Weston Arm (Montgomery Canal) to Ellesmere (Llangollen Canal)

Friday 12^th July

We are off back up the four locks this morning and back onto the busy Llangollen canal leaving the secret world of the Montgomery canal behind us, we have really enjoyed our 6 days on here, it’s a brilliant canal but it’s now time to get back to reality.

Boat behind us

Boat stuck in front of us

There was three of us moored in the Weston Arm this morning so around mid morning we all set off to go up to the moorings below the locks to wait for the lock keeper to open the flight at 12 noon. One boat went in front of us and one behind.

Water is way down

Coming into the bottom lock

Lockie pulling the boat

The water was really low and although we didn’t have far to go it was hard going and we got slower and slower. The boat in front was almost at the moorings which were on a curve and he came to a grinding halt and so we all stopped.  He wasn’t going anywhere as the water was so low.  He rang Canal &River Trust and they said they would send someone down to let water through so we all switched off our engines and waited.

Within half an hour water was coming down and we all started slowly moving.  We still struggled to get into the moorings but we made it. 

Passing the old dry dock

The locks are padlocked overnight and opened by the lock keepers as only a maximum of 12 boats are allowed up and down each day and you have to book.  The lockie unlocked the paddles and the boat in front of us went into the bottom lock.  Once he was out of the lock, we emptied the lock and then it was our turn.

Coming into the staircase

At the Top

Back onto the Llangollen Canal

There was a few boats to come down so they started coming down the staircase and we went up the second lock passing the house with the garden which used to be a dry dock and out of that one and straight into the staircase lock. The boat that came out of the second lock got his rope caught around his propeller and so they had to pull it out of the lock and onto the moorings.  Also the boat that was stuck behind us went to go into the moorings at the bottom of the locks and he got jammed on a rock and had to wait for more water to go down before he was able to go up the locks, so it was all happening today on the Monty!

Turning into the Ellesmere Arm

There was a lockie here so he helped me work the lock and Kev was soon heading into the second lock of the staircase and soon we were up at the top and out of the lock we went turning right back onto the Llangollen canal leaving the wonderful Monty canal behind us.

Common Sandpiper on the towpath

Down the arm we go

We chugged on a few miles under some bridges and then we were approaching Ellesmere.  There was a couple of spaces just before the arm and we were going to moor there but then a boat came out of the arm and we asked him if he had been moored there and he said yes so in we went to get his space.

At the bottom of the arm

We went down the end to turn around and went back up a couple of boats and moored up.

In the afternoon, we went up into the town and went to the deli which is such a great shop and bought a few goodies, then had a coffee in the nice café we went in on our last visit here.  We took our purchases back to the boat.   We needed some squash, wine, tonic, beer etc., so we went back to Tesco which is right by the canal at the end of the arm with our trolley to get all of that.

Ellesmere is a nice place and it was good to moor in the arm as on the way up the canal, it was full as it is a popular place to moor.

We are staying here tonight then moving on in the morning.

Moored in the Ellesmere Arm