Hinksford Lock

 Apart form a fox barking in the early hours we had a very quiet night but you need good curtains as the area is well illuminated. I looked out this morning about twenty past nine as a chap on a bike came up the locks with a bag on his back and stopped by the bottom gate which made me wonder if there was a boat coming up. It turned out it was Jim, a friend of John who has helped us up and down the flight many times. I always gave John a couple of bottles of beer for his trouble but Jim informed me that John doesn't drink. Anyway we were in the top lock at nine thirty and Jim was off on his bike setting ahead, this resulted in us being at Wordsley Junction at ten past eleven. I thanked him kindly and gave him a few bob asking him to also get John a couple of Mars bars, we said farewell and he headed off on his bike to Kidderminster. 
I was surprised to see this lock beam is still hanging on to life, its not far short of just being a skeleton of its former self.

The Red House Glass museum had no sign of life but a nice display on their end wall.

Just past lock 13 we passed a boat "moored" with a couple of ropes from its roof the the top rail of the railings just below the lock moorings. not an ideal place of method to moor.

Once clear of the flight we decided not to visit Stourbridge but carry on down to Stourton Junction and there at the Stourton top lock was Jim on his bike with the lock full and the top gate open ready for us. One of the houses in the flight has an impressive bird box, or house.Lots of the houses have very smart gardens leading right to the canal side and some have even used a bit of the offside land at the locks. We said goodbye to Jim for the final time at the last lock. If all the official Volockies worked like this it would be just great, every lock full and open for us all the way down. not two or three standing around just one lock of the flight.At the junction we turned right on the Staffordshire and Worcestershire canal and it wasn't long before we met a boat coming down. We have come down 39 locks since we left Titford Pools on Sunday. Someone left a comment were the Titford Pools the highest point on the system. They are not the highest on the system but the highest navigable section of the BCN canals at some 38 feet above the Wolverhampton level and some 300 feet above Stourton Junction, from here we would be going up hill again. We stopped for lunch at Prestwood Bridge on the visitor moorings where another boat went by, so hopefully the rest of todays locks would be with us. After lunch we wet off in light rain which just got worse, as expected the locks were with us and Just as I was approaching Rocky Lock a couple walked down from above, thankfully looking before they turned it and seeing me approach opened the bottom gates. From here the rain got even heavier. Passing Hinksford Wharf  we see that Heart of England Narrowboats now have their hire base there.

As we went up through Hinksford lock God stopped the rain, he just decided to pour it out of a big bucket instead, it just fell down, we called it a day about a hundred yards above the lock, needles to say, once all the wet stuff was stripped of, a cup of tea brewed, it stopped raining. 

Todays Journey 7¾ miles, 24 locks in 5½ hours.