Having had a couple more days at Cambrian Wharf, in Birmingham city centre, we went to church at Birmingham Christian Centre on Sunday morning with the crews of nb Rosie and nb Florella and had [repeat] visitors Sunday afternoon, in the form of Esther & Jos and arranged for the former to join us today while Jos revises for his finals.
We readied ourselves this morning and set off intending do some shopping at Tesco Express, we made the 90° turn at The Mailbox and saw a boat ahead of us making a dogs dinner of mooring up, as we attempted to do the same we came alongside the moorings perfectly, only for the wind to nearly push us broadside across the canal too, thinking about it, every time we walked up here it has felt like we are in a wind tunnel, so we decided to abandon the attempt and press on. The city soon turned into the leafy suburb of Edgebaston which was a pleasant surprise and through the Edgebaston Tunnel, the railway following the canal most of the way, we had passed Birmingham University when we had a call from Esther saying she was in the city centre, so we reversed back to the uni to wait for her to walk down and catch us up.
After the compulsory stint at the elum [helm] for our self-styled goddaughter we crossed the new Selly Oak Aquaduct [Feb 2011] when the rain & hail started so it seemed a good plan to stop for lunch. Fortunately the rain soon stopped and the girls went off to get provisions from the nearby Sainsburys whilst I was left to do the washing up.
Our target of Bournville was soon reached and we got the last ‘secure’ mooring there behind the BW gates opposite Cadbury’s factory. We changed our mode of transport here to the busses and saw our young visitor back home where we had a cuppa before returning to the boat for dinner. Whilst eating our meal we were surprised to see not one, but four of Alvechurch’s boats pass by each flying a Swedish flag.
By the strangest of co-incidences we have just watched Julia Bradbury’s Canal Walks on BBC 4 the first bit covered our trip today, watch it here on iPlayer
Cadbury’s World awaits us tomorrow and then onwards towards Kings Norton & the Stratford Canal.