Saturday 22 August 6 miles
Hilary, Donna, Tracey + Jane
The weather was not promising first thing as it was drizzling. It was cloudy and a bit breezy at the beginning of the walk.
We parked on the side of the road near The Shady Oak pub.
We did some walking on the road to start with away from the pub then joined the Sandstone Trail with lovely views of Beeston Castle.
We crossed the Shropshire Union Canal canal and walked across the fields to the road and passed the entrance to Beeston Castle. We continued on the Sandstone Trail through the woods, then walked along the road around the base of the castle until we got to the sign for the Shady Oak and followed that road to the canal.
The sun had come out and we had our lunch sitting on a bench by the canal opposite the Shady Oak.
A lump of grass came floating under the bridge, some boats pushed through the grass sending it back towards the bridge, then another boat came under the bridge sending the grass the other way and passed us. Hilary wondered if it would hold a person, I suggested that she should try it, but she didn't - I wonder why not!
To make the walk a bit longer we walked down the canal to the A49 by Chas Hardern Boats, then we walked back. We could see the place where the canal had been repaired after a major breach of Shropshire Union Canal at Beeston was caused by heavy rains and floods from Storm Christoph. We noticed the River Gowy at this point and the railway line, a few trains passed.
When we got back towards the Shady Oak a leisure boat was manoeuvring the piece grass and pushing it into the bank where the canal was a bit wider.
We went to find The Drays Coffee Shop in Eaton, we did eventually find it but it is closed on a Sunday plus it closes at 3pm so we wouldn't have got there in time anyway. So we went to Tarporley Garden Centre for tea and cake. They have made the cafe bigger, but had the aircon on so it was a bit cold. We had a look around the garden centre
No comments:
Post a Comment