Stockton Heath, Blue Ray and Preston Brook

You've heard of Wimbledon Common I'm sure .... well ....

.... this is the canal version - he apparently cruises up and down the Bridgewater removing the rubbish.

Yesterday when we stopped at Stockton Heath we did a Morrison's shop.  George had asked me to get two dvd's - Robin Hood (Russell Crowe) and The Ghost - which I did.  It wasn't until I was preparing our evening meal whilst moored at Moore that George opened the sealed packet containing the dvd's and announced that I'd bought Blue Ray ones (I thought they were dvd's which happened to be in blue boxes) and that they wouldn't work on our player.  So today 22/9 we walked the 2 1/2 miles back to Stockton Heath to see if they would exchange them.
It was a pleasant walk ...

when we approached the swing bridge at Lower Walton the barriers were down and the bridge in motion, unfortunately it was closing not opening so we didn't actually see this boat go by.

We walked along a footpath from the MSC bridge and found these derelict locks

Immediately after crossing the river bridge take a footpath on the right along the north side of the Walton Cut (the original course of the river) to view the derelict Walton Lock which gave access from the Ship Canal to the river Mersey.

Three cormorants in the sunshine on an old lock gate

a wide view of the site

a great crested grebe

the old lock gate barely visible in the vegetation.

When we got to Morrisons they agreed that they could refund the cost of the Blue Ray discs and she of course opened the covers to check that the discs were there - and low and behold the Robin Hood one was empty - I couldn't believe it!  I bought ordinary dvd's and we walked home again where we searched RnR from stern to bow and top to bottom - and we still can't find that disk - it really is a mystery.

Moore Post Office and General Store as we upped-sticks and continued on our way

we've heard a few Pheasants recently but this is the first we've seen this season

The sun continued to shine as we exited Preston Brook Tunnel back onto the Trent and Mersey Canal and stopped to visit Midland Chandlers.  I had purchased shoes the last time we were there (about 2-weeks ago) and whilst walking at Dunham Massey in the rain they started to leak so I returned them for a refund.

We ended a very busy day just past bridge Ryans Bridge 210.