Heading home

I had another couple of nights in Birmingham, visiting both the RSBA and Ikon galleries. Chris and Christine caught me up and we had a good night at the Fiddle and Bone open mic, where Chris played a few numbers. Once again all the musicians were very good. I met up with Luke's friend, Jane, the next day and we exchanged tips and stories about our forthcoming journeys as we were going in opposite directions. I moved down to moor at Bournville and spent a couple of hours looking around the village. I liked it. Why can we not build such user friendly villages anymore? I visited Selly Oak Manor which contains quite a lot of unusual utensils and tools as well as insight into Tudor life.

I took a couple of days to cruise the Stratford canal down to Kingswood Junction. It is a pretty canal and the only hardship for me was the two drawbridges where it is difficult for a singlehander to get to the "workings". The first one was possible to do by positioning Olivia across the canal, her bow pointing to the working side, me getting off the bow with the bow rope, opening the bridge and then slowly pulling her through using successive ropes until I got her completely through and tied the stern rope while lowering the bridge, hopping on the stern and driving off. As is usual, as soon as I had finished a boat with crew turned up!! The second bridge was less easy as a moored boat is close by. I did start to follow the same procedure but then one of the local boaters offered to help so I could drive through rather than pull her through. I moored at the top of the Lapworth flight of locks and started down the next morning.

I did the first four on my own and then I met up with a volunteer lock keeper who assisted with the next nine locks, I moored here near the pub (:-)) and cafe, finishing off the next six locks next day.

From my mooring at the junction I walked down to Lowsonford lock to see the Anthony Gormley statue and the sweet barrel roofed cottage.

The next morning, Monday, I was woken by a high pitched whine. It was like a strimmer on speed. I looked at of the window to see a camera drone "parked" next to my boat. Being nosy I had to find out what was going on. The guys operating it told me they were filming for Great Canal Journeys as Tim and Pru were around and are doing the Stratford canal for the next series. It was interesting to see how they go about the filming for the series and, although I didn't get to see the Wests, I did enjoy seeing the crew organising and filming segments for the show. I then discovered that the locks were closed due to a broken collar on one of the locks. This was significant in that Christine was now moored at the top of the locks and was due to come down to moor near me and from there to go for a meal at the pub. I walked up to see her and we found that a new part was being fabricated and should be fitted within the next three or four hours so we kicked our heels for a while, then went down to lock 10 to watch the guys fitting the part. Chris arrived from London and we helped Christine down the locks. We had a very nice meal at The Boot pub with Gary and Sarah from Lyons boatyard who are good friends of Chris and Christine.

The plan for Tuesday was to press on to Hatton locks where we were meeting Luke. We had gone down about 5 locks when Luke cycled up from Warwick. With Chris going ahead and preparing the locks and Luke shutting the gates behind us, we were able to get down the locks in good time. It is not a flight that I would enjoy doing alone. We moored at the Cape of Good Hope pub and had a nice late lunch. Most had pie and a pint for £10 but I had a chicken breast burger and half a pint. It was tasty and greatly appreciated. Chris went to the station to get his train home and Luke and I went into Warwick to do a quick round of charity shops and get some supplies.

When we started off through Leamington to Long Itchington, Luke took the helm. I thought he was going a bit fast and then discovered that he wanted to make the car boot sale at Long Itch that afternoon. We moored outside the Two Boats pub (think there is a bit of a theme going on here) and Luke went off booting. He found a few albums that he thought were worth buying and together with those I had picked up for him at Tipton he was laden with 40 albums when he biked back to Warwick for his train home. Christine and I went for fish and chips at the pub.

Thursday was to be our last day together as I was booked into Calcutt for a service and Christine had arranged to meet friends in Braunston. We had ten more locks to do and as we were being followed by a working boat and a hire boat we got plenty of help from their crews. At Calcutt I helped Christine through the last three locks, waved goodbye for now and took Olivia into the boatyard for "work". I knew I needed to do some remedial work on the gas locker but it needs welding so think this will be an expensive month.