Home

About

Diary

Plans

Kontakt

Other Stuff

Journeys

Switch to Full Diary

17th July 2010

Bournville to Lapworth. Birmingham & Worcester and Sratford canals.

S_ and R_ discuss the finer points of lock wheeling Awake in the morning at the surprisingly early time of about 9 o'clockish. I think. My watch was a bit blurred. C_ sallies forth for papers and pop (good man) whilst the rest of us ablute. Which S_ does from a mainly horizontal position. Final get under way, at, oh I can't remember. Before lunch. C_ has a go on the tiller and does the usual zig-zag as he gets used to the less than immediate response, which he does surprisingly quickly. But not before we lose a rear fender. Ouch! Have an uneventful trip from thereon up to Shirley Drawbridge where S_ enjoys himself stopping the traffic. Very nearly re-modelling the rear of an impatient Jag with the descending barrier. Get a bit of inclemency following Brandwood tunnel, forcing the good Kaptain to take recourse to a Silly hat. This prompts much derision from the unruly crew, and something that sounded like a reference to an anchor from the foredeck. I don't even have an anchor, what was he on about? Next stop is Hockley Heath and into The Wharf for a spot of lunch and a smidgin of hairy dog. Full of gentle stimulant, we now head for the Lapworth flight, with a couple of warm up drawbridges to get our hands in. Get down the flight quite quickly, C_ taking the helm as the Kaptain joins the crew on the lock-wheeling. The novelty has begun to wear off by lock 14, but I avoid a mutiny by using the age old ruse of a distraction. "Oh look, a pub!". My bacon is saved, and also my wallet, as apparently it's not my round. Result! Several beers later, we depart The Boot and continue down into Lapworth itself. A boat on the way up seems to be having difficulty negotiating the pound ahead of us and insists on us leaving paddles up to assist their progress. This drains our pound and they really should have invested in a set of wheels if this is how they intend to navigate. C_ makes matters worse for them by answering an enquiry as to the nature of the pub we had just left with, "Oh, it's full of w****** in porsches, that kind of thing..." only to discover he was talking to one such a few sentences later. Well, he may have been lying about the porsche. Never mind, The Cat sits fairly high in the water and we get into the lock with little difficulty leaving them playing with their poles in our wake. The remaining 6 locks pass remarkably swiftly. What shall we do with the rest of the evening?

"Oh look, a pub!". This time we savour the delights of The Navigation much to the relief of the more determinedly proletarian amongst our number.

C_ takes her in

Click to Enlarge

	This	Total
Miles	13.83	283.76
Locks	19	219

Height Gain		-
Height Loss		116'3"
Height		336'9"