Competition for Charity Dock?

As we neared Stockton Locks this morning a boat pulled out in front of us. It turned out to be Bywyd Arall with a BCF couple on board; they made efficient locking partners. They stopped at Long Itchington while we carried on to Leamington Spa.

At Bridge 34 it seems someone has taken inspiration from Charity Dock on the Coventry Canal.

We made good time down the locks, meeting boats coming uphill at frequent intervals. We found that, if the top gates had been shut for even a very short time, there was so much leakage from the bottom gates that a top paddle had to be raised to refill the lock.

There is some striking artwork/graffiti in Leamington Spa.

From the canal you get the merest glimpse of the station; I went back to get a proper look at the wonderful art deco building.

Vandalism or art?

Quite early on in today's boating we came across yet another example of a boat blocking the canal. This must be at least the fourth case of a partially untied boat we have encountered in London in the last few weeks. Here a widebeam was across the cut.

A passer-by had already tried to sort it out and had ascertained that there was nobody on board. I was going to come alongside and gently nudge it back to the bank but he asked to borrow our cabin shaft. He competently and quickly got it back in place; by the time I'd reversed Jubilee to the bank he'd almost finished tying it up. With our shaft back we carried on, stopping at Bull's Bridge for water and lunch on board.

London is full of buildings either being demolished ...

… or being built.

The demolition was just west of Bull's Bridge Junction (anyone know what the building was?) and the construction was in the Old Oak Common area.

Not far from the demolition works we came across some workmen packing up tools under a bridge. They had been fixing a clear plastic screen over some graffiti.

Is it a Banksy, I asked? Supposedly, was the reply.

Can you see what the letters of "Peace" are made from? Clever, but I don't get the other elements of the artwork (if that's what we are supposed to call the vandalism of a canal structure).

We tied up opposite Uxbridge Boat Centre after filling up with diesel. (The previous fill-up was also here; our exploits to London and on the Lee and Stort and back had used 85 litres so there were only 15 litres left in the tank.) We investigated The General Eliott pub for food and decided to try it. The verdict? Good. The chips were excellent, about the best I have had anywhere, and the chicken and leek pie had proper pastry and was a good size. Jan said her lamb shank was also good. Both meals came with a decent amount of veg. We even had puddings. Prices were very reasonable. The pie was £7.95; the lamb shank was £10.95. Puds were mostly £3.50 each. (My beer was good too, but I can't remember what it was.)

Official graffiti?

As we came to the Farmer's Bridge flight on Tuesday I took some photos of some artwork I hadn't seen before. This one has presumably been here long enough for the undergrowth to become overgrowth.

A few yards further, immediately below the bottom lock, is this welcome.

The CRT logo indicates that this is "official" graffiti - or should I call it a mural?

But that was two days ago. Today we moved from the top of Farmer's Bridge Locks to Windmill End ready for the Black Country Boating Festival this weekend. On the way I took just two photos, including this of Bromford Junction as we passed.

Once we'd tied up on our allotted mooring we had lunch, and then I went over to the festival site to see what I could do. I helped with setting up a stage, putting the framework of a marquee together, putting sides on another marquee, shifting a load of chairs and tables etc. etc. I didn't finish until about 1930; tea on the boat followed; then we met up with Andy of the Jam Butty, Barry and Sandra of the homebrew boat and others for a walk to The Old Swan, aka Ma Pardoe's, in Netherton for drinkies. Tomorrow there will be plenty more to do.

The clear waters of Wolverhampton

Day 10 of our Big Summer Cruise of 2014. Here are some stats for the five hours of cruising we did today:

Locks: three.
Trips down weed hatch: two.
Moving boats seen: two. No - three, there was one on an aqueduct overhead.
Barbecues had: one.

We made a leisurely start from Gas Street at 1015 and were soon out of the central Birmingham area on the wide and deep Birmingham Canal (new main line). We saw there was a boat in front of us, and were catching it up over a distance of two miles, until just past Bromford junction he waved us past. It was a curious place for the overtake as it was quite bendy and there were trees overhanging on the right. As I opened the throttle and moved to the left I was aware that the canal was quite shallow near the bank. This had the effect of giving me minimal speed advantage over the boat we were overtaking (Jura Reve). I got there in the end, just feet before a bridge hole.

Before this excitement we had the bonus of seeing a boat pass overhead on the Old Main Line or Wolverhampton Level on Stewart (or is it Steward or Steward's) Aqueduct.

Here's a graffito for Adam.

It was another hot day, and the grass cutters were doing their thing on the north towpath. Except they weren't, they had abandoned their strimmers and were taking a break in the shade of a tree.

It's great that the towpath vegetation is being cut back, especially on the lesser-used northern one, but it's a pity so much of it lands in the water. Shortly after passing through all the floating grass cuttings we stopped on the Ryland Aqueduct where I removed a quantity of freshly cut stalks from the prop.

Perhaps I should have waited until we'd cleared Factory Locks.

After the three locks progress was again slow. I couldn't be sure whether it was the relative narrowness and possible shallowness of the Wolverhampton Level we'd joined, or something else round the prop.

We got through Coseley Tunnel and then stopped. A visit down the weed hatch produced a large thick plastic bag from the prop. I'm always surprised by how well the boat copes with so much rubbish round the prop.

Immediately after Deepfields Footbridge is a large pipe bridge. These youngsters found the challenge of beating the anti-climb spikes too much to resist.

Nothing of great significance happened until we tied up in Wolverhampton just above the top lock. (Nothing of great significance happened then, either.)

We walked into town to look round. It was our first time there, despite having passed on the canal at least twice before. I continued my search for a supplier of large O-rings for a project on the boat and, again, drew a blank. Where are all the hardware/ironmonger's shops? There's an excellent one in Norwich (Thorn's) but that's no good to me here.

When we got back we had a towpath barbecue, then pushed the boat across to the other side to be slightly "safer" from night-time revellers. The police and ambulance sirens are slightly closer, but the trains are slightly further away. Not that you'd notice. There's a curve just to the north of the station, right opposite us. The train wheels squeal as they negotiate this curve, and the track sounds like (proper) jointed rails (not the continuous welded stuff which doesn't sound right!) I can feel the vibrations in the boat. I don't suppose all this noise will keep us awake, though. If it wakes us early in the morning we'll make a reasonably early start down the locks to beat the heat. (This summer weather is fantastic, isn't it? Long may it last!)

Oh - the clear waters of the title: here in Wulfrun* the canal bed is very weedy. This seems to filter out the sediment from the water, with the result that you can see the bottom, and loads of fish.

After we had moved across to the 24 hour mooring the other side I noticed a floating island of rubbish. This was gradually moving to our original mooring, so I went round and fished out the bottles, cans and expanded polystyrene, put them in a discarded carrier bag, and deposited it all in a bin.

Maffi would be proud of me.

*Wulfrun is apparently the old name for Wolverhampton. A case of the modern name being an embellishment of the original rather than a contraction?

Evolving language at King's Norton

We moved on from Bridge 5 on the Stratford Canal today and tied up for the night in central Brum, just round the corner from Holliday Wharf. On the way there were several interesting sights.

First, by the water points at Bridge 5, this house has been in renovation mode for several years.

It's looking almost finished ... apart from an extension (a garage?) being added at the back. It now sports a name: Canal Cottage.

Just past Bridge 3 lie the sorry remains of a fibreglass cruiser. It looks as though it had been set on fire. CRT notices warned of the hazard.

After Brandwood Tunnel, in which we passed a boat which entered as we had almost exited, we came to the old guillotine lock at King's Norton. This has recently been "restored", but not to operation. There's no need, as the Stratford Canal now meets the Worcester and Birmingham on the level.

On the western gate someone, presumably Gary or Gareth, has left his mark.

"Gaz waz ea". In former times this would have been "Gaz woz ere" (I don't suppose there would ever have been an apostrophe). Now we have "ea" for "here"! It's logical. If, in a few hundred years' time, the accepted spelling of the word meaning "at this place" becomes "ea" you read it ea first.

Not that I condone in any way the daubing of graffiti on anything, let alone historic canal structures.

And so to Gas Street Basin (almost). We attended to the loo cassette at Holliday Wharf then, as I have said, moved round the corner. I'm now regretting moving as it's quite noisy with all the revellers walking past. There was plenty of space at Holliday Wharf.

Oh well, it's only for one night. Tomorrow we have the delights of Wolverhampton to look forward to.

Corrugated iron covers on towpath bridge parapets

In and around Birmingham I've noticed several instances where a towpath bridge over a side arm has one of its parapets clad in corrugated iron sheeting.

This is on the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal near Cuckoo Wharf.

I guess that the modification is to make it more difficult to climb on, thus protecting neighbouring properties from trespass. It's a shame that a historic structure has to be defiled like this.

Canalside window: graffiti or art?

This window is on the towpath of the Worcester and Birmingham Canal in Worcester. I think it's rather good. I'd rather see that than mindlessly sprayed "tags".

Stopping for diesel; and a wag's wit

South of the Three Locks I spotted fuel boat Ascot tied up, and advertising diesel at 89p/litre, the best price we were to see all trip. I made the right decision, therefore, to stop. It took a while to rouse the boatman as he'd hurt his knee badly. At last, though, he emerged and we were able to top up the tank. I even remembered to get a new gas cylinder.

Shortly after this we arrived at Church Lock, where the church in question has been converted into a private house.

A notice on the balance beam originally read, "Please close gates and paddles to save water". Some wit has crossed out the "close" and inserted "fix".

This is unlikely to make any difference to the problem of leaking gates/paddles.

The move to Milton Keynes is now under way

Ally and Ben are moving house. After living aboard in Birmingham for a couple of weeks they're moving to Milton Keynes. But, unlike usual house moves, they're taking their house with them. All right, it isn't a house, it's narrowboat Jubilee.

The timing was dictated by Ben's graduation ceremony which was held in Birmingham Town Hall on Wednesday morning. Unfortunately I couldn't get a ticket, so I waited outside.


The next day, Thursday, saw BW transform into CRT, after which it was time for Ben and Ally finally to leave Birmingham.


We stopped at King's Norton to do a bit of car shuffling. Our car was there, and A+B's was parked just off Broad Street, so I drove Ben there to pck it up. The return journey was horrendous: four miles took about an hour of crawling traffic. Ironically that's not much faster than a narrowboat. We've bought train tickets to get from MK to King's Norton to pick up both cars (advance fares of just £5 each - not bad). After all that we stopped again at Bridge 5 on the Stratford Canal to get a takeaway from our favourite curry house, the Sweet Chillies, and then tied up at Dickens Heath where we entertained one of Ally and Ben's deaf friends on board for a while.

This morning, Friday, we set off in rain. By the time we'd done a few of the Lapworth locks the rain had stopped, and we enjoyed a pleasant cruise. At Kingswood Junction we joined the Grand Union, and decided to make the most of the decent weather and get the Hatton flight under our belts.


A black cloud hovered overhead, though, and we did have a little more rain, but it was hardly worth getting our waterproofs on. Ally was inside cooking tea, and we tied up to eat with just four more locks of the flight remaining. They can wait until the morning.


Ben was unaware that he was about to be nibbled by an an enormous angry bee!

Ink Floyd

(I originally mistyped the title of this post, but then I looked at what I'd done and thought, yes, that's appropriate.)

In his column in the latest issue of Canal Boat magazine Steve Haywood mentions the Pink Floyd bridge (or remains of bridge) on the Oxford/Grand Union Canal between Napton Junction and Braunston Turn. He suggests that the "brick art" (my words) appeared 40 years ago, and wonders what the person who painted the simple graffiti thinks now of the rock band which so inspired him. No such musing on the band itself: Steve calls them "the biggest purveyors of drab middle-aged, middle-of-the-road rock since The Sweet".

Steve, you, like me, were obviously a fan in the 1970s. But surely it's you (again, like me) who has become middle-aged? I still love the music from that era, although I don't listen to it much now, I admit. But you probably do still like Pink Floyd's early output. You're railing against the later stuff. And I would have to agree: it's not as good. (The band has to be Waters/Gilmour/Mason/Wright to count; Barrett was a fantastic founder member.) But isn't it we who have grown old?

This is one of the landmarks I look out for when cruising this length. Now I think about it, it's surprising that it's lasted this long without being defaced (can graffiti be defaced?) or removed. I hope it lasts another 40 years.