The Skipton Waterway Festival is a popular canal boat event held in the Skipton canal basin in Yorkshire. It is due to attract around 60 to 70 boaters to the three day festival with around 10,000 visitors expected over the bank holiday weekend.
This year the theme of Tour De France Grand Depart was chosen by the organisers, as the first leg of the Tour De France, known as the Grand Depart will be passing through Skipton this year on Saturday 5th July 2014.
Gordon Hepworth from Skipton
‘Janela’
Sue Day stands on her narrowboat ‘Elland’
In 2012 Sue was the first person in 60 over years to make the journey between Leeds and Liverpool with a horsedrawn narrowboat
The Grand Depart was the theme this year
Rosie and Jim!
Ducks on the water in the morning sun
Looking along the canal
Carol Hayhurst sits on her boat ‘Westwood’
Looking out
Carol Hayhurst looks out of one of the hatches on her boat ‘Westwood’
‘Herbie’
Moored at the canal side
Narrowboats are moored up at the start of the 3-day festival
‘Juniper’ sails through one of the loch gates
‘Juniper’ prepares to moor up alongside
Many of the boats are decorated with painted jugs…
…of different designs. All hark back to when water was poured from barrels transported on the top of the boats.
‘Constance’
Visitors enjoy a ride on a canal boat tour
Narrowboats are moored alongside
The Leeds & Liverpool canal in Skipton
The Leeds & Liverpool canal in Skipton
Molly Bond, 10, from Skipton sits on the front of her families boat
Sitting on deck
Narrowboats moored alongside at the festival
Jack Carter from Chorley in Lancashire
Sylvia and Jack Carter from Chorley in Lancashire on their boat ‘Katherine’
Jack Carter from Chorley in Lancashire looks out of one of the hatches
Sylvia Carter on board her boat ‘Katherine’ looks at some of her decorative artwork she painted
Morning papers and a brew
Many of the boats had a Grand Depart theme this year
Wombles out it force
Colette Sloan from Otley lies in her hammock with her guitar
Michael and Lisa Walmsley from Burnley chill out on their boat
Michael Walmsley from Burnley
A man looks out of a side hatch as flags festoon some of the boats
Skipton canal basin
Some of the pictures from the first day of the festival were used in the Express
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Images remain copyright Ian Forsyth/Getty Images
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