Harecastle Tunnel

I was excited to be able to traverse Harecastle Tunnel. I’d heard that it was haunted and that the tunnel roof comes down to a ridiculously low height. All I found was dissappointingly false and an anticlimax.

The roof of the tunnel does come down in stages but the height was never worryingly low and I was still able to stand up to steer the boat, although maybe with a slight stoop for my 5’11”, 1.81m height. As for the hauntings and markings on the wall somewhere, I found none.

To be able to pass through the tunnel, one is normally required to book passage with the CRT, which I had done so for 3pm this same day. However, I had turned up the night before along with another boat. In the morning the good CRT chaps arrived bright and early and allowed us to go through at around 8.15am. The other boat went first and then I followed 5 minutes later.

The following two images are slightly blurred due to be being taken on my phone with low light surroundings.

One thing I did find though, was that if you took your eye off where you are going for just half a second, you could be in trouble and may find yourself having contact with the tunnel wall. I did not on this occasion, but it did come close once, but I masterfully avoided striking the wall. My own fault really for trying to take photos and film with my phone. I should have been doing it with my GoPro instead.

Here’s a short video I took with my phone, which is quite good but I found it very difficult to hold the phone in the correct position and steer at the same time, avoiding walls.

After 35 minutes or so, I emerged triumphantly at the other end and the CRT guy checked me off as passing through. Dissappointingly, he did not have a gold star of achievement for me!

You can just about see the tunnel from whence I emerged, with a boat waiting to go in. Again we have the mucky, orangey brown colour of the iron oxide infused water.

I paid attention to the keep left instructions going under the bridge. If I had gone the other side, I dare say I would have run aground.

And I passed by the junction to the Macclesfield canal which after a few hundred metres, I was to pass under, by way of a couple of locks going down and an aquaduct.

I moored up very shortly after this for a well deserved rest, considering the number of locks I had negotiated the previous day.