April 28th – I had business in Walsall’s and Birmingham, but had to pop to Walsall Wood first in the morning, The junction was obstructed at Anchor Bridge, so I got off to cross the road on foot, and in the process, noted a familiar classic Brownhills view – usually a muse of mine in night time, it’s looking fine in it’s daytime spring green overcoat.
Summer must be coming!
April 18th – I took the train to Macclesfield, and rode back. If the cycling game is to be upped this year, challenging rides are required, and this one was at the very limits of my cycling ability.
On my way, I visited Sutton Common, the Cold War microwave transmission station in the same series as Cannock’s Pye Green. Meaning to visit for years, I climbed to the peak of the hill at 403m to see it, and was rewarded with stunning vies of Macclesfield, Manchester and The Wirral, as well as the Roaches and Dane Valley.
It was a great day, sunny, but again, so cold. Look out for ride videos coming soon on my main blog.
December 22nd – Looping back down the High Street it was getting light on the eastern horizon, and the view from Anchor Bridge was altogether more positive.I’m frequently out and about at this hour, but rarely stop to take photos.
Perhaps I should.
November 2nd – I was lucky to pass through Darlaston tonight as the sun set, and the view over the landscape – today, a genuinely black Black Country – was beautiful; once, this view would have been marked by chimneys, stacks and furnaces; this evening, house lights, clear air and the glow of sodium discharge made the urban sprawl look like glowing embers of a fire that caught the clouds alight.
Watching on, like a sentry, the cellphone tower; constant, contracted, monitoring, trading it’s hundreds of concurrent conversations with the ether.
And there I stood, camera in hand, caught for a moment in ideas of technological progress and the beauty of the place I love.
August 8th – I still can’t get my head around the state of the trees currently blocking the new development’s view of Catshill Junction. This is a Walsall Housing Group project consisting of apartments, sold as ‘canalside’ dwellings – but as far as I can ascertain, most of the properties have no view of the canal itself due to the overgrown thicket in-between.
Such dense vegetation must also make those flats terribly dark. Unusually for Walsall Housing Group, they don’t seem to have any plan to deal with this and integrate their development into the immediate environment. I find this surprising and sad.
And still languishing unloved on the bank, the Catshill Junction Sculpture.
What a mess.
August 5th – An early evening drop into Stonnall to call on a mate on the way home from work took place under some remarkably threatening skies. There were a few spots, but rain didn’t catch me however, and I was reminded near Lynn of the spectacular panoramic beauty that occurs unexpectedly in the local countryside.
Harvest seems to have stalled for the moment, and crops still languish in the fields, adding a welcome golden hue to the landscape. Despite the weather, it really is high summer now.
June 25th – Out late after a busy day working at home. It was a pleasant evening as I spun up to Chasewater along the canal from Ogley Junction.
I must say, that view of Hammerwich over the Warrenhouse still stuns me after all these years – and with the grass high in the meadow like a gently rippling sea, it’s even more beautiful.
Another lovely thing (though perhaps not if you grow veg!) is the burgeoning rabbit population along the canal and around Chasewater Dam. As you ride on a quiet afternoon, bunnies scuttle for cover from the towpath, nearby scrubs and gardens. They look healthy, and seem to be doing well, which is good news after myxomatosis wiped out the warren at the Chase Road Bridge a few years ago.
A nice afternoon’s bimble.
June 17th – The skies were still grim when I reached Shire Oak, although the sun was trying it’s best.
I hope this is the start of some more settled weather.
The rain does seem to have made the trees and fields very lush though. Beautiful.
April 20th – As the weather had cleared, I stopped to snap a familiar view – from Shire Oak to Lichfield and beyond. Burton, Swadlincote and the disused cooling towers of Willington were in sunlight. In the foreground, the Old Ladies of the vale looked constant and imperious.
I shall never tire of this view.
March 28th – It was a hectic, stressed day and I didn’t get much time to myself; but I swung out in the afternoon to nip into Stonnall. On the way I stopped to take a classic view – that of Lichfield from the quarry access road at Shire Oak.
It still stuns me that you can see so far from here on a clear day, and the detail with which once can capture the Old Lady of the Vale.
Note the cooling towers on the horizon are Willington, between Burton and Derby, and are in fact derelict.
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