Bad tempered swans and endless locks are set to test the spirits of a team of intrepid canoeists.

Skipton town manager Brett Butler, town council officer Mark Santos and four friends are preparing to paddle the 120-mile Leeds-Liverpool Canal.

And it’s not the 26 miles a day that they’re finding the most daunting, but the over-protective swans.

“They are very protective at the moment because they’ve got cygnets. We’ve had our boats hit and one of us has even been hit on the back,” said Brett. “We have to be very careful and if we see one of them coming towards us, try to steer them away with our paddles.”

Brett, Mark, Phil and Judy Probst, Zoe Clarke, from Pennine Cruisers, and Theo Stead will be setting off from Liverpool on Wednesday and plan to arrive in Leeds five days later.

They will be using Canadian open canoes, courtesy of River Mountain Experience of Ripon, whose tutors have also got them up to a good level in canoeing.

They have also been given cash support from Skipton solicitors Walker Foster and John Midgley, of Midgley Motor Cars, Skipton, is lending a food-stocked caravan for them to stay in for two nights.

They have already been promised £1,500 in donations, which will go to Martin House Hospice and the Multiple Sclerosis Society.

“People won’t be able to miss us, we’ll be wearing bright orange bibs and collecting money as we go along. We’ve actually had to turn down offers of cups of tea along the route, as if we accepted them all we’d never finish,” said Brett.