Working the weaving machines at Quarry Bank Mill

A visit to Quarry Bank Mill today near Styal. And a very good visit it was too. Expensive, at £20 to get in but as we're National Trust members it was a good day out. Mind you we did spend quite a bit in the cafe.

Quarry Bank reminded us very much of New Lanark in Scotland situated as it is in a wooded valley in the countryside. The mill exhibition was fascinating especially as many of the cotton manufacturing machines were working and were being demonstrated. You get an inkling of what it must have been like to work in that environment, even given that the owner Samuel Gregg was a benevolent mill owner, building accommodation for workers in nearby Styal. We visited the Apprentices House where up to 60 children would live fro the age of 9 up to 18 while the worked in the mill for no pay at all.

The Mill gardens are also very interesting, they're in the process of being restored with an extensive greenhouse newly opened this year. And the water that originally powered the mill still turns the wheel but is also used to generate electricity to help power the site.

The evening was spent over in Hayfield with my brother and his wife. I've seen him more recently but this is the first time we've seen his wife for over a couple of years.