Mode Wheel to Barton Lock.

About twenty minuets later we were entering Mode Wheel Lock. The bloke on the lock was telling us he had worked there since a lad and had just taken over the company that now is subcontracted to work the locks etc on the MSC. He was very interesting and had been working over night at another of his jobs.

The Ship Canal was completely opened in 1893 ans it looks like the machinery for the locks has not cahnged much at all since those days. As can be seen the gates are opened by chain drives that are hydraulically operated. The guy was saying that originally they had worked via an accumulator but now it is a pump providing the pressure and it sucks in from above the lock and out at the bottom. In winter, as there is not that much use, the water freezes. With the accumulator antifreeze could be used or the tank heated.

Our first vessel passed was 'Noest' that was discharging cement that is always in demand. Noest is Dutch and was built in 1995.

Allied Mills supplies flour and semolina for the Associated British Foods group and has recently restarted milling for third parties too. As much grain was brought up the Ship Canal from Canada it is a natural place for the mill to be built in.

There are plenty of old wharves and quays and these cormorants were taking advantage of the structure and the sun.

The next ship we passed was the Arklow Rival that was on a scrap metal berth. She looked loaded to me and it transpires that a couple of days before a loaded ship left the berth and touched the bottom. The captains are instructed to load their ships to the maximum draft, so as to get as much paying cargo in them. Quite rightly the Master refused to sail until he knew what draft he could load to. It seems up here the maximum draft in 5.6 mtrs. and they had to verify that this was still so.She was built in 2006 and was taking the scrap to El Ferrol in Spain. A lot of our scrap goes to Spain for all those SEAT's I suppose.

Part of the scrap was these tram wheels. I have often wondered how often the wheel and rails had to be changed as they go round some sharp curves and there is much squealing of steel on steel. With this pile of wheels it seems it is quite regularly.

As we approached the Barton Canal swind bridge we could see a narrow boat on the Bridgewater sitting there and taking pictures of us. It was the 'Molly Ryan'.

It is always nice to have a cute photo of cygnets on a swans back.

The same lads saw us through Barton Locks. Going down we didn't need any ropes as you could hardly feel the decent. The dial on the side of the building is a gauge that reads off the depth in the canal above the lock. It is the only lock with one left as there are now digital read outs inside the shed. I wondered why they use the big lock when it is just a pair of narrow boats and was told that the smaller, barge locks couldn't be used as they had been stripped of gear to keep the ship locks going. There is a 'middle' gate in the large lock, and this was used on a couple of the locks to reduce the amount of water lost.

The training wall between the two locks shows great neglect and would need a lot of work to be brought into use again.