Monday 30th May 2005
Birmingham - Kingsbury (16 miles, 38 locks)
We slipped quietly away at 5:30am. The rain had started as soon as I poked my head out of the hatch.
I was still in two minds about reversing back to the junction, but decided that exploring new territory was a good thing, so carried on around the loop. There were boats moored all the way so it took some time. Then, we realised our big mistake. The end of the loop rejoins the route to Wolverhampton at a very shallow angle and to turn right would be almost impossible. With Jen on the towpath one side with the front rope and me on other side with the back rope, we hauled the boat round with less than an inch to spare each end. We were thankful not to have an audience and certainly wouldn’t recommend the experience.
The whole exercise had wasted a lot of time, and we were dismayed to find that there was a boat in front of us when we got to Farmer’s Bridge Locks. They seemed to have the locks in their favour, but were still making a meal of it and we kept catching them up in spite of all the locks being against us. The surroundings got more depressing, the rain got heavier, and the crew came close to mutiny (actually it was just the hormonal teenager going through her “I hate Birmingham” phase).
We turned left onto the Birmingham & Fazeley Canal at Aston Junction, following the same boat down the eleven locks of the Aston flight. In spite of the low pound after the first lock, we had no problems until leaving the bottom lock where we were scraping over some obstruction and it felt as if we had more rubbish round the prop. A second trip down the weed hatch revealed nothing other than paranoia - or do I just like plunging my arms into the refreshing Birmingham waters?
The rain had gone by the time we stopped for water at Cuckoo Bridge and Jen cooked breakfast. Then it was on towards Salford Junction and familiar territory. From this point, the level seemed quite low and it was difficult to pass oncoming boats without scraping along the bottom. There were now a lot of hire boats en route for Birmingham and during a brief chat with a fisherman, he told us that most of them had run aground while passing him. We demonstrated our “expertise” by gliding gracefully past, although we knew it was just luck. In spite of the boats coming up, all the Minworth flight was against us.
The aim was to reach Kingsbury Water Park which meant we had to get through the eleven locks at Curdworth. Our luck changed dramatically and two of them were actually in our favour....
We moored after the bottom lock near the man-made lakes populated by common terns and walked back to the Dog & Doublet for good beer but rather mediocre food.