Liverpool bound.......

Back onto the Leeds and Liverpool canal we headed towards our rendezvous with the Canal and River Trust team just before the swing bridge near Aintree. They would then help us down through the locks into Liverpool.

Cruising through Burscough and Scarisbrick we joined  other boats the following day that were heading towards the Liverpool 'Link'....


We had booked the passage through the 'link' early in the year to coincide with the three-day event by the fantastic giant puppet creations of the French company 'Royal de Lux'


Passage through the last few miles of the Leeds and Liverpool canal towards Liverpool has one serious problem - rubbish!!!!!!!   Mainly in the shape of plastic bags that wrapped around the propeller.  We had been behind the wide-beam charity boat 'Pride of Sefton' and started to loose speed as the dreaded bags converted the prop' into a round ball of plastic.  I managed to struggle the boat to the top of the locks that take boats down into the 'link' and moored there to spend 15 minutes hacking at the plastic bags through the weed-hatch.


Propeller free to actually move the boat forward at full speed we descended the Stanley lock flight towards the tobacco warehouses dock.  These warehouses have been converted to apartments and businesses in the last few years after remaining derelict for some sixty years. They are impressive buildings and claim to be the largest brick-built structures in the world with some16 million bricks being used to build just one of them. Not sure who counted the bricks but I am sure they made some nineteenth-century building material supplier a wealthy man!!!!! It is certain that the bricks would have been shipped by barge and unloaded by hand......what a job!!!!!

Tobacco warehouse at the bottom of the Stanley locks.

Stanley Dock........Liverpool link  is off to the left.

Moving through the first dock the 'link' canal is on the left and one of the Canal River Trust volunteers has planted a sign next to it announcing ......... 'Sid's Ditch'      A bit of characteristic Liverpudlian humour that paints a smile on the faces of boat crews during their passage into the heart of Liverpool water front.......

'Sid's Ditch'   otherwise known as the Liverpool Link

Liver building glimpsed through the new developements

'Hey - what is that cruise-liner doing on our mooring ?'

Liverpool 'Link' passing the Pier head

Opened in 2009 at a cost of some £22 million this was the first direct link from the Leeds and Liverpool canal to the South docks since the George dock was filled in during the  1900s and the Liver building built on it.  Boat crews are greeted with stunning views of the 'Three Graces' and the modern pier head building as they emerge blinking from the gloom of a short tunnel into the new waterfront.

Entering Canning half-tide dock. Mersey Bar lightship is now actually - a bar!!!!

Salthouse dock - is it something we said?  Peaceful but not for long, as the moorings soon filled with visiting boats.

Passing through Canning dock and Albert dock we arrived at our mooring for the next ten days - Salthouse dock.

Liverpool greeted us with weather that was more Mediterranean than Liverpudlian. Our folding chairs and cold beers materialized like magic as we relaxed to drink in the view of  Liverpool waterfront with its dramatic buildings both old and new.

 

Albert dock is dramatic both by day and ........night.

Fireworks display for a cruise-ship's last night in Liverpool.

Inland waterway boat crews are more used to muddy canal water and it comes as a welcome surprise to realize that the sea water in the dock is crystal clear giving a perfect view of the bottom of your boat - and the colony of beautiful jelly fish that inhabit the dock.

A visit to Liverpool is not complete without a trip on the world famous Ferry. We decided to visit the Seacombe terminal and then a local bus to the flesh pots of New Brighton.........we know how to live!!!!!!!!!!

I remember visiting New Brighton as a small boy when the rapidly declining resort had a Ferry terminal all of it's own.
Even then I was not too impressed with New Brighton but the ferry was a 1950s equivalent of a cruise-liner ( in my eyes) and I would have been more than happy just to ride the ferry all day!  

Mersey Ferry is dwarfed by this giant cruise-liner registered in Bermuda.

Sun-kissed beaches..........New Brighton

Now THIS is what I call a sand-castle............ Perch Rock fort built in 1826 to stop Napoleon sailing up the Mersey and laying claim to New Brighton for himself after he became bored with the Mediterranean.

Exhausted from the never ending delights of New Brighton
 (including a visit to Morrison,s supermarket) we reluctantly returned to Liverpool for the main feature................. a fabulous three-day giant puppet event.

This event proved fantastically popular in 2012 and reportedly attracted £32million for the local economy. We had seen the coverage on T.V at that time and it certainly captured our own perpetual childhood imaginations. Now we had ring-side seats and could not wait......

Xolo the dog meets a real pooch.

Grandmother takes to her wheelchair to cross Salthouse dock bridge.

Crowds line Salthouse dock

A glance for the camera from the Little girl puppet

Jean Luc Courcoult - the giant character behind the creation of the giant puppets.

Prepare for anything during this show........

Giant cranes for giant puppets. Canning dock is prepared for the farewell voyage of the puppets on the River Mersey.

Farewell flotilla on the River Mersey for the puppets.

Puppets........Liverpool........Salthouse Dock........New Brighton.   All good things come to end, so we will return soon via the Leeds and Liverpool, Bridgewater, Trent and Mersey canals.

Puppets may come and go - but 1960s singer Billy Fury is still remembered

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