Thursday 17 September 2015

24 red shirts hanging on a line; and a blogger met at last

This has to be one of the more unusual sights on our travels.

24 red T-shirts hanging next to each other on one washing line by the Stratford Canal to the south of Birmingham. They all seem to say "A Support Team" on the back. Fortunately one has been hung up the other way round so I can see "Angel Canal Festival" on the front.

Having looked up the Angel Canal Festival I can see that it's "Angel" as in "The Angel, Islington". The T-shirts seem to be a long way from London.

We set off from Bridge 5 (Yardley Wood Road) on the Stratford Canal at about 1430, arriving at Hockley Heath three hours later. This is where we had planned to stop, so we could eat at the Wharf Tavern and be ready for the Lapworth flight in the morning. I got Jan to drop me off as we approached the moorings so I could see where the best place to stop would be. As I walked towards the pub three things happened more or less simultaneously. I recognised a boat (from photographs); I recognised a man (from photographs); said man greeted me by name.

The boat was Waiouru (in the middle, above) and the man, of course, was Tom. One of the lovely things about canal blogging is that we already knew each other despite not having met "in real life" before. I said we'd be eating in the pub; Tom said he'd see us in there later. Well, the food took a long time to arrive. Tom appeared before the food did so he had to witness us getting through it before we retired to Jubilee for more chatting.

It was good to see you, Tom, and we hope to meet (your) Jan in the morning.

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