Oozells Street Birmingham

After we moored up yesterday we went for a short walk to the park behind the junction toll house. The bridge and the track that CRT put in for the restoration work is still there. Looking at the house it has no windows to the back or end, its all front.

Maybe it was all built for show as it was the junction of the two canals.

This was our mooring for last night, we may have  done a bit better to have moored on the W&B rather

than the Stratford as the road bridge over lock No.1 was rather noisy, we were told this is due to traffic lights and road works on the other road, so people are bypassing it and using the bridge. Passing Bournville there was only one boat on the secure moorings but several on the towpath, the towpath is also designated “Winter Moorings”. Just  past here was a family of swans sitting on the stop plank landing.

We stopped to stock up at Sainsburys in Selly Oak. Its actually a shorter walk if you moor on the towpath, the other side of bridge 80 and walk along the towpath than to moor in the layby opposite.
University Station is quite a structure now that its complete with a foot bridge across the canal to two levels and a high level enclosed walkway over the tracks.

Network Rail failed to do anything about the Giant Hogweed so it’s set seed and we can expect even more of it next year.

As we approached Holiday Wharf a boat had just pulled off so we stopped to fill with water and then made our way through Gas Street, all the towpaths are closed for the filming that’s going on there. I hope the nasty dull black paint they have painted the boats with comes off when they have finished. Round at the Oozells loop there were already a couple of boats moored and another arrived just after us. Birmingham is much busier this week that it was when we were last Wednesday.
Anyway we are roughly in the same spot, so I wonder what will get nicked tonight?

Today’s Journey

 

6 miles with no lock in 2½ hours

Kings Norton Junction

Yesterday evening was nice and clear, I went out to adjust the TV aerial and looking up at the sky there was along row of Starlink Satellites right from the horizon to directly over our heads. Someone posted on Facebook they counted 30 of them. I did try for a photo but nothing showed up.
Later it was a rough old night, with wind and rain so we didn’t hurry this morning, but by the time we left at 11 am it was quite nice and dead calm, however that didn’t last, around mid day it hammered down and the wind was blowing in heavy squalls.
It was only a few minutes after setting off and we were passing the Dickens Heath development, there is a nice looking Italian restaurant behind the flats but unfortunately the gate on the bridge is closed early evening, so that’s a non runner for eating out.

We met several boats including hire and day boats, we even caught up with one hire boat that was needing to make good use of the pole off the bows, thankfully they waver us by. Then on to Shirley Draw Bridge, we only got 3 cars, but two turned round in front of the pub rather than waiting

It wasn’t long after this that it started to rain, not to hard, but then suddenly he turned both the tap and fan on, I was hard pushed to hold the brolly. We didn’t see any more boats on the move and I was looking forward to Brandwood Tunnel as I crept past the long line of moored boats at Lyons Boat Yard. As we came out of the tunnel the rain had stopped, we weren’t going much further, mooring at the junction for the night. Now the sun is peeping from behind the clouds .

Today’s Journey

6 miles with no locks in 2¼ hours

Dickens Heath

Tonight we are moored in exactly the same spot as last night, but facing the other way. Last night we weren't where I thought we were and I put Hockley Heath.
It rained a lot overnight and the forecast for this morning was not great so we didn’t hurry our selves getting up. It turned out to be a fabulous sunny morning. Our first stop was at Bridge 20 so Diana could nip up to Wedges.

I didn’t moot up but started off just standing and holding the boat on the centre line, well there was no traffic about, looking behind me I spotted this.

I then got a bit bored so slowly drifted down to the bridge and just stopped in the bridge hole until she came back.
We passed a boat with an impressive paint job and he still has one dog onboard.

I dropped Diana off at bridge 26 the manually operated lift bridge and once the bridge was open continued down through 27 to wind as we didn’t want to go down the North Stratford locks. Thankfully there were no boats moored in the winding hole because I got it wrong and went too wide.
I have noticed a couple of these official notices under bridges, this one is at bridge 27, I wonder if they have any relevance today or whether they ever did. 

Swallow boatyard is right beside this bridge and foe many years there has been an old butty converter to a motor standing at the back of the yard.

Back at the lift bridge, it was still open but you can bet someone would have wanted to cross if Diana hadn’t stayed there I spotted that the old cable winch to open it is still there, all the ones on the South Oxford are raised by body weight on a chain, so this one must always been a lot heavier.

Beside The Wharf pub at Hockley Heath is an old arm, it is now completely silted up and full of weed. I wonder if CRT own it or whether it is the old wharf and privately owned ?

As we approached bridge 19 we could se our way was blocked, a day boat had managed to get across the canal but his bows were still moored, a lot of revs and advice from someone at the Warings Green moorings and he was on his way.

We had originally considered going back to The Shirley Lift Bridge to eat tonight but decided to stop in the exact spot we were in last night, the chains are through the same gaps in the piling rail.

Today’s Journey

 

8½ miles, no locks in 3½ hours

Dickens Heath

It turned quite foggy last night which slowed down the traffic on the A441 which crosses the canal by the pub. It was still thick at 6 this morning but clear by the time we got up. It did mean we had a rather beautiful spiders web on the bow door.

You can see how clear it is now by these geese going overhead, at least they didn’t come in early to disturb us, they let the bugler alarm and emergence services sirens do that. See the bits of blue coming through?  

Wast Hill Tunnel is a little over 2Km long and today you could see end to end, it was completely clear unlike when we came the other way. We didn’t meet a boat until after we had cleared the tunnel which was good. The sign at the southern portal I thought interesting.

The blue sign says a hour to do the tunnel, it took us 25 minutes.
At Kings Norton Junction we turned right down the North Stratford canal, not the best photo of the toll house but a walker stood and watched me take the bend so I was well round before he walked out of shot. Through Lock No.1 the old guillotine stop lock that’s sole purpose was to prevent one canal company losing water to the other. For some reason its a magnet for graffiti.

then on to Brandwood tunnel where we met two boats, the first a hire boat with an LED headlamp, they are a real pain to meet. We stopped for water by this old canal cottage, a few years ago it could well be described as derelict but today it’s looking quite smart. Shirley Drawbridge went without incident, only caught 4 motors on one side, couldn’t see how many were the other side and then we moored for the night just past the waterside flats at Hockley Heath.

Today’s Journey

9½ miles with no locks in 3½ hours

Hopwood again

  We we were dead lucky with the weather yesterday not getting wet, from the TV reports other places in the midlands got around 40mm of rain, We did get heavy rain overnight and this morning the canal was a few inches higher, this was grass not water when we moored up last night.

The weather was much different from yesterday, bright and clear with a slight chill in the wind. We were away at 10 and soon passing Alvechurch Marina where a boat was just being lifted from the water, probably for a survey as it had a for sale notice in the window.

The held the operation while we passed and then continued once we were on our way, it was a very slow lift.

Ahead of us lay Shortwood tunnel, this is another fully bricked two way tunnel but today we didn’t meet anyone.

There was a serious land slip at the south portal of this tunnel earlier this year and the bank is now supported but ton bags of ballast.

A short way after this we passed the old Anglo Welsh yard, they closed it earlier this year and apart from a moored boat and a van, it stands empty.

Only a few hundred yards passed this and you come to Tardebigge Tunnel, this one is brick for about half its length and then the rest is cut from paw rock. We couldn’t go much further as its not far to the top of the Tardebigge flight of lock and once you set off down the flight there is no where to turn for 34 locks and then we would have to come back up again. The wharf here by the winding hole where we turned, is one of the few places for segregate recycling waste. Last time we were this way, this old full length Narrowboat hull was a floating patio outside the canal side property. Now its a sunk patio and the property has just been sold.

I spent quite a bit of time photographing bushes where a few seconds earlier there had been a Kingfisher sitting, this was the only one where I timed it correctly.

Looking across the fields we could see this stand of conifers, interestingly they were neatly trimmed for almost half their height and then left wild.

We were of course by now retracing our step and heading north again. On the offside on the edge of someone’s garden I spotted this canal company sign that would have marked the companies boundary, so half the edge wall is on the canal companies land.

If you know what the letters stand for please lit me know, it looks like SND & C & B NC.
The Floating Pennywort is getting quite a hold in places and of course when bits get broken off they float away and start another colony.

In the distance we could see HMP Hewell its some complex and houses over 1000 male inmates.

Coming back past Alvechurch Marina the boat being lifted was high and dry sitting on blocks, it has rather a strange stern IMO. It also looked quite shallow draft.

One of the house owners would rather people didn’t moor opposite the gate they have out onto the towpath, I wonder if they pay CRT for access, even so I don’t see how a boat on the water could make it difficult for them. The other notice they had I couldn’t read but it concerns a dog I think.

  Back at Hopwood we moored almost in the same place as last night, but on the visitor moorings as they are not water logged. Moored a bit closer to the bridge was a hire boat, its the first electric hire boat I have see and looked a very high specification.

Ollie Owl and its even dog friendly, but I am surprised the navigation light have survived.

Today’s Journey

11 miles, no locks in 4 hours

Hopwood

UPDATE
The winter mooring signs have been removed from the services and will be moved over to Cambrian Wharf.

This was our mooring last night, as you can see there are just the two of us.

It rained lightly during the evening and then more heavily over night. Bizarrely we lost two items off the roof overnight, one was a small circular fender that I found and which I kept on the roof for the exhaust to sit on and the other, one of the two rags that lived in the chimney cap just to wipe grease and mud off my hands.

The mooring lines and boat hook were not touched nor the rope mat that covers the bulls eye. Most strange.
This morning it was not raining but very low cloud with lots of the tops of the flats out of view.

I reversed out onto the main line as we wanted to go on the Worcester and Birmingham canal. Directly opposite the junction is a large carved bee.

There was only one boat moored in Gas Street and we stopped at Holiday Wharf to fill with water, not the fastest tap on the system, but it gave me time to check a couple of things on google earth before setting off again in the gloom.

 

Our first stop was Selly Oak to visit Halfords to get a new Stanley Knife to replace the one that I lost down the weed hatch. Mooring up opposite Sainsbury's there was again more CRT litter and waste, I removed and binned them all before I left.

We started meeting a few boats after this, probably 6 or 7 in all. At Kingswood Junction we carried on straight ahead  passed the refurbished Toll House. I didn’t realise that the house had road access but there was a car in the garden. I knew they laid a temporary track to do the work but I assumed that would have had to be removed.
As we arrived at Wast Hill I could see there was about quite close to the exit so waited for them to clear the tunnel before I entered, only to find a was firmly in the mud.

The visibility with my headlamp in the tunnel for the first half was about 50Mts. and well before the half way mark I had lost all sight of the north portal. We met a boat just past half way and after that things were much clearer until the last 100Mts. when it was thick again. After the tunnel we got a short shower as we looked for somewhere to moor for the night, we finally goy in just before the winding hole.

Todays Journey

9 miles with no locks in 3¾ hours