June 15th – I really have got the taste for Birmingham and the Black Country’s canals. Another trip into the city after work on a grey, occasionally drizzly afternoon rewarded me with flowers, great bridges and interesting views.
You just know that if life were a video game, there would be a secret something behind that brickwork.
Really enjoyed the Tame Valley Canal today.
June 14th – Changing places.
On the left stood Brownhills Market for near enough 25 years. where the low block facing me is was the site of Silver Court Gardens, once the 5th most deprived housing estate in the country.
Not now; a row of new build gables, a block of modern apartments. Silver Street has been transformed. There is life and activity here in what was for several years a barren, windswept wasteland.
I’m glad to see this change, and I welcome the people that will live in these places. New builds, new starts and new people.
Not all change is bad.
June 14th – On the way to work on a warm but windy and wolfish Thursday, I stopped to look back down the canal I’d just ridden along. It’s so green and verdant now, sow beautifully limpid and peaceful. Hard to imagine that a few short weeks ago this was barren and grey, and soon enough it will return to the dormant, winter state.
Bless the summer, bless the green, bless the weather.
June 13th – One of the more fascinating things about the commonly derided and scorned Canada goes is their propensity to social support between families.
On the way home from work this evening, four adults (one dallying out of shot) and two broods of goslings numbering a dizzying total of 12 youngsters in two distinct stages of growth indicated that two families were hanging out together and probably sharing childminding and security duties.
Can’t think of any other wild birds that do this.
Lovely to see, and I got hissed at in quadrophonic!
June 14th – The King Of Kings Hill is still napping outdoors even though the sun’s gone in. Old Sam continues to enjoy this most temperate of seasons.
But interesting to see the effect the cooler day has on his sleeping position, in a ball, on top of the retaining wall, pointedly and resolutely with his back to the passing world.
Sorry, but I’m a little bit in love with this old chap.
June 12th – Following isolation of the leak at Little Bloxwich, the canal level has continued to rise and is now about 20-25mm off maximum (ie. the weir bar at Clayhanger overflow), so more or less back to normal.
It took a while, with problems at Chasewater and with balancing pumps having to be installed at the leak site, but thankfully, apart from the fact that there’s a large repair required in Little Bloxwhich which will prevent passage from Brownhills to Wolverhampton and vice versa by boat for a bit, it’s good to see the waterway back to normal health.
This could have been so much worse.
June 12th – Passing the embankment of the new pond at Clayhanger I noticed that the kidney vetch is showing well this year. One of only two places I can think of that it grows locally, this plant, once thought to be good for healing wounds, is profuse in the sandy soil of the embankment.
Consisting of individual flowers on a fluffy, down covered flower head, it’s a storage and very beautiful wayside delight at this time of year.
June 11th – For the first time in absolutely ages, I found myself in Redditch on a business call, and for old times sake I rode through the gorgeous Arrow Valley Park that bisects the town, with the still quaint little hamlet of Ipsley in the centre of it.
I used to come here week in, week out but the customer changed hands and moved out fo that line of business, so I really find myself here now. But it’s still lovely.
But that climb back up from the south of town to the station is still an absolute killer…
June 10th – Good deed for the day, though I don’t know if it did any good.
Slipping through Oldbury, something grey moving in the water caught the eye, and stopping to investigate I found that it was a sodden, floating and stricken wood pigeon that had somehow fallen in the water, and couldn’t get out. Although floating on it’s outstretched wings, it looked tired and frightened and was clearly going to die if it couldn’t get out.
Forty minutes later, using a spare inner tube as a gentle lasso, I finally got the struggling, terrified bird onto the towpath. It was saturated, and exhausted.
I placed him carefully in a patch of sun to dry out in the undergrowth. A couple of boaters nearby said they’d keep an eye on it.
I think it probably died: It was so wet, so shocked, so tired. But I couldn’t leave it to drown without trying. Hopefully, foxy didn’t find lunch, the sun was enough to dry him and the grass around provided enough nutrition to get him to safety.
Hopefully. Call me a fool, but I couldn’t leave it there.
June 10th – On the previous Friday, I got the taste for Birmingham and it’s canals again, so I headed up to Wolverhampton on the cut and back down the old line through Tipton into the city centre.
As ever, the sheer vibrancy of this environment – that many would condemn as ugly – was stunning. From the wildlife to the flowers, the discarded dreams in the scrapyard, the geese and herons and all in-between were a joy. I love the seamless continuity of the upper side of the Engine Arm Aqueduct, although you’d be hard pressed to realise the glamorous structure below.
Much of the main line I rode had been resurfaced – and although it needs sweeping badly due to loose gravel – the riding is very good indeed.
Had to smile at the gull that looked like it was concealing a weapon.
A fantastic urban ride. The weather really is spoiling me at the moment.
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