This walk is rescheduled to 10 July 2021

After a walk around Spike island we head to the West bank where the old transporter bridge was sited and then cross the Mersey on the through-arch Silver Jubilee bridge which was built in 1961.  We can also see the double-webb lattice girder railway bridge which opened in 1868.   The road bridge has now been modified to take only 2 lanes of traffic and a cycle lane.  We also cross the Manchester ship canal and head into Runcorn where we pick up the tow-path of the Bridgewater canal.  Some streets take us to a listed swing bridge over the ship canal and we enter Wigg island. This is the former site of a chemical works manufacturing mustard gas but is now a nature reserve opened by Bill Oddie in 2002.  We take a circular walk around here to view the magnificent Mersey Gateway Bridge, a cable-stayed suspension bridge which opened in 2017 and cost £1.86bn. We return through Runcorn via a different route to cross back over the Silver Jubilee bridge to return to the start.

The area is rich in history being the site of lots of chemical works and the Mersey estuary is home to many birds. The walk takes in the river Mersey, the Bridgewater canal, the Manchester Ship Canal and the disused St. Helens canal.