Manchester (day 2)

Thursday morning was windy again so we put on hold our plan of going through the nine locks in the centre of Manchester until later in the day.  Whilst having breakfast a boat went past us on the way out of Birmingham – they were obviously unaware that the canal was closed about ¼ mile further up due to broken paddle gear in a lock.  I managed to get outside and let them know before they were out of earshot.  They weren’t aware because they hadn’t signed up for the notification emails.   

Anyway, a little later there was a knock on a window and I went out to see who it was.  It was Brian from the boat that had gone past.  He thanked us for letting him know about the closure and asked if we were going to go down through the middle of Manchester.  I said we were either going later today or tomorrow depending on the weather.  He wanted to know as he was going to have to turn round and go a different route because of the closure.  I said we were happy to pair up with them as they are double width locks in the centre of town.  We swapped telephone numbers and agreed to keep in touch.

Later on there was another knock on the window – it was Brian again, asking if we could help walk his boat back from where they were moored to moor next to us.  He wasn't able to turn it round as it was too windy.  We finished what we were doing and walked up to help them.  It was only ¼ mile as they were moored just under the first lock that was closed and we managed to walk it back with them without mishap.
 
After lunch we talk Buddy for a walk.  The name of this boat tickled us.

We also went past yet another duck house – they seem to be very popular up here.

At one point we passed these fine old cotton spinning factories.

The weather forecast for Friday was much improved so we agreed with Brian and Judith that we would set off at 7.30 on Friday morning to get down the nine locks together.  The locks are called the Rochdale Nine as they are the first flight of locks on the Rochdale canal which starts in the middle of Manchester and heads North across the Pennines to Rochdale.