Today has been a good day!  The water level had dropped enough at Castleford for us to be able to go through Castleford and back onto the river.  We cruised down to the lock and moored to fill up with water and empty the toilet before we got under way.  Unfortunately the elsan disposal was blocked so had to leave that.  Whilst we filled up with water the lock keeper arrived and prepared the lock for something coming up.  This turned out to be a large gravel boat.  Took some pictures of it coming through the lock to try and show the sheer size of these things.

The plan was to moor up somewhere just past Fall Ings Lock today, but as we were making good time and it wasn’t raining, we decided to carry on a bit further to try and make up for the stoppage at Castleford.  We had a couple of problems with some of the locks, which now have to be operated manually, including Fall Ings Lock where I just couldn’t move the paddles at the top end.  Graham had to come and do it and he struggled as well.  Today has been a mix of river and canal work, with some of the river levels being fine and other parts being well into the amber on the indicator boards.  It will be strange to get back onto the canal system where water levels tend to be too low.   

 

Went past BW's workshop at Stanley Ferry and spotted a pile of lock gates.

Also crosses the impressive aquaduct at Stanley Ferry where we also emptied the toilet, in the elsan disposal of course.

We moored up at Broad Cut Top Lock at about 5:00pm, and after sorting out the dogs and having a shower retired to the pub, conveniently sited next to the tow path, for a beer.  If the weather is kind to us again tomorrow we will likely have another longish day, and hopefully remain on schedule for our booking to go through the tunnel.