This Easter, we’re inviting our wonderful Friends to join us for a very special historic boat gathering, marking the Golden Anniversary of the National Waterways Museum at Ellesmere Port.
See all the colours of our Historic Boat Gathering over Easter weekend, 3 to 6 April
Join us on Good Friday, 3 April from 10am and you can see a spectacular historic boat flotilla of around 40 colourfully decorated narrowboats and barges begin to arrive along the Shropshire Union Canal.
You can then enjoy our Easter Gathering between 10am- 4pm until Easter Monday, 6 April. That’s four days of boat trips, lock demonstrations, live music, craft workshops, stalls and family activities to experience. And all at the home of the nation’s largest collection of historic boats – many of which are preserved and protected thanks to your donations.
Remember, as a Friend, you receive free entry to the museum and the celebrations, and you can toast the day with 10% off in the café, so we’d be delighted to see as many of you there as possible.
See our restoration projects
You will be able to find out about the restoration projects on two important National Historic Fleet registered boats. Firstly, ‘Basuto’, the oldest surviving steam-powered ‘Clyde puffer’, which once supplied goods from Glasgow to the islands of the Scottish West Coast. And ‘Gifford’, another star of the show, and a fine example of a ‘tar’ boat whose wooden hull is sealed by this black, sticky waterproofing material, is celebrating her 100th birthday. She’ll be wearing a fresh coat of paint by expert canal boat artist Phil Speight, MBE.
One of the highlights of the weekend will be a chance to pick up expert tips and techniques from Phil at special ‘Roses and Castles’ canal art talks and painting demonstrations taking place in the Island Warehouse on Easter Saturday and Sunday.
The anniversary is also being marked by several restoration projects that will bring new life to our canal heritage. They include a Historic England-funded renovation of the site’s Grade II Listed Pumphouse, where an impressive Victorian steam engine once powered dock machinery for more than 100 years.
You can also discover new exciting exhibitions, follow a family-friendly museum trail and join tours of the museum that has been used as a location for TV blockbusters such as ‘Peaky Blinders’ and the new Netflix ‘House of Guinness’ series.
Marking 50 years of care
The National Waterways Museum is home to the nation’s largest collection of historic boats
The idea for a new boat museum was first floated in September 1970 at a meeting of passionate canal enthusiasts. The ‘North Western Museum of Inland Navigation’ group was launched a year later. Volunteer work parties began to restore the site and in June 1976, the new ‘Boat Museum’ was officially opened to the public by canal campaigner and author, Sonia Rolt.
The late Queen Elizabeth II visited the museum in 1979
In 1999, The Waterways Trust, a charitable arm of British Waterways, was invited to step in to manage the museum, linking it with similar museums at Gloucester Docks and Stoke Bruerne to become a new ‘National Waterways Museum’. The Canal & River Trust took on running the museum in 2012.
Our North West operations director Jon Horsfall explains: “The museum plays an important role in preserving some of our nation’s key historic boats and highlighting the vital contribution our canals made to Britain’s Industrial Revolution. We owe an immense debt of gratitude to those early volunteers, whose inspired determination helped to restore the wonderful port buildings and canal features we enjoy today.
Now in 2026, volunteers still make a valuable contribution to the running of the seven-acre site, working alongside our staff to welcome more than 20,000 visitors a year. During our special anniversary it would be great to see even more people enjoying a fantastic visit to our superb waterside museum.”
Dedicated and proud museum volunteers like Mike and Cath Turpin have cared for this remarkable collection since the early 1970s, and still regularly devote two or three days a week to museum. Over fifty years on, they are still just as passionate about being part of this special museum as they were in the early day. Thanks to your wonderful support this is all possible and together we can keep our heritage collections alive for the next generation.
“I’ve been proud to be part of something very special that continues to have relevance,” says former teacher Cath. “It was the industrial heritage that drew us in. The museum tells the stories of working boats and people that so often go unmentioned. It’s a wonderful place to visit.”
We’d love to welcome all our Friends and supporters, to this very special celebration so please join us this Easter. It’s an amazing way to see how your kind support can help protect our precious canal heritage for another 50 years - and for the next generation to come.
