Doggin on the Twenty-one!

I thought that headline would get your attention.

It's been another lovely day and we had an uneventful trip up the Wolverhampton 21. That is until we got to Lock Sex (6). More about that in a minute though.

We started off up the flight at 1.00 and the first few were full so needed emptying, but then we met a couple of boats coming down so that made Roger's job easier. I'm back to steering again as the one lock I worked the other day took it's toll and proved I'm not as fit as I thought I was.

Autumn is well and truly here and the trees and bushes have started showing their spectacular colours.

So, as mentioned earlier, we had a pretty uneventful trip until I was half way up lock 6 and a youngish couple came and sat on the lock beam behind me. I didn't pay them much attention at first but Roger signalled for me to look back at them and I got a bit of a shock. He was sat on the lock beam and she was sat on his lap with her legs wrapped around his waist getting rather amorous. They seemed oblivious to us and were getting more and more raunchy. Once we'd left the lock I glanced back, as you do, and she had her jeans round her ankles and they were going at it with some gusto!  At 3.00 in the afternoon and with people walking along the towpath too!  Brazen pair........... I felt like shouting "get a room".

We got to the top of the flight without any further incidents and were greeted by "sounds of the city".....Wolverhampton Station tannoy announcements and a couple of ambulance and police sirens.

After nipping into Broad Street Basin to dump the rubbish and fill the water tank we're now moored for the night on the main line ready to carry on again tomorrow.

Wolverhampton to Brewood

After lunch yesterday we moved the boat to Wolverhampton ready to go down the 21 locks today.  I'd volunteered to drive while Roger stayed inside and played his electric guitar, but I'd forgotten that we needed to go through Coseley Tunnel and, if you remember from previous blog posts, I have a bit of a phobia about tunnels. Just before the tunnel, Roger came out and said he'd take over while I went inside but I decided this was going to be the time for me to conquer tunnels! So with quite a lot of trepidation I carried on. Luckily there was nothing coming the other way and I wasn't exactly comfortable to say the least, but I DID IT!!!!  I didn't crash from side to side and the roof didn't fall in on top of me....and by the time I got to the other end I was grinning like a Cheshire Cat.  I doubt I'll be volunteering to drive through Harecastle just yet, but I'm going to try and stay outside for the trip through it next week, instead of cowering inside or doing the hoovering. I'll let you know how I get on.

This morning the canal was very busy and 8 boats went down the locks before we were ready to set off.  We gave the last boat half an hour to put some space between us and then just as we were going into the top lock another 2 boats arrived behind us.  Apart from passing 3 boats coming up all the locks were against us, but with help from a lovely man on one of the boats behind us who was whizzing up and down the flight on his bike, setting paddles and closing gates, we managed to get to the bottom in 3 hours 20 mins.

I must say that the Wolverhampton 21 locks are extremely well maintained. Every paddle is well greased and there's no litter and hardly any rubbish in the canal.  At Lock 17 we met 2 lengthsmen who were carrying out some routine maintenance and who dragged a huge tyre out of the by-wash.  If only every lock flight was as well maintained life for us boaters would be a lot easier.

We pulled in for a late lunch just before Autherley Junction and then carried on through the stop lock and onto the Shropshire Union Canal to moor for the night in Brewood.

typical tall narrow bridge on the Shroppie

Brewood visitor moorings

BCN Explorer Cruise Day 2

After dinner last night we joined the other cruise members in the Great Western pub in Sun Street.  It's a fantastic real ale pub serving Holdens ales.  The Black Country Mild was superb and at 10.00 the landlord came round with a plate full of black pudding, pork pie, pickles, beetroot, bread and cheese for every table, all for free. Wonderful!

This was the view of our moorings taken from the bridge on the way home.

We certainly weren't the first to leave this morning, but we weren't the last either, despite it taking 3/4 hour to top up the water tank in the BW yard, and by 9.30 we were under way.  We turned left at Horseley Fields Junction onto the Wyrley & Essington Canal, also known as the "Curly Wyrley" because it's quite twisty in places.  This canal is very under used and people actually stopped and stared at us as we passed and we were told a few times by locals that they hardly ever see any boats. That's a real shame as it's a beautiful canal, with a good mix of housing, including this duck house, and open common grazing land.

There's a distinct lack of wildlife however and we've seen very few water birds today.  One creature we did see though was this wily fox, cutting across someone's back garden.

The peace and quiet was shattered by the roar of the M6 which we heard long before we saw it.

This is the service block at Sneyd, complete with resident doves.

There are plenty of open views across the countryside

and we came across more of these tethered ponies on the open common grazing land.

Despite it not being used very much, it's a clean canal without too much weed, but we did see our first shopping trolley of the trip.  Let's hope we don't see anymore.

It's been a long day as it took us almost 6 hours to get to tonight's moorings beside the Fingerpost pub at Pelsall Common.

As soon as the boats started mooring up this pair of swans arrived with their 7 cygnets.

BCN Explorer Cruise Day 1

As requested, we set off early and were down the 6 locks of "The Crow" by 9.15.  Many thanks to Brian Holmes who helped us all by lock-wheeling (setting the next lock ready to speed things up).  Brian's a lovely chap with a wonderful sense of humour and is quite famous on the canals, some of you may know him from his days as a correspondent on Narrowboatworld.com

Today's itinerary was for us to cruise 9.5 miles back to Wolverhampton. This was backtracking the route we'd taken to Titford last week, so we decided to take a detour, it is an explorer cruise after all.  We turned right at Junction Bridge and went down Brades Locks onto the Gower Branch Canal.  These are a staircase of 2 locks followed by a single lock.

The bottom lock is right beside the Shri Venkateswara Hindu Temple.  There are high railings surrounding the temple and adjacent shrines so we couldn't get a very clear view, but what we did manage to see was quite spectacular.  If you're interested you can see more here

The Gower Branch is only about half a mile long and at the end we turned left onto the Birmingham Level Main line. After cruising through 2 fishing matches where the fishermen were quite amiable for a change, we arrived at Tipton to go up the 3 Factory Locks. Two young lads of about 10 years old were looking after a younger boy of about 5 and came to watch as we went into the bottom lock.  They looked a bit dodgy with their pasty faces and hoodies, but couldn't have been nicer.  They asked sensible questions and were quite chuffed when I let them push the top gate open.  The youngest boy, who was wearing his wellies on the wrong feet, thanked us for letting him help and then said he was going to sing us a special song for the boat, all about pirates.....priceless!

We rejoined the Wolverhampton Level and carried on through Coseley Tunnel which is very wide and has 2  towpaths through it. It's also very wet with lots of water dripping from the roof, so you need to wear a hat! At Deepfields Junction we decided to take another detour and turned right onto the Wednesbury Oak loop, following n.b.Upton, another member of the Explorer Cruise.

It's only about half a mile to the limit of navigation but it's a lovely half mile.  There were lots of Yellow Flag iris at the waters edge, apple trees in full blossom, bluebells and a huge lilac tree in full bloom.

We also saw several pairs of Little Grebes, which we've never seen anywhere else before.

There's a sign saying that the limit of navigation at weekends is this winding hole, however it also says that on weekdays you can go another mile to the BW yard at the end of the branch. As it's Sunday both boats decided not to risk it and we turned round here.  Upton let us turn first, presumably so we'd break up the weeds and make it easier for him.

It's very obvious that few boats come down here as the weed is extremely thick, however the weed cutter we have fitted on our prop shaft make short work of it. 

Rejoining the main line again, we carried on to Wolverhampton to join up with some of the cruisers who had already arrived and moored up. We're all double breasted up but it's no problem at all, I even managed to get the washing hung out when we arrived and it's dried in the afternoon sun.  All in all we've had a great first day and are looking forward to a social evening in the pub tonight.

Wolverhampton 21

We spoke to a guy the other day who'd just come down the Wolverhampton 21 and said it was an awful trip, so I was dreading it when we set off this morning.  I was expecting the lock flight to be really hard work with lots of rubbish in the water, but it was quite the opposite. It's one of the best looked after flights we've ever done.  All the lock paddles are extremely well greased and easy to do and the lock surrounds are well maintained.

The first few locks are still quite rural looking, several having been planted with cowslips.

Further up the flight industry starts to encroach on the canal but I was amazed that there was absolutely no litter either on the towpath or in the water.

In one of the pounds there were several coots nests. This mother was still cleaning the bits of egg shell off her newly hatched brood.

I've never seen coot chicks before.  They're quite ugly really.

This stone was built into the side of Lock 15.  I wonder how many boats have passed through the lock since 1861.

The locks might have been fairly easy but I was still glad when we got to the top.  It took us 3 hours 12 minutes and we only saw 4 boats coming down.  We would have done it dead on 3 hours but were stuck at one lock for 12 minutes waiting for a BW hopper and tug to come down 2 locks.  They're dredging the flight at the moment and the mud they're dredging up is horrible, very black and greasy looking.

lock cottages beside lock 1

We're now moored outside Broad St. Basin which is a BW yard with water and rubbish disposal.  These are secure moorings but there's no access point so we can't go off and explore the area.  When we arrived there were 2 other boats here and another 2 arrived later this evening, all ready to go down the locks tomorrow.