The Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, designed by Thomas Telford is the highest canal aqueduct in the world. If you're not sure if you're scared of heights or susceptible to height vertigo, it's a good place to find out.

I got speaking to a lovely man walking his dog whilst recording this. He told me that the arches were built around bales of sheep wool to keep the weight of the 38 metre high arches down as well as hold the structure while building them. He also mentioned that lanolin, the waxy substance that keeps sheeps wool waterproof, was used to seal the canal. Doing some reading online, ox-blood was also used in the mortar to help prevent it crumbling away during freeze-thaw cycles. I'm not sure how many sheep were sheared and oxen bled for the constuction of the aqueduct, but imagining these 220 year-old animal materials impregnated throughout its structure didn't help much when walking back across it.

Anyway, in this recording you can hear blackbirds, flycatchers, thrushes, wrens and chiff chaffs, as well the occasional 'Morning!' as people walk or cycle by. There's also the occasional drip from the canal and the constant rumble of the River Dee below. We end with the sound of a narrowboat turning its engine back on after completing the 307 metre journey over the valley.

Recorded at 8am, Sunday 29th June.

www.soundfromatown.com

Dibbinsdale is a site of special scientific interest near Bromborough on the Wirral, cradling the river Dibbin passing through. I arrived at around 4am and set up, having never been before. With it being ancient woodland, I was expecting to hear weird and wonderful birds for this dawn chorus – almost as if stepping into a time machine. This was most likely ignorance on my part, as I was instead met with a familiar burble of suburban birds. With the woodland truncated to the east and west by a trainline and the M53 respectively, and surrounded by houses, this is probably no surprise. I aim to go again, though, as in a sleep deprived state I left the headphones too close to my EM272s when I stood back from the set-up which caused feedback. This recording is instead from the back-up BP4025.

There's a Pentecostal Church on the Westminster - one of Ellesmere Port's suburbs - that backs onto a motorway sliproad. The sliproad was opened in 1972 to join up with the M53, a motorway that ran right through the middle of the Westminster and cut the community in two. I'm not sure what this cemetary would have sounded like on a Sunday before the M53 was built, but I imagine the low drone of errand-laden traffic wouldn't have dominated the soundscape as much as it does today.

Recorded Suynday 8th March.