A European Adventure: Part 2 The Narrowboat

If you didn’t see part 1, that talks mostly about Paris and how we ended up on this adventure. You can check it out here.

After 4 days in Paris, we took the train back to England. We took the 7:43 train and thankfully there was a Paul’s Bakery in the train station. Paul’s is a chain, but quite a good one! We got some delish pastries for breakfast on the train. We arrived in London and walked from St. Pancras Station to Euston Station. It’s not too bad of a walk but lugging 45lb suitcases made for an interesting trek! At Euston Station we caught the train to Shrewsbury where we would spend the night before picking up our canal boat in Ellesmere.

Shrewsbury is just a few stops away from Wrexham, so we just had to take the train up to see the town and where the games are played. If you haven’t watched Welcome to Wrexham yet, you’re missing out! It’s kind of like the real life Ted Lasso. We happened to be there just days after the football club had been promoted, so the atmosphere was amazing! We went to a restaurant called The Fat Boar for dinner. It was so good! They had this beer cheese appetizer that was so yum. We couldn’t quite identify the flavors but it almost had a holiday taste to it. I had the chicken salad on Henllan Bread. I had never heard of Henllan bread, but it is so delicious! Fluffy but well structured. After dinner we headed back to Shrewsbury.

Before we left Shrewsbury we had some free time that we weren’t sure how to fill. My SIL found a historic home called Attingham Park, so we took a cab and went for a visit! The home was donated to the British Trust and a lot of the original furnishings were included in the donation. This was one of the best manor homes I’ve ever been to. The docents had excellent information. The rooms that had been in disrepair had been excellently redone with great attention to detail. One of my favorite rooms was the kitchen! It was massive and there were two people working in it actually making food! It smelled wonderful and they gave us samples. One of the samples was a Shrewsbury Cake. They were so good and unexpected that I was super excited to see that they sold cook books with the recipes they were creating. I’ll have to share this recipe at some point!

After our tour we went back to the hotel and picked up our luggage and got a cab to Ellesmere, where we picked up our canal boat from ABC Boat Hire. We decided on ABC because of their boat layouts. With 5 people on the boat we wanted to have 2 full bathrooms and “bedrooms” for all of us. We were in the Greenish Warbler. It worked out perfectly because the closet doors swing both ways and can become “bedroom” doors. Canal boats are 6 feet wide and vary in length. Ours was 75ft long to accommodate the 3 “bedrooms”. Canal boats were used between 1759 and about 1830 to transport goods to market. After that, transportation changed to railways and the canals were used less. Originally, canal boats were pulled by horses, so there is a Tow Path on each side of the canals where a horse would walk, and where nowadays, people walk. Our route was to take the Shropshire Union Canal Llangollen Branch from Blackwater Meadow Marina to the Llangollen Basin Marina and back in 7 days.

We got a quick tour of the boat, which included driving and canal etiquette, and then took off! We motored for awhile and then stopped at Whittington wharf near a pub called The Narrow Boat Inn where we went to dinner. We had a starter of breaded brie wedges, and I had the ricotta cannelloni, both of which were really good! For dessert I had the raspberry white chocolate roulade which was amazing. The last time I was in the UK, over 15 years ago, I remember thinking the food was only ever just warm… But we were surprised to find this time around that the food was always piping hot. So wonderful on a cold day! At the end of the night we moored up along the side of the canal and tied the boat off.

We happened to be on our trip during coronation day! Unfortunately we were motoring and didn’t have good enough television signal to see much of the ceremonies. We went through two locks on day two on the boat and they were a little easier to operate than I thought they would be. We stopped in a town called Gledrid, where we got off to explore a bit. We ran into the most interesting store called Dobbies Garden Center. At first glance, I was like why would I go to a garden center when I can’t garden?! But it was wonderful! Sort of like a department store with a garden center, grocery store and a food hall. They carried some great brands and those of us who were freezing were able to pick up a jacket or two! I’m sure to locals it is equivalent to a Target or something, but we loved it!

On day 3 of our trip we got to go over 2 aqueducts, Chirk Aqueduct and Pontcysyllte Aqueduct. Crossing Chirk Aqueduct officially put us in Wales. And Pontcysyllte Aquedyct is a world heritage site. The crossing was absolutely stunning but also a little nerve wracking because the sides of the aqueduct look like thin pieces of metal holding the water in! We felt a bit like a circus side show going across the aqueduct as people were walking along enjoying the day and taking photos of our boat crossing! After going through the aqueducts, we went through two areas which were only one boat wide, meaning that if you came across another boat, one of you would have to back up and let the other pass. There are walking paths along the side of the canal, so we would walk ahead to the end of the narrow and then call back to the boat to let them know to proceed.

After getting through the narrows, we arrived in Llangollen. This is the only place where we stayed the night on a dock. Llangollen is the end of the line and you have to turn around and come back the way you came when you’re done. So there is a big marina at the end with docks and spaces for quite a few boats. Llangollen also has a horse drawn boat, which is how the canal boats were originally powered, so that was very fun to see. The town of Llangollen is very picturesque. The canal and marina are up on a hill and the town itself is quite a ways below with a river in between. So pretty!

In Llangollen we visited Plas Newydd which is an old gothic home and garden. The style of the home is very different and the interior had multiple different ceiling heights, types of decor and intricate carvings. The ladies who had lived there would re do small sections at a time so the design styles were quite different in each room. The gardens are also very beautiful, we were there in early spring and there were already tons of gorgeous flowers. After visiting Plas Newydd, we went back into town for lunch at Fouzi’s. I had the brie, bacon and cranberry panini which was so delicious! After lunch we all went our separate ways to explore different things. My mom and I explored the town more, Dad went to Horseshoe Falls and my brother and his wife went to Dinas Bran, which is remains of a castle which was destroyed in 1277. Later on we all met up for dinner at the Dee Side Cafe where we sat in a booth hanging over the River Dee. After dinner we went back to the boat to watch some British telly!

On day 4, we left Llangollen to go to Chirk. We arrived around 1pm and as soon as we arrived we smelled something like baking chocolate bread. It smelled delicious and we finally figured out that there is a Cadbury chocolate factory where they process all of the cocoa for the rest of the Cadbury plants. We walked in to town and visited the parish church of St. Mary. The fount is from 1662 and the church has been mentioned as far back as the 11th century, there are references to it in the Domesday Book from 1086. Its definitely worth a look if you’re in the area! After walking through town a bit we went to dinner at the Castle Bistro, which was quite good.

The following day we walked to Chirk Castle. It was about a 40 minute walk, uphill, from our boat. Phew! It wasn’t super pleasant, but the castle was very fun! It is a 13th century Marcher castle that became the home of the Myddleton family in 1595 where they stayed for over 400 years. The gardens are very large and have tons of different plants and flowers. There were some gorgeous fiery looking tulips that were a favorite of mine. All of the tulips we saw in the UK were massive and beautiful. After the gardens we did the self guided tour of the castle. This castle has many areas that still show what life may have been like at the time. From dungeons to servants quarters to commodes and more, there were many areas that felt as if they had never really changed! There is also an area of the castle that was lived in until the 1940’s. This area still had a fair bit of furniture and decor and the difference to the older area of the castle was striking.

After visiting the castle we went back to our boat and on to Whittington. To get there we would have to go through two locks again. At this point in our trip all of the locks and bridges had worked perfectly. At the New Martin 1 lock, a boat went through and then it as our turn. But the door of the lock wouldn’t close. After almost an hour of messing with the doors using the pole included on the top of the boat, my dad finally dislodged something and we were able to move again! As is to be expected, many boats came up to the lock in both directions while we were working on the problem. Thankfully they were all very cheerful and kind and wanting to help. We found that of almost everyone we encountered.

That night we stopped in Whittington again and ate at the Narrow Boat Inn again. Clearly it was pretty good! We also enjoyed the staff. Martin in particular was super kind and fun to talk to. While in Whittington we visited Whittington Castle. We were all a bit surprised to walk up and see that the castle is all ruins! All that is left is the front of the moat, the front towers and doors and a portion of the center.

We headed back towards Ellesmere to return our boat the next day. After returning our boat, we took cabs to the Gobowen train station to go to London. Unfortunately during our trip there were quite a few train strikes and this day happened to include one. Because of the strikes we could only get to Birmingham by train and then the rest of the route was closed. So we had to take cab all the way from Birmingham to London!! We knew this would be an issue so we had booked a cab in advance since finding a cab to fit all of us would probably be difficult. I’d definitely recommend trying to schedule cabs in advance if you are in a larger group. They don’t always send the right size, but most of the time they do! It was a two hour and forty minute drive and thankfully wasn’t too much more expensive than the train tickets would have been.

Check out Part 3 where we head to London! And if you missed Part 1 in Paris you can check it out here!