Out into the country

We awoke to a bright, sunny morning, albeit cold and fresh. The sky was clear and central Birmingham from the canal seemed hardly a busy city centre! We set off and almost immediately arrived at the top of the Farmers Bridge flight of 13 locks. Although much of the city
centre has been re-developed and looks attractive, this was the first part and we recall it as very new from a previous cruise through
Birmingham back in the Eighties!



The locks were quite easy to operate and we completed the flight in about an hour and 40 minutes, putting us well ahead of our schedule. Although the flight is still built over, with a number of the buildings covering the side ponds which are essential in a flight with such short pounds. However, the old industrial scene has been replaced with modern office and apartment blocks, as well as one or two attractive modern footbridges to complement the original cast iron ones.





At the bottom of the flight we turned onto the Digbeth Branch and the Ashted locks. In the middle of the flight there is a short tunnel (really a very large bridge) but a shallow angle to the arch made it difficult to navigate and the cabin top edge scraped through - just - but leaving some of the paint behind!

The next flight - Camp Hill locks - were now uphill. At the top we moored up to use the disposal facilities and to fill up with water. We also took a break for lunch. After 25 locks we felt that we had deserved it!



The rest of the day was completely different - no locks and level cruising all the way! Gradually the overtly industrial landscape changed and a long stretch in a cutting was very green. In fact, many of the trees were rapidly changing to their autumnal colours and looked very pretty. Shortly before we planned to moor we started the stove so that by the time we stopped the cabin was already snug. We had hoped to reach Knowle and, just as it turned six o'clock we moored up just outside the village.