… [I do hope I’m using the idiom correctly: I gather it’s the latest phrase the young folk use to applaud some worthy person or initiative] for Ian Jack in the Grauniad, for his piece on Huddersfield, where one pushes one’s boat through canals broad and narrow. whereof there is much to be learned (and fine things to be seen) on the Pennine Waterways website.
Stalybridge, mentioned in the article, is where “It’s a long way to Tipperary” was composed and first sung.
Irish waterways history 