Part 4 – In steam narrow boat President’s centenary year, Tim Coghlan continues his personal memories – concluding his voyage in August, 1998, when he joined fellow Friends of President for a run down Britain’s last-ditch attempt at canal building.
We soon arrived at Mode Wheel Locks, the first proper Manchester Ship Canal locks which historically also controlled the whole of the water for the Manchester Docks. On the Manchester Ship Canal itself, all locks are plural, as they are all double locks – one for large and the other for smaller vessels. As promised by the organisers the gates then remained open until the whole fleet of twenty-six boats had entered it. – though still the mighty lock looked half empty of boats. ‘You should have seen it on the way up. We had 66 boats in one of the locks.’ said Ron, ‘It was quite spectacular’.