April 17th – Cowslips are my favourite wildflower, and thankfully, proliferating once more, despite their apparent appeal to rabbits, who devour them with gusto. They are actually a type of primrose, and I love their delicate flowers and hardy, resilient tenacity. These two patches on Clayhanger Common I guerrilla planted a few years ago, from a pack of wildflower seeds bought from a National Trust shop.
April 17th – I’d been lucky and missed the day’s intemperate, sharp showers. Feeling smug, nature slapped me about the face when I was nearly back in Brownhills. At 4:45pm, the heavens opened and spat down the most violent hailstorm. Sheltering in a bus stop, I waited for it to pass – I’m no fair weather cyclist, but I draw the limit at being pebbledashed.
Within 15 minutes, the sun came out and the sky returned to the threatening darkness that it had been wearing for most of the day. Inspired, I headed to Clayhanger and the new pool. I noted swans were nesting there, too, and how green everything seemed to be becoming. Dawdling, I was just clipped by the rain as I returned home… going to be an interesting week of commuting, I think.
April 16th – Signage is an interesting thing. Passing the Anchor and Anchor Bridge on my way back to Brownhills I noticed these two examples. Of the dog water, I’d be interested if anyone had actually ever charged for that, or whether it encouraged any patrons.
‘Fancy a beer, Bob?’
‘Not here, we need to find somewhere I can get free water for Fido’
I’m not knocking it, just interested in the thought process. It took effort to do that, to satisfy what the sign writer saw as a market. Curious.
The canal distance markers sprung up like mushrooms when the canal footpaths were rebuilt here about 8 years ago. A fantastic project, it did involve some inexplicable decisions, like closing off access to the canal from the Pelsall Road bridge. Sadly, someone forgot to tell the guy casting these expensive, cast iron signs, and the distance to the Pelsall Road is painted out on every one. Unfortunate.
April 16th – A late spin out after a tough dental appointment provided welcome solace. The wind was horrendous, to be honest, and the weather not really warm, but I had unfinished business at Chasewater, so I headed there. On the way back I returned via Pool Road and trundled past all that remains of Highfield House and farm; the house has gone, the bricks being slowly reclaimed and only a few outbuildings remain. It’ll be interesting to see what gets built and how quickly. This place deserves someone who cares for it and I wish the new owners well.
April 5th – Spring is in full throw now. The trees are coming into leaf, early rapeseed is flowering and despite the cold wind, the sun was warm on my neck. Trundling back from the Chasewater Transport Show, I noted one of my favourite sights was coming into being – a weeping willow over water. Such a beautiful thing, and a real sign that better days are on the way. Home or Lanes Farm at Sandhills looked gorgeous with its patchwork of rolling fields. People who say Brownhills is ugly really need to get out more.
April 15th – I wasn’t going to mention this, I really wasn’t, but I’m finding it increasingly irritating. On some jobs, a spirit level is essential. Amongst these should be the jobs that nature holds a natural ruler to. The new concrete plinth atop the outlet culvert at Anglesey Basin, at Chasewater, is such a situation. The water below it will always be level. Consequently, the fact that the plinth was cast on top on the skew will always be visually obvious. I wince every time I see it. Unfortunate.
(For those not sure what I mean, the gap between the water and the underside of the plinth increases considerably to the left. It’s not an optical illusion, it actually does.)
April 14th – It was starting to rain as I pottered about by the ‘marina’ in Brownhills, just off Silver Street. I don’t know why, but it’s compulsory that any development ever passing near a waterway has to have one, and Brownhills in the 1980s was no exception. When the current stores were built here – then a Hillards supermarket and a Great Mills DIY store, they paved a section of canal bank, put in a few hitching posts and called it a marina. I once joked that it was named after the famous Leyland car, and was horrified to hear someone take that seriously and recount the tale in seriousness. It’s not a bad feature these days – the blossom and trees are pleasant, and now we have the Canoe Centre at one end, boats do moor here from time to time. It could do with a bit of love, though.
April 14th – Didn’t get far today for one reason or another. Slipping out for a quick scoot around town at teatime, I found myself at opposite ends of the modern development history of Brownhills. I noted that in High Street, at the corner of the Ogley Road junction, the second phase of the social housing project started a year ago has begun. Replacing the hated maisonettes that formerly occupied the site, it’s nice to see some housing development happening. We have so much land left vacant by the clearance of bad social housing, yet the pace of replacement is painfully slow. The 75-odd homes this project will create are next to nothing compared to the hundreds lost.
Meanwhile, littered with the detritus of drug use, forlorn and abandoned, the loading bay for what was Brownhills’ first Tesco at the rear of Ravens Court. Tesco have got cold feet on replacing this derelict structure with a new store, leaving the town in limbo. When will we ever learn?
April 13th – Ah, the true English. Yesterday, I feature my first bluebell of the year, spotted on a verge at Sandhills, near Brownhills. Sadly, it was the foreign, invasive variety. I should, have course, realised that the English ones would have been easy to find in the Arrow Valley, also a haven of my beloved wild garlic. If you compare this plant with that featured yesterday, you’ll note the blooms droop more, are generally more delicate, largely on one side of the stem and the colour is a richer violet.
You can’t beat the real thing… even in Redditch.
April 13th – By heck, it was nippy this morning. Not cold by winter standards, of course, but cold by spring ones. There was quite a heavy frost last night, and it made for an interesting mist. The sunrise wasn’t vivid like earlier in the week, but pastel-hued and ever changing. At Stonnall, my muse, Grove Hill, was stunning, as were the pylons and woods at Mill Green. An hour and a half later, on the Arrow Valley cycle route in Redditch, the lake was also captivating, it’s fringes holding a light mist, softening the light that made even the Canada Geese precious.
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