GREAT CANAL JOURNEYS RETURNS TO MORE4

Sheila Hancock and Gyles Brandreth return for more glorious canal and river journeys.

In the first of a two-part special exploring the waterways of Staffordshire, Sheila and Gyles journey along the tricky-to-navigate Caldon Canal and the Trent and Mersey Canal, as they go on a pilgrimage in the Potteries and the city of Stoke-on-Trent.

They begin their journey at Cheddleton Flint Mill, built in 1253, to hear why flint was such an essential pottery ingredient. Gyles pays tribute to one of his great heroes, the Potteries-born writer Arnold Bennett, and Sheila visits the former home of one of her heroes, the ceramic artist Clarice Cliff.

They try their hand at making their own vases at Middleport Pottery, before boating through the one-and-a-half-mile darkness of Harecastle Tunnel... if they can make it that far, that is! After all, Sheila and Gyles are still very much narrowboat novices, and steering a 72ft vessel along such a narrow and winding canal is no easy thing.

Great Canal Journeys begins Monday 15th March at 9pm on More4.