Audlem in August

 

Audlem locks

Hilary and I are just back from a week in Audlem, not on a boat but in a holiday cottage. After a long period - predating lockdown - of not being able to go away much we finally got the chance last week, provided that we didn't go too far or for too long.  A short-notice search for holiday accomodation "within 100 miles of Lancaster" (but excluding seriously busy places such as the Lake District or the coast) turned up a handful of possibilities of which Audlem stood out immediately.  Having passed through there many times on Starcross and other boats I'd always wondered what it might be like to live there, so here was a chance to find out, if only for a week.

Although the canal, and particularly the flight of locks, were an attraction, we chose Audlem primarily as base for cycling - it being at the hub of a network of quiet roads radiating in all directions from the village. Not that we ignored the canal, of course. Indeed on our first afternoon after arriving we took a walk up and down the flight, closing a few gates for boaters and dropping paddles for a solo boater who appeared to have "forgotten" his when leaving the lock. 

 Afterwards, finding ourselves outside the "Shroppie Fly" we treated ourselves to our first pints of draught beer in a pub since March.  I have to say that it was a surprisingly normal experience. Apart from the barmaid wearing a face visor, we just ordered at the bar, paid in cash and took our drinks to an outdoor table. Naturally, I didn't even find it strange that an attractive young woman in a pub was asking me for my name and phone number (although she hasn't called me yet!).

But the main focus of the week was cycling. Even the two A roads that meet in the village square were lightly trafficked and they gave access to a large network of even quieter "yellow" roads that were just hilly enough to make life interesting without being exhausting. Although in Cheshire, the Shropshire and Staffordshire borders were not far away and we travelled through all three counties over the week.

Cheshire County Council must have been one of a number of rural authorities that took the government's policy of removal of old-fashioned signposting from  roads as an "aspiration" rather than an "instruction" back in the 1960s and so I was able to indulge my passion for photographing the old milestones and fingerposts that abounded there but have disappeared from many parts of the country.  My favourite was this one in the hamlet of Wilkesley.

Note the Cheshire County Council ("CCC") badge on the post and, most unusually, the maker's name at the base

 

The rather improbable W.H.Smith & Co of Whitchurch, which was actually a foundry and not a chain of booksellers!

That example was on a junction of two minor roads, but Cheshire also retained some fingerposts on "A" roads such as this one we came across on the A529 which was supposed to have been removed when its modern replacements were installed, although it appears that maintenance and repainting has since ceased.

In a car you probably wouldn't notice these signs. Indeed one of the reasons for replacing them was that modern traffic goes too quickly for them to be of much use and it was felt that drivers slowing down suddenly at junctions to check directions would be a hazard to faster traffic behind. (These days it would be called "traffic calming"). Even when you do notice them - and other things of interest -  from a car there's never anywhere to stop to take a photo, which is one of the reasons I like travelling by bike.