BrownhillsBob

#365daysofbiking Deceptive

March 10th – Some days you look at the photos you’ve taken and wonder if the camera experienced the same thing you did. Today was that kind of day.

I slipped out mid afternoon. I had things to check up on. I felt rough, I needed the air. But it was bitterly cold, had periodically been snowing, and there was a very wolfish wind that punished for any open zip or gap in clothing.

The towpaths and trails were muddy and wet, but I headed for the common anyway, and found it looking good. The heathland management is still going on here and the latest effort has been using and excavator to pull pack the grass in small squares all over the common.

This will help small, fragile plants take a hold and also give bugs and other small creatures access to fresh earth.

Looking at the pictures, I notice how blue the sky looks and how serene it appears. It was really rather unpleasant. My camera is lying.

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#365daysofbiking Following the herd

March 9th – A terrible long range photo in awful light but a huge herd of red deer were loafing in the fields near Gains Lane, between Pelsall and Great Wyrley. In total I think somewhere around 40 animals were there in total – more were appearing from the scrub behind as I watched.

Wonderful to see of course but only a short distance from the M6 Toll, the A5 and a major junction complex.

It’s great to see the deer around but I do worry about them.

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#365daysofbiking Unusual visitors

March 9th – Nipping over to Great Wyrley on an errand, I hopped onto the canal at Silver Street which was, quite frankly a mistake – the towpaths were waterlogged and muddy.

However, I was pleased to spot at the marina just by Tesco a goosander pair who seemed quite at home with the Canada geese watching on.

These fish eating birds are fascinating, beautiful and hard to photograph as they move and dive quickly.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen any in this spot before.

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#365daysofbiking Nearing home

March 8th – By the time I got to Brownhills, it was late and dark. I didn’t mind though – the rain had stopped and I wasn’t far from a hot shower, fish and chips and a big mug of tea.

The keen wind was drying things out an on the lonely but familiar Black Path, I reflected on what a hard week it had been , and how glad I was that it was over.

Some weeks you’re glad just to survive to see the end of them.

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#365daysofbiking Weather or not

March 8th – It was another wet, blustery afternoon and I had to go to Birmingham for a working lunch then come back to Walsall for a legal meeting.

The rain when I arrived at Walsall was horrendous.

I know it’s still winter, and that the early spring lulled me into false optimism, but I’d quite like an break from the wind and rain if that’s OK please.

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#365daysofbiking Approaching equity

March 7th – Things that happen while you’re not looking.

The darkness is receding fast now – we’re gaining around fifteen minutes more light in the evening now every week, and soon it will be the spring equinox, when the daylight and night time are the same length – 12 hours.

The concept of the equinox fascinates me, and I don’t really know why. But within a fortnight the sunrise and sunset will occur at the same numerical time, but AM and PM.

And after the equinox comes the start of British Summer Time – this year cruelly not until the 31st March.

Still, it’s almost over.

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#365daysofbiking Everything counts

March 7th – It’s time for the periodic traffic survey in Walsall, and the sheer number of traffic counter units fitted across the borough’s roads is causing some comment on social media.

They aren’t sinister at all: By law local authorities have to take traffic counts for planning and other reasons and like most councils now, the work is deputised to a specialist contractor.

These Metrocount units – that use the familiar, traditional rubber air tube and pressure switch technique are surprisingly sophisticated and the manual for them was found online by The Stymaster – you can read it here.

I crossed at least eight between Brownhills and Darlaston. Just setting them all up and gathering them back must be a mammoth task, let alone analysing the data…

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#365daysofbiking Rather sluggish

March 6th – Returning home, I called in at the off licence on the High Street for a treat or two. It had been a long day. Leaving the shop, I nearly trod on this slug, who was clearly travelling somewhere with some intent.

I hate killing anything accidentally, so I photographed it and eased it out of the way with a discarded lolly stick.

I’d had good news, so this wasn’t really a day to pass up the chance to do another creature a good turn…

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#365daysofbiking Brutally wet in Cannock

March 6th – I had an important hospital appointment in Cannock, a place I rarely go. Cannock Hospital is actually lovely, and a model of the best of the NHS, but Cannock itself, I find a bit otherworldly. It’s nice enough, suffering like all post industrial town centres, with odd, lingering pointers to a more prosperous, or at least busy past.

The brutalist concrete relief mural featuring local industrial icons – pit heads, Caterpillar vehicles, Rugeley Power Station and GEC seems to have been transplanted from an earlier building or situation. It’s almost soviet.

Everyone seems to know of Walsall’s hippo, but who ever dares mention Cannock’s concrete elephant? How did that come to be? There’s a story there.

On this wet, grey and unpleasant day, I found Cannock solemn, but pleasant, and I shall come back – mainly to see if it wears it’s cloak of quiet melancholy on nice days, too.

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#365daysofbiking Bottoms up

March 5th – On the way to work, I took the canal through Bentley Bridge to Walsall. Near the disused Anson Arm at Bentley Bridge, apropos of nothing, four pure white domestic pekin ducks I’ve never seen here before. I assume they’d come down out of the wind for a break.

They have got the cutest backsides of any waterfowl though, I think…

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