Flight of fancy

The guidebooks will tell you that the 16 locks of the Marple Flight are one of the most picturesque in the country. What they won't tell you is that they are bloody hard worrk.
The mile long flight certainly is beautiful, the second half especially feels like it's in a country park, running through tall trees between which can be glimpsed distant views of the other side of the Goyt Valley.
But the locks drop you down 214 feet so they're big and big usually does mean heavy. The huge bottom gates were hard work even when the lock was emptied and, as for the paddles well some I couldn't wind up and had to resort to taking the windlass out and moving it around to find the optimum angle for a quarter turn heave before moving it round again. Wimp that I am!
Anyway, we were in the first at 8.15 and out the last at 10.50, didn't see a soul and moored just below the flight moments before a cloudburst. Not bad.