun was going down so we headed home.

If you have been to the Windmill at Parbold, let us know what you think of it here:

http://www.towpathtreks.co.uk/LLC/pub_info_display.asp?ino=19

Canal Walk: Blackburn to Cherry Tree

After some map reading we found our way to the carpark of the Wharf pub at Eanam Wharf. This was my first time at the canal in Blackburn and I didn’t know what to expect. I was hoping to see some mills and signs of the much talked about regeneration of the canal area.

Eanam Wharf is a group of warehouses similar to those at Wigan Pier. The main warehouse is used by the Wharf pub and a conference centre, with the short covered section of towpath in front of the conference centre closed to walkers.

At midday on a Sunday I had expected the pub to be busy but we were the only car in the car park. We walked around the back of the well redeveloped warehouses to head out of Blackburn to the west.

The towpath is well maintained and would be great for cyclists although the bushes in some places could do with cutting back. Throughout the whole walk the towpath felt very isolated and quiet with only a few people walking on it, and none of the cheery “hello”s of the last walk.

The canal is above the city; past bridge #103 you get a good view down to the main railway station and across to the streets on the hills opposite. Walkers feel elevated on this section. As we arrived at Blackburn Top Lock we met a boat going down the flight. It was a welcome sight to see people using the canal. There are six locks and they, like the towpaths, have been refurbished recently. Lock 54 is squashed beneath a modern bridge, the canal only just given room to exist by the road builders.

The BWB sanitary station is in part of a group of canalside buildings which have been very nicely redeveloped. There is even a sculpture of a man on a bike, suggesting that the smart towpath is aimed at cyclists.

After the locks and just past bridge 98 I found a large milestone hiding behind some brambles. It was in very good condition considering it was made obsolete by the metal posts put in in 1898. After the milestone is Ewood aqueduct dated 1810 and a long embankment from which you can see the home of Blackburn Rovers.

At 55 miles to Liverpool the only milepost of the day was a sad sight. Both its plaques have been lost and the top is missing, filled with rubbish. The disappointing lack of mileposts was made up for by the finding of another milestone. The old 54 miles to Liverpool milestone is, like the 55 mile stone, in good condition.

At Cherry Tree Bridge #95 we reached the start of George Birtill’s legendary Towpath Treks. There are a lot of new houses which won’t have been there when Birtill took to the towpath. There was no sign of milepost 54, and we turned around at Livesey Hall Bridge #94.

We returned to Eanam Wharf to find the pub still empty. The warehouse here is said to have a milepost (57 miles) inside it but the conference centre made it impossible to look for it.

Canal Walk: East Marton to Greenberfield

After a filling lunch in the Anchor Inn we climbed about Rocinante again and set off to find East Martin. East Martin is a small place, even smaller than it appears on the map. The road crosses the famous Double Arched Bridge #161, if you turn right at the Cross Keys pub and drive down the small road alongside it you come to some stables next to bridge #162. If you are lucky as we were you will find a space to park on the road, otherwise if you are going in the pubs you can use their car parks. We crossed the bridge and turned to walk back towards Greenberfield.
The Double Arched bridge is one of the most distinctive features of the Leeds Liverpool canal. Opinion is divided as to the reason why it is a double arch. Some think the road has been raised and a second bridge added on top of an earlier one, others say it was built with two arches because the engineers didn’t have confidence in the strength of a single arch. Looking at the bridge I could see no evidence for two stages of building so I would say it was built in one go.
Next to the Double Arched Bridge is milepost 89, over the next 2 miles there are the full set of mileposts: quarter, half, three quarters and full mile posts. In all we found 13 mileposts.
The canal was very still and there were some very clear reflections of the surrounding hills. We passed milepost 88 and arrived at bridge #159 and the furthest point of the mornings walk.
We walked 10 miles altogether and covered 5 miles of towpath. Although there is some light industry and housing there are some very nice views and interesting features on this section. The afternoons walk was a little muddy compared to the tarmaced towpath of the mornings walk. A glance through bridge 162 gave a preview of the next section up towards Gargrave, a tree lined cutting that looked very inviting.

Canal Walk: Chorley

The rain and drizzle managed to hold off long enough for todays towpath trek. We parked at Botany Bay by the half mile post marking 46.5 miles to Liverpool. We have walked north from here up to Johnsons Hillock before so today we went south as far as Rawlinsons Bridge #71 at the 43 mile mark. A 7 mile round trip was about right given the grey weather.

We spotted the 46.25mile quarter mile post but there was no sign of the 46 mile milepost, it probably went when the motorway was put in.

All along this walk we were never far from the motorways or busy main roads. There were signs of past industry but only one remaining mill. Some places were residential with gardens backing onto the canal. The towpath was popular with cyclists (who had left their manners at home), fishermen and walkers. We saw 5 boats on the move (one of which was going backwards). There were no swans at bridge 77A Froon Street so there was no need to tighten my grip on my walking stick as George Birtill felt he had to on his trek.

Milepost 45 was missing but the half mile (44.5 miles) was there. After Barrack Bridge #75 the area around the canal was wooded and there was less sign of industry. We found milepost 44 which needs a coat of paint.

This section is part of Rennies Lancaster Canal South part so the bridges are his impressive monuments. Bridge 74A is perhaps the most impressive, it is both skewed and twisted over the canal with deep rope cuts and stalagmites. The aqueduct near Cross Hall Bridge #76 is a great work of engineering and design but one few people must see as the view from the aqeduct is as George Birtill said in 1973 one of "one mill in ruins and the yard full of industrial paraphenalia". This river is Black Brook the source of Chorley's industrial power.

43.75 miles quartermile post was spotted as we headed towards the end of our trek. Bewteen Idle Bridge #72 and Rawlinson Bridge #71 there are the remains of a embankment where a mineral railway crossed the canal from the Ellerbeck Colliery.

Mile post 43 is not shown on any map, and is now missing, but under Rawlinson Bridge you can see the milepost shaped mark of where it once was. A sort of trace fossil of the milepost world.

It was too wet to sit on the bench opposite the boatyard so we just turned around and started back. The highlight of the return trip was a big pig in a pen next to the canal.

I doubt I will do this walk again, the towpath was good in places for cyclists but the views cannot compare with the sections either side of this stretch.

Canal Walk: Riley Green to Withnell Fold

We drove from Liverpool and parked at the Boatyard Inn just off junction 3 of the M65, right by Riley Green Bridge #91A. The pub is on the bankside; to get the towpath you pass an attractive ruin. We doubled back under the bridge and walked south west (towards Wigan/Liverpool).

Milepost 51 once was next to this bridge but is no longer there. Not far from the M65 (Brimmicroft Bridge 91AA) we found the 50 mile milestone. As suggested by the 19th century OS maps the milestone had a benchmark carved on to the top. There was no sign of any mile markings though. The milestones on this section are made of a better quality sandstone than their counterparts on the Wigan to Liverpool section.

The three Ollerton Bridges (#91, #90 and #89) as mentioned by George Birtill in his 1970s book Towpath Trek are very picturesque but seemingly overkill as they do not link anything other than fields. The bridges are of the same sturdy build as the bridges on the Lancaster Canal southern part, which was later, incorporated into the Leeds Liverpool canal.

Anyone looking for mileposts and milestones will notice that on this section the mileposts have been painted and have daffodils planted beside them. We found the 50mile milepost and the quarters and half posts associated with it. The first time I have found a mile, quarter, half mile and three quarter mile post in succession.

Withnell Fold was once a centre for paper mills. The former sludge ponds and filter beds are now a nature reserve and an ideal place to stop off for a picnic. They can be reached from Withnell Fold bridge #88 or by climbing over the wall alongside them.

We found the 49-mile milestone which also had a benchmark carved on it. From there it was a short distance to Jacksons bridge #87 (formerly Stony Flat Bridge) and its twin Brown House bridge #86. These bridges are another example of the engineering and architecture of the 19th century. The canal runs along a contour on a steep slope; therefore the bridge has to be at an angle from the towpath side to the bankside.


We soon found milepost 49 which had eluded us on a previous walk from Botany Bay. It was behind a fence and in some brambles it is completely hidden when the hedge is in full leaf.

Having reached the extent of the walk from Botany Bay we turned around and headed back. We took a diversion at bridge #87 to take a closer look at an aqueduct visible from the canal towpath. I assumed it was a railway viaduct but looking at the maps it seems to be just a very impressive way of bridging a small valley.

We went back to the towpath and returned to the Boatyard Inn passing many cyclists and walkers but only one boat on the move.

As we had used the pubs carpark and they had taken the time to put up signs about £100 fines and clamps we thought it was only fair to have a pub lunch. The Boatyard is a modern pub with a good menu, a nice terrace and overnight mooring for customers. It is an ideal place to start or end a day enjoying the canal.

Feeling refreshed and relieved we decided we would have a short walk in the other direction, towards Blackburn. We found milestone 51 and just beyond Finnington bridge #91B an impressive stone wall which used to belong to a Small Pox hospital. The moorers didn’t seem to be concerned that their boats were just feet away from a building that was once home to victims of the pox. After Millfield bridge #92 we found milepost 52 which only had the “75 1/4” left of its Leeds plaque and little more of the Liverpool one. It had been painted and had some canalside daffodils to mark it.

Before Stanworth bridge #93 there are the remains of a quayside and tramway which ran from the paper mill at Feniscowles. There is also a distinctive winding hole which looks like it was once a small arm serving some industry but there hasn’t been anything on the site for the last 150 years.

The paper mill at Fensicolwes keep their privacy with a tall ugly concrete wall which is sited in front of the original stone wall. This Berlin wall has hidden the 52-mile milestone from view. As the M65 came into view beyond the trees and the canal passed over a stream we come to a boundary marker on the border of Chorley and Blackburn and Darwin. We turned around here and went home.
This was one of the nicest and most interesting walks we have done. The abundance of mile markers and the aqueduct added to the landscape views and cute lambs and sheep.