Getting filthy for fun!

More than a dozen grown men were slopping around in mud at the weekend, as volunteers from the Waterway Recovery Group helped the Chesterfield Canal Trust's Work Party members to clear a lock.

Wheeldon Mill Lock on the Chesterfield Canal as it passes Brimington was getting clogged up with mud, Rod Auton tells us, so the work party sealed up the top lock gate, emptied the canal below the lock and set up a pump. They then had to climb 14 feet down into the filthy, muddy water and shovelled the mud into wheelbarrows. These were then hauled up out of the lock on a hoist and were emptied on waste ground away from the canal, which took all weekend.

Of course all the activity attracted great interest from walkers on the towpath, with lots of questions, much approval and admiration that this sort of work would be done by volunteers. One woman even asked for a form to apply for membership of the Chesterfield Canal Trust.

Renishaw

As many of you know, the Waterway Recovery Group volunteers help to restore canals all over the country, going for weekends or sometimes full weeks. They are next due on the Chesterfield Canal in July to help with the work at Renishaw.

The Chesterfield Canal Trust is campaigning to 'Close the Gap' between Staveley and Kiveton Park. This is the nine miles section that remains to be restored. Detailed studies and plans exist for the full distance and work is going on all the time, with the construction of Staveley Town Basin planned to start in the next few weeks.