Mid-day in mid-winter. Long shadows. Flat mid-Cheshire. Midi midi mid mid midi midi mid.

Poor, poor Fatty (AKA "Bess"), a lovely affectionate cat who used to hold me up walking to the bus stop across the car park at the marina in Scholar Green by throwing herself under my feet demanding to be stroked!

She was 17 years old and had spent several years living on board with a very nice family at the marina, after getting over the habit of rolling over asleep and falling in (and not being too athletic in terms of her ability to get out!). She was also quite happy curled up asleep in the pouring rain. She died under the wheels of a car in chase for her last mouse (she got it).

The LLangollen branch about to join the Chester branch of the S.U. Hurleston reservoir which supplies drinking water to the chester area is behind the bank on the left - the very distant-looking oblique hill is Mow Cop on the edge of Stokey land - and below which I lived for many years in and around Heritage marina. I miss it and the peeps (especially that special little dog Holly!) in The Rising Sun, - but Nantwich is great as well.

The view from the Bow - The Shropshire Union canal is known for its long straight sections - especially on the old Chester branch.

View out of a port-side window, the canal goes over Nantich Aquaduct (Telford) S-bends through the trees and heads off through flat cheshire, then soon into rolling Shropshire countryside.

Not a Boat Blog! (or not just a boat blog).

There's also other randomish stuff here but a fair bit of boaty stuff too, and it's mainly somewhere to send my camera phone pics as I say above.

Anyway - here's a gratuitous picture of a rather elegant old boat I took some months ago. I've got '1817' written here...maybe it should be 1870?

Political Blogging - If I thought that writing a political blog would make any discernable difference maybe I would write one. I strongly suspect however, that they are as about as effective in mustering change as pissing on a nuclear explosion.

Having said that - read my rant with some Tory types on the link below if you really want to!

http://carolinehunt.blogspot.com/2007/01/cameron-being-sound.html#links

Laa daa Dee daa daa daaah etc.

Looking "swell"

Geddit?

Trip boats and ducks on the Dee

I actually saw a butterfly flitting about today. It's mid January and T-shirt weather!

Meanwhile an English professor visiting Atlanta gets wressled to the ground by a cop .for J-walking!

Pedestrians and cyclists of the world unite! - now we have nothing to lose but our err....chains.

As someone said - "it's the end of the world as we know it - and I feel fine"...

What is there not to love?

(Murderous little git)

I think they must have spent the entire year’s profits on the fireworks at The Boot N’ Shoe on New Years Eve.

The Boot N’ Shoe, or "Shoot N’ Boo" as I tend to call it after a pint or two – one of my regular haunts since I’ve been in Nantwich (now on a winter mooring ‘til the end of March)….

A great pub and great bohemian company.

A Christmas pressie from my sister - a log-making device for turning old newspapers, boat-mags and anything else burnable into densely-packed "logs" for the stove. Thanks Suey!

Here are my home-made "logs" !

Harvey thinks my lap-top bag makes an ideal bed.

Good places to see Kingfishers that I know about on "my stretch" of the canal network...

Scholar Green (especially around the leafy section near the stop lock and by the turning point a couple of miles further up opposite Ramsdell Hall). Also, when I have been to Nantwich before I had one sitting on the bow (before I could get a photo) and I am seeing them so regularly here lately that they could become boring (not really).

Recently between the juction at Wardle and the Venetian marina I counted five kingfishers, including two together (so they weren't all the same one if that's what you're thinking!). I always see far more in the winter I don't know if that's because the water is clearer for fishing when there are fewer boats moving or what?? They are not easy to photograph with my mobile phone/camera however so I have nicked this photo from http://www.wbct.org.uk/a-z_wildlife.htm from the Wilts & Berks Canal Trust, thanks.

Potential New Year Resolutions….

Admit to everyone I meet that I found Saddam’s hanging made me feel sick to the pits of my stomach – no matter what he’s done – KILLING IS WRONG. A killer is a killer – He was murdered as far as I’m concerned and the manner of his death can only be a bad thing in every conceivable way.

Join a human rights campaigning organisation – they seem to be slipping from under us in the name/false evil of “security”.


Scrap the above and start a campaign to have Bush humiliated and executed.

Finally plumb in my new sink unit!

Finally start/join that band.

Not have any New Year Resolutions.



I think I’ll go for No 6. Though maybe “stop ranting” would be a good one!

Have a great 2007 whoever you are!