Birmingham to Wolverhampton

Following information and advice from Andrew last night, Mike set off into the city centre to call at Maplins as soon as they opened. Here he was able to replace the GPS unit and the battery stabiliser for the laptop. By 9.30 we set off and proceeded down the New Main Line. At least this section was quite speedy - wide and with good depth. Nevertheless, it took some time to get to the three Tipton Factory Locks.

Soon after this - and as time was pressing we had lunch 'on the run' - Christine discovered that yesterday's thief had also removed one of the fanlights from a side window. A phone call to the next boatyard - soon after the bottom of the Wolverhampton 21 - set up a repair first thing on Monday morning.

As a result, there was no point in rushing to complete the flight today as we had planned. We called at Broad Street Basin to use the facilities and a very helpful BW man found a spare piece of hardboard and cut it to fit the window space for now. A bit more secure (?!?) and will keep the rain out if it should do so in the next 24 hours.

He also said that, in the circumstances, we could moor overnight in the basin which is perhaps that bit more secure than the other mooring spots above the locks. None are especially quite or salubrious but we are not fussy at this stage!

This gave us time to track down a few more replacement items - Andrew had advised that there is an Argos within walking distance so off we set. After a few false turns we found the Mander Shopping Centre and first called at Currys. This put us in a quandary as we suddenly found ourselves confused over the screen size! Mike volunteered to go back and check which
gave Christine the time to find a third option - a local Euronics store. As the other sets we had seen had DVD drives that come out from the side, rather that a slot version, we opted for this one.

We also managed to pick up some other small items including a signal booster to replace the one that was stolen. To add to all the problems, Mike managed to stype in the wrong pin number - twice - resulting in the card being locked. Back at the boat, a phone call to the card company yielded the advice to follow the instructions on most cash machines! Back to the city centre!