Ninja Turtle

Returning from my meeting at Stockport, I stopped briefly at Worsley Delph for a quick photo.

It was looking lovely in the sunshine. I know a lot of people regard rhododendron as a weed, and it can be invasive, but here the broad splash of purple looked fabulous. 

Looking forward you can see one of the two entrances to the underground canal system (the other is in the shade to the left) These two "arms" meet after 500 yards, and then it is 50 miles of underground canal on all sorts of levels, from which coal was once mined. A feat of supreme engineering, now inaccessible, and dangerous. But in the 1750's the Delph and the Bridgewater Canal which the Duke had built to Manchester to transport coal kick started the industrial revolution by bringing energy costs down. From here began the whole story of steam and mills on which Manchester and  Salford's fortunes were built.

And bizarrely - sunning itself on a rock in the foreground (this has to be enlarged, and it's not fantastic quality - a phone blip) a terrapin. That might explain why there are no ducks or ducklings - they will all have been gobbled up. A legacy of the Ninja Turtle craze of years ago. I'll have to seek advice from our ecologists.