Tag: canal

February 9th – A grim day. Grim all round, really; not feeling in the best of health, and the weather was overcast, wet and miserable. I’d had a thoroughly depressing couple of hours unsuccessfully fiddling with bikes, and had to nip up to Walsall  Wood. In such murky, unphotogenic conditions, it’s difficult to find subject matter, but as I got to Bullings Heath and the Black Cock Bridge, I thought how quant and villagey the area looked. It’s true that riding a bike can lift your mood. From a feeling of darkness and a depression that didn’t seem to want to go, I suddenly felt happier.

Bicyclic antidepressant: cycle one, twice a day.

February 3rd – Out at sunset again, and another good one. I had something to deliver up the Wood so headed up the canal. As I rounded the bend at Catshill Junction, the quality of the sky really stunned me. I followed it up along the canal looking for a good vantage point, and never really found one; there would have been some great views over Bullings Heath were they not impossible to get to due to the canal bank copse and barbed wire. As it was, I contented myself with the three bridges – Clayhanger, the Black Cock and Lathams Bridge, behind Barons Court.

You can’t beet a good winter sunset.

February 2nd – By chance, I caught a good sunset. Out late afternoon to go shopping, I cycled up  through central Brownhills and hopped on the canal near Anchor Bridge. Near Home Farm, I caught sight of what I thought was sand spread on the fields; it was actually soft, red sunshine, although it was cloudy directly overhead. As I sped to Chasewater to catch it, the light tantalised me with glimpses between houses and over the hilltop village of Hammerwich. Beautiful.

I’d almost forgotten it was soon to be the season of sunsets again. Late autumn, early spring. Every year. Love it. As I noticed earlier in the week, the seasons wheel is turning… it wasn’t dark tonight until gone 5pm.

This makes me very happy indeed.

January 26th – Had a wry laugh at this one. Noticed yesterday that the sign was still up trumpeting the new Pier Street footbridge, over the canal in central Brownhills. The bridge is a fine thing indeed, linking as it does Clayhanger and Brownhills in style, replacing a steep-stepped footbridge that was awful, frankly.

I was unaware of Walsall Council’s ‘Drive to regenerate Brownhills District Centre’ – wonder how that’s going?

Would the last business to leave the town please switch the lights off and feed the deer? Cheers.

January 12th – Spent some time today making sure the bike was ready for possible bad weather – greased the gear cable, tuned the brakes, checked the wheels. The time taken to do this will ensure the snow doesn’t come…

Getting out after dark, it was very chilly are there weren’t many around. I headed up towards Chasewater on the canal, and the only living souls I saw were the rats that scattered away from my light. Through the anti-vehicle barrier on the far side of the Anchor Bridge, I stopped to look at the structure. The original bridge is in there, somewhere, but it has been widened and strengthened so many times, only the underside of the bride gives any sign of it’s history. This bridge takes a huge amount of traffic, yet just a few feet below road level it’s quiet and peaceful. For the second day running, the canal was absolutely flat. 

January 11th – Today didn’t work out so well. A failed trip at work, then a mad panic dash to get home. When I did, I hit the canal and headed up to Chasewater, as a decent sunset was threatening. At Anglesey Basin it was quiet, and deathly still. This is the kind of chilly weather I’ve been longing for; the air was clear and hard, but a shallow mist was forming over the canal. The only thing that caused ripples was the birdlife.

Peace, blessed peace. Just what you need after a chaotic day.

January 2nd – I rounded the bend towards Brownhills, and the overflow near the Pier Street Bridge caught my eye. Only a few days ago, this was a raging torrent, flooding the land behind, struggling to cope with the downpours that had constantly filled the canal. Tonight, it was quiet, a relative trickle. The land behind was still saturated, but draining, slowly. There was very little sound. I thought about it for a while. The transitory nature of the water, about beginnings, endings and direction.

You see, today, It was the end of 365daysofbiking. I started this odd mission on April 1st, 2011, after being cajoled into it by fellow cyclist Renee Van Baar, originally only for 30 days. I enjoyed those 30, and resolved to do a whole year, but last new year I was very ill indeed. I missed two days laid up, and returned to the bike on the 2nd of January 2012. So, the mission is now complete, but I have cycled all but two days out of 21 months.

I’m quite proud of that, but more later. Is this where the story ends?

January 1st – Happy new year! A great ride was first of the year, up onto the Chase. A clear, chilly day, but not terribly cold. Chasewater was rammed, as were most public spaces I passed through. There was winter sun, and everything was drying out; folk walked, spotted birds, or accompanied children on new Christmas bicycles. I watched families feeding the gulls from the balcony boardwalk on the south shore with water lapping underneath. That was a sight to see after so long being land-locked.

Further on, the Chase was similarly packed, but in the remoter spaces at sunset, the beauty of solitude remained. An unsuccessful badger spotting foray meant cycling home at dusk, and returning via Rugeley.

This was the Christmas break I wanted, not getting wet all the nine. Oh well, never mind…

December 24th – I reckon, if this weather continues, there won’t be any smokers left in the UK by the end of January. Everything in the country will just be too soggy to light….

I don’t think I’ve ever known such a wet Christmas break. Disappointing, as I wanted to get up to Derbyshire, or maybe just around Staffordshire, but largely I’m confined to utility rides around home at the moment. It was on such a ride today that I noted the canal  overflow at Brownhills had swamped it’s culvert again. That’s the second time in two months, and as a consequence, the low area of Clayhanger Common is starting to flood. This area, if the wet weather continues, will be several feet deep in a day or so, but it’s doing exactly what it was designed to do, and protecting Clayhanger Village and the Ford Brook channel from flooding.

In years gone by, this would have flooded the village, but since the reclamation of the common and the creation of this flood bund, the village is protected giving residents there peace of mind and a good Christmas.

Next time you see someone from the Environment Agency, tip your hat.

December 23rd – The Christmas spirit has taken a while to arrive with me this year. Nothing unpleasant, but with the dismal weather and concentration of work it’s been difficult to focus. Spinning back home tonight to Brownhills from Cannock Chase, I spotted this boat at Catshill in Brownhills. I love it and it made for a very unexpected breath of festive cheer…