The Madeline narrow boat

This boat is normally moored at Hollingwood Hub  the headquarters of the Chesterfield Canal Trust where the main attraction is the boat trip which runs on Saturdays from April to October and Wednesdays during school holidays. The boat is a typical UK narrowboat  fitted out as an educational resource. It was fitted out from a steel shell by the students at Eckington School in north Derbyshire as part of an after class project supporting their Craft , Design and Technology programme (in America it was called  “Shop”). The trips generally run from the hub to Staveley Town basin. The boat is run entirely by  Chesterfield Canal Trust volunteers and the crew are very knowledgeable about the history of the canal. The funds created are shared between the Trust and the School (after taking away the cost of running the boat). Boat  trips cost £5 for adults.

If you have a big party, up to 12, a 2 hour private charter would cost you about £100 or for an even bigger party (up to 24) you can combine the charter with a boat owned by the  Trust itself, John Varley, a new boat which, remarkeably, was purchased by the Trust from funds provided by the “Neighbourhoods Investing Criminal Earnings (NICE) scheme” where money seised from criminals under the “Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 is put back into local communities.

Apart from the boat trips the canal side is used for walking and cycling and the towpath links up with the Trans-Pennine Trail. Just opposite the Hub is the terminus of the Hollingwood Common Canal, an underground canal which used to carry  coal from a coal mine on the other side of the hill.

 For lovers of literature,  Hollingwood  village  is reputedly the model for the village of Stacks Gate  in D.H. Lawrence’s book Lady Chatterley’s Lover. In walking distance is the Barrow Hill Roundhouse, the only worrking railway roundhouse in the country (open to visitors).