Page Published: 4 December 2025
Welcome to Part Two!
If you've come to this page via a search or by mistake, you might find it better to read Part One of this story of my first solo cruise aboard Stolen Time.
Anderton and Beyond
After the brief spell photographing the interior, recorded in Part One, it didn't take too long to reach sight of the Anderton Boat Lift. It opened for traffic the following month after a two year restoration. Not that I think I would have wanted to pay the fee to drop to the River Weaver when there was only me on board.
Approaching the Anderton Boat Lift.
The drained pool at the top of the Boat Lift.
After a flurry of picture taken early on the Saturday morning I seem to have forgotten about using the camera. It may be that I was concerned about filling it's memory. I don't recall but I may not have had any memory card at all. In those days cameras often had a small amount of internal memory. I know I didn't buy a card with any worthwhile storage until 2003, when I was preparing to join the crew of nb Earnest for a Week's cruise between Lancaster and the Bingley Five Rise.
After passing by the boat lift the canal makes its way north-east in a zig-zag course, past back gardens and a large marina, towards Marbury Country Park. The park is a heavily wooded area but, suddenly, the woodland gives way to farm land and 200 yards later the canal swings in a tight corner south east. I have to resort to other sources for images of this part of the cruise.
After passing through Anderton you finally make it to open countryside just before the canal swings to the right.
The Lion Salt Works and Industry Beyond
The next significant landmark after Anderton is the Lion Salt Works. They were on my right as I passed and I seem to recall that both sides of the building you see in the photograph below had similar sign writing. The latest towpath images suggest that there is much more vegetation around the building these days which totally obscure the side you see in the photo.
This image is much closer to the scene as I recall it than recent pictures of the salt works which have the building totally obscured by vegetation.
Beyond the salt works you encounter almost a mile of modern factories or warehouses on the left side. Then there's another sharp turn and you find yourself travelling in a generally southerly direction, and that's where the heavy industry starts. These days maps label the largest part of it as the Tata Chemical Works, but there are other companies present too.
On our right are the Tata Chemical Works although, from the various somewhat specialised bridges it appears that part of the plant is on the off-side of the canal.
If I'm reading Google Maps labelling right, this is part of Inovyn's manufacturing plant.
I read that the Inovyn operations at Northwich focuses on the solution, mining and processing of brine. No doubt that accounts for why you see something that could be taken to be a large swimming pool on the site. The Northwich plant supplies their site at Runcorn where it is used as one of the key raw materials for the production of chlorine, caustic soda, chlorinated derivatives and food grade salt. More locally they also supply the Tata factory. I knew none of this as I passed by on an increasingly grey day.
The Return to Bartington
Once past the heavy industry you begin to encounter housing on each side of the canal. I do not recall where I stopped for lunch but I do recall that I began to consider how far to go before turning round to head back to Bartington. My copy of Nicholson didn't indicate any especially significant land mark which I would miss if I turned at the next winding hole. My best guess, although I have no memory of doing so, is that I would have turned at the one close to the Elizabethan Way Play Area.
My guess is that this is th winding hole at which I turned Stolen Time to return to Anderton. It's just north of Bridge 183.
I do wonder if I stopped for lunch somewhere between the Lion Salt Works and the point just before you pass through the woodland at Marbury Country Park. However, I can be certain that I stopped at the Anderton Facilities to top up with water, as I took a photograph showing the boat's hose pipe running from the tap to the tank. That photo also confirms that, by then, it was raining, something I do remember.
The rain left smudges on my photo while I topped up the water tank at the facilities at Anderton, which were then just north of Bridge 199.
I didn't have my collections of old Nicholson Guides when I began writing up this log and even if I had I may not have realised that while my 2003 edition shows the facilities just north of Bridge 199, my 2013 reprint of a later edition shows that they are now amongst the boatyards beyond Bridge 198. That's where contacts with long memories came in useful. They were able to give me the give me the link from which I grabbed the image below.
The site of the old Anderton facilities as it looks in 2025. My contacts drew attention to the break in the fencing where the building used to stand and the telegraph pole on the opposite bank as reference points, which can can see better if you click on the credit link which takes you to a 360° view of the area.
One of the differences I noticed between the two photographs was the change from the black and white notice of British Waterways on the far bank to the blue of the Canal and River Trust but what jumped out at me was the red boat moored on the far side of the canal. It appears to be the same one that was moored there in 2002. At first I thought the blue boat ahead of it was the same as that in my time as well, but looking at the current view you realise the new boat is a lot longer.
Monday 11 February 2002 - Last Morning
After visiting the Water Point at Anderton I know I carried on as I have distinct memories of spending the night moored on the long straight between bridges 200 and 201, on the hillside above Winnington Swing Bridge.
A current view of the long straight where I recall spending the night before returning the boat to Bartington Wharf.
I don't think it was quite as sunny as shown in the picture when I awoke on that last morning, but it was certainly dry. I recall taking the next three pictures which were planned to be used on the Stolen Time web site, and were to show the engine compartment before the "hospital silencer" was fitted. This was to be installed during the forthcoming winter maintenance break.
I see no trace of rain on the pictures which suggests to me that they were taken on the final morning rather than later the previous afternoon after visiting the water point. But they also show no trace of sun, which suggests the skies cleared very quickly on that final morning as there wasn't a cloud in the sky by the time I had moored Stolen Time at Bartington Wharf.
With all the hatches removed, we look down into the engine bay from the steps rising from the aft cabin.
Here we see the engine looking down to starboard from above the weed hatch where we can see a sheet of plywood covering the bank of batteries.
Now looking forward to port, we see the calorifier, the hot water tank, and a lot of sound insulation on the aft cabin bulkhead.
The shed in the grounds of Bartington Forge, seen on the bank opposite the wharf is still there. The shadows in my final picture suggest that it may have been between 10:00 and 10:30 by the time I had moored at the wharf and packed the car. It was around a four hour drive to get back home to Norfolk and that wouldn't have included any breaks I would have taken along the way.
The final picture that I took on the trip. I was told to leave Stolen Time triple berthed against another OwnerShips boat.
It may not have been the holiday that I had in mind for both of us, but I think, that for me, it was a question of making sure we got value for money from our purchase of the share in the boat.