The Huddersfield Narrow Canal at Slaithwaite is old ground for the register, and Lock 22E gave me this one on a mild morning at the back end of January. Right trainer, white originally — the notebook says "originally" and I'd trust it, because a white trainer that's been out on a towpath through a wet winter is white the way a sheep is white, which is to say roughly. Laces present and knotted, which I noted then and note again now. On its side on the towpath just below the lock.
The canal were high after all the rain — 2020 came in wet, and the book mentions the water more than once that month. Mild for January, it says, and I remember the mildness as the sort you don't trust, where you carry the big coat anyway and you're right to.
I sat a short while on the lock beam with the flask. Cheese and pickle. A lock beam is decent sitting — it's the right height, it's usually dry on top, and nobody minds. The photograph came out a bit dark, and the notebook's verdict is "it'll do," which were my standard for photographs then and, if I'm honest, is my standard for photographs now. The camera and I have an understanding. It shows what it needs to and no more, and the trainer is in there, on its side, white-ish, knotted. That's the record.
Written up August 2026, from the notebook.