Wednesday 10 June 2015 – Historic Marple (2)

This was another of Jack’s guided walks for SWOG. His previous outing, on 20 August 2014, is recorded here.

Today Sue and I would have set off from The Navigation if we could have found it (it’s in Marple on the main road by the canal), but we soon caught up with the twenty or so folk from SWOG who were ambling along the towpath in Jack’s delicate care.

We soon passed a converted mill building near where various short side branches of the Peak Forest Canal, to now disused mills and lime kilns, have been blocked off for some time.

However, it’s good to see the main canal, part of the 98 mile circuit that is the ‘Cheshire Ring’, in fine working order.

We wandered along to the aqueduct that dates from 1800. This is the highest canal aqueduct in England and the highest masonry-arch aqueduct in Britain. In the 1960s it was faced with demolition, but was saved with the help of a politician, Geoffrey Rippon.

This is a route that I used for ‘pushchair walks’ with my children back in the 1980s. Until recently views of the arches have been obscured by the uncontrolled growth of self-set trees, but these have recently been felled and the path has been upgraded, allowing easier access and good views through the arches of the aqueduct to those of the more recent railway viaduct.

It’s the time of year, as readers may already have noticed, when fields in this part of the world that aren’t being used for other crops are a yellow riot of buttercups, as here on the approach to the Watermeetings Farms.

After a pleasant stretch alongside the Goyt, and an illustrated history of Compstall from Jack, we turned towards Brabyns Park, past The George, which until recently was a vibrant pub with a fine bowling green, utilised on various occasions as a start and finish point for our evening walks.

But not today…

By contrast, the old iron bridge that leads into the park now sports a viewing platform and an impressive information plaque.

The bridge dates from 1813 and is apparently the only remaining cast iron bridge in the north west of England.

A little way upstream is one of many weirs built when the River Goyt provided power for numerous mills hereabouts.

A walk in the park saw us pause beside this mill pond for Jack’s final speech.

Thanks go to Jack for his informative efforts, the highlight of his commentary being to point out the curious nature of one of the occupants of the cemetery that we passed before adjourning for an excellent beverage in The Navigation.

Here’s our route – 7.5 km in well under 2 hours. One of many options for a short walk in this area.

Monday 8 June 2015 – Jacob Visits Chester Zoo

Sue and I enjoyed a lovely day out with Jacob. It was his first visit to a zoo, and our failure to visit the lions and alligators was for good reason. We didn’t want the four year old to have nightmares.

He didn’t seem seem to be bothered by the meercats though, whose main threat here seemed to come from a persistent band of magpies, whose diet maybe matches that of the meercats.

This rhino seemed curious, but posed no threat.

The monorail afforded us good views of zebras and other inmates.

Two types of flamingos were separated by a low fence. These are the dark orange variety (as opposed to the light orange variety).

We whizzed through the aquarium area, pausing only briefly to admire the seahorses.

By way of contrast, we spent an age with the penguins, who were fascinated by Jacob’s lollipop stick, which must have looked to them like a tasty little fish.

I was the only one to catch a proper sight of the giraffes, who were allowed out briefly, but their usual viewing points were closed as one of them had given birth the previous night.

The jaguars are housed in a large enclosed area, but they looked quite happy.

The day passed all too quickly. The four year old showed good stamina and was a pleasure to be with. He’s pictured below with his reward for good behaviour.

We can’t wait to go again. In the meantime, here’s a slideshow (36 images plus any added later from Sue’s album). Click on the first image and then click on ‘slideshow’.

TGO Challenge 2015 – Index of Postings

This posting is by way of an index to my daily entries, with links at the foot of each entry to daily slideshows that should open in a new window, and a link to the next day’s posting if you wish to continue reading without having to scroll back up the pages.

The majority of readers may prefer a single slideshow covering the whole crossing, so I’ve selected a few images from each day, giving a 119 image captioned slideshow – click here, then click on the first image and then click ‘slideshow’.

INDEX

Getting to the Start

Day 1 - Dornie to Coire na Breabaig

Day 2 - Coire na Breabaig to Garbh-choire

Day 3 - Garbh-choire to Kerrow House B&B, Cannich

Day 4 - Kerrow House B&B to Loch nam Meur (north)

Day 5 - Loch nam Meur to Aslaich B&B, Drumnadrochit

Day 6 - Drumnadrochit to Allt Cailtidh confluence at NH 612 207

Day 7 - Allt Cailtidh confluence to Carn Caol - NH 770 155

Day 8 - Carn Caol to Vermont Guest House, Aviemore

Day 9 - Aviemore to Glen Luibeg (NO 020 937)

Day 10 - Glen Luibeg to Thornbank Cottage, Braemar

Day 11 - Braemar to Broom Hill (NO 281 798)

Day 12 - Broom Hill to Tarfside

Day 13 - Tarfside to North Water Bridge

Like Lemmings to the Sea!

Day 14 - North Water Bridge to Nether Woodston

Finally, here’s a reminder of our route – 327 km with 11,100 metres ascent.

Enjoy!

That’s it. I should do the same for previous years, but I have other priorities just now…

Friday 5 June 2015 – Buttercups in Deepest Cheshire

This was the first of four ‘Deepest Cheshire’ evening walks organised by Andrew.

Six of us turned up early, intending to enjoy a pre-walk tipple at Sam Smith’s Olde Park Gate Inn. It’s not the first time that our planned rendezvous in Deepest Cheshire has proved to be drier than expected!

There was a minor conflab re our route, but I’m sure Andrew had it planned to a high degree of precision.

This is the map they were looking at….

We were soon strolling along the good path by Foxfield Wood, on a lovely sunny evening.

Jodrell Bank rose above the flat landscape, as on many most of Andrew’s excursions into Deepest Cheshire.

One of Cheshire’s principal crops just now appears to be Buttercups.

The light was starting to fade as we crossed a footbridge over the Peover Eye that eventually runs into the River Weaver.

Towards the end of our walk we passed the locked gates of the private mansion that is Peover Hall.

Lengthening shadows heralded a cloudless sunset.

The Whipping Stocks (a hostelry) was beckoning, hence the blurred figures in the evening light, with the hall in shade behind us.

Here’s our 8 km (5 miles) route, all on good paths and quiet lanes, taking well under two hours.

Well, that was a good way to spend an evening. Unfortunately I can’t get to the next three walks on Andrew’s programme, but he and Sue will be there to well anyone who cares to join them. Details are below:

Thursday 25 June
Deepest Cheshire (2) - starting at 7.30pm from the Bird in Hand, Knolls Green, Mobberley (SJ 803 795).

Thursday 16 July
Deepest Cheshire (3) - starting at 7.30pm from the Crown Inn, Main Road, Goostrey. (The one furthest from the Church, SJ 778 700.)

Thursday 30 July
Deepest Cheshire (4) - starting at 7.30pm from the Egerton Arms, Chelford (SJ 807 752).

A Visit to Dot

On Thursday, Sue and I enjoyed a visit to Eccleshall, to try to cheer up Dot, who is injured from a fall and unable to walk to the shops. We hope she recovers quickly.

We spent a happy hour or so in her garden before spending an hour and a half chatting to other drivers on the M6 after we got trapped by an accident. Looking at some of the tailgating going on on the other side of the road, it’s perhaps not surprising that some drivers are unable to retain control of their vehicles.

Another half hour delay greeted us in Altrincham, where a lorry had killed a pedestrian and in a separate accident a police car had crashed, blocking the ‘diversion’ route. Luckily, we didn’t really suffer apart from being slightly delayed. In fact, we regard ourselves lucky not to have been involved in the accidents.

It was also distressing to see parkrunner Jeanette arrive on crutches this morning, having tripped in the street and broken a kneecap. Thankfully race director Alan took pity and relocated Jeanette’s marshalling point from the ‘far bridge’ to somewhere closer. Thanks for your shouts of encouragement as we passed you Jeanette, I did a reasonable time though I was only third out of seven in my age group. Sue and I wish you a speedy recovery. (Results are here.)

Wednesday 3 June 2015 – An Evening Walk with SWOG – Godley

32 stalwarts from SWOG (Stockport Walking and Outdoors Group) assembled near Godley railway station and the entrance to Vincent Park. Sue found a friendly horse, and I found a pretty tree.

We set off along a disused freight line now utilised by the Trans Pennine Trail.

There are some fancy signs.

.. and some fancy gestures from someone who should know better (see slideshow)

We reached the Peak Forest Canal and its muddy towpath. After a while Old John needed a break where the towpath changed to the other side of the canal. Poor chap, his leg has gone wonky.

We enjoyed the lovely evening light.

32 people created quite a long crocodile.

We left the canal near Hyde Central Station and wound our way back to Vincent Park along minor roads and ginnels (see map below).

We passed this castellated pigsty, which I noted when we were last here on 6 August 2014, dates from 1767. (Previously we walked from a different spot in the opposite direction, on a similarly pleasant evening.)

We passed this tree house with window boxes.... Campbell lives here, we concluded, though he tried to deny it.

Here's the flattish route - a little under 8 km in an hour and three quarters, ending on this occasion with beers at Godley Hall Inn.

An excellent outing, there’s a slideshow (20 images) here. Click on the first image, then click ‘slideshow’.

Sunday 31 May 2015 – Resurfaced Towpaths on the Bridgewater Canal

First, I’m pleased to discover that Windows Live Writer is now working again.

Having received some positive information from Jan Williams at Saturday’s parkrun (congratulations to Sue on breaking her PB, by the way), I decided to cycle towards Manchester beyond Waters Meet, from where I know the Bridgewater Canal towpath has been resurfaced as far as the swing bridge over the Manchester Ship Canal.

I had thought the resurfacing on the Rochdale Canal link via Castlefield ended shortly after Waters Meet, so I expected to encounter mud fairly quickly. It was therefore a surprise to discover that the towpath has been resurfaced all the way to Castlefield. Great. If I was still working in town I could now cycle mainly off road on a firm surface and be at my desk within an hour, which is the time it used to take me by car.

No wonder I seem to be encountering more and more commuting cyclists when I go out at certain times. I just hope they remember that they are not the only users of the towpath and they respect others, especially dog walkers, who shouldn’t be expected to keep their charges on leads.

The top picture shows the new surface heading towards Castlefield from Throstle Nest Bridge, where the towpath crosses the bridge.

As I passed through Sale I noticed these ‘hooligans of tomorrow’ being herded in large numbers by their obnoxious parents.

If only we were allowed to trap them, I’m sure they would provide some tasty snacks!

Shortly before reaching Castlefield I decided to try to find an off-road route along the northern side of the Ship Canal, to get to the swing bridge and return home alongside the Bridgewater Canal. Taking a convenient bridge, this worked fine for a while, but beyond the BBC studios a short section of road was needed before the pavement incorporated a cycle track. The final section into Eccles was also along a road.

This ride does provide a good route from Timperley that doesn’t involve any mud. The path I took is shown below – it was over 32 km, but if the exploratory diversions are ironed out it would be about 30 km from Timperley Bridge.

Thanks to Jan for alerting me to this, and to Mike’s excellent ‘Mad Cycle Lanes of Manchester’ blog that Jan also put me on to. Anyone keen on cycling off-road in Greater Manchester could do worse than take a good look at some of Mike’s postings.

Chardonnay chicken with artichoke hearts

This chicken casserole goes well with creamy mashed potato or basmati and wild rice.
There is plenty of sauce so the recipe is very flexible, so you can do 2 thighs per person,
or add more to serve more people.

These ingredients will serve 6-8 people

 

12 chicken thighs, on or off the bone, skin removed
salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 tbsp olive oil
15 gm / ½ oz butter
2 large onions, roughly chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tsp caster sugar
25 gm / 1 oz plain flour
300 ml / ½ pint Chardonnay or dry white wine
225 gm / 8 oz small chestnut mushrooms, whole
1 x 400 gm can artichoke hearts
2 tbsp full-fat crème fraîche
4 tbsp chopped fresh parsley

Method
1       Season the chicken thighs with salt and pepper. Heat the oil and butter in a large deep frying pan (we use a Le Creuset casserole pan) and brown the chicken thighs all over, using more oil/butter as needed. Lift out onto a plate.
2       Add the onions, garlic and sugar to the oil remaining in the pan and cook over a low heat for about 15-20 minutes until tender.
3       Turn up the heat and allow the onions to brown. Sprinkle in the flour, thoroughly blending, add the wine and stir well. Bring to the boil, stirring until thickened.
4       Return the chicken to the pan with the mushrooms, season and bring to the boil. Simmer (covered) over a low heat, or transfer to a slow oven at 160°C/325°F/Gas 3 and cook with the lid on until the chicken is tender, about 45 minutes.
5       Drain the artichokes, cut them in half, and add to the chicken. Heat through gently then add the crème fraîche, check the seasoning and stir in most of the parsley.
6       Sprinkle with the remaining parsley and serve with creamy mash or basmati and wild rice

cook now, eat later TO PREPARE AND COOK AHEAD
Prepare to the end of step 4. Cool quickly, cover and keep in the fridge for up to 24 hours. Reheat until piping hot, stirring in the artichokes towards the end of reheating. Stir in the crème fraîche and parsley to serve.

TO FREEZE 
Cool quickly and freeze at the end of step 4 for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight in the fridge and reheat until piping hot. Continue with steps 5 and 6.

Recipe From Mary Berry’s Book
’Cook now, Eat Later’

Note:
This entry was triggered by a complaint about this recipe from our topwalks.com website that I received whilst on the TGO Challenge. The person concerned claimed there was not enough liquid. I usually use greater quantities, which may make a difference, so on return from Scotland I cooked a batch exactly as prescribed by the recipe. There was plenty of liquid, as you can see from the picture. I don't know what the complainant was doing wrong; perhaps she left the lid off the casserole...

The Trent and Mersey Canal

The missing image at the top of the last post is intrinsic to that post, but I don't like to see that at the head of my blog.

Some of the images in the 'Cruising' trip that I've adjusted here by clicking on 'HTML' and changing the pixel size are now showing at a horribly low resolution, so I've tried to provide an improved version of one of them above.

The lower image has been added at the pixel size of 550 width and 410 height that I use when composing in WLW - I had to adjust it in HTML in Blogger to get this, and it's after 'Save for Web' using Photoshop.

The upper image has not been 'saved for web', simply saved into the folder I use for posting to the web, at a size of 1.3Mb. When inserted into this posting using Blogger's 'X-large' setting, it was too big for this page, so I found the size by clicking on 'HTML' and I reduced the width from 1600 to 1400 and the height from 640 to 560. This seems to have worked well.

At least viewers now see images rather than a black cross, and I hope my efforts may be useful to someone - probably you are already loading images in the manner I have just discovered! I suppose I ought to go back to the 'Cruising' images and reload them by the method that has produced the upper image, but I have other priorities just now...