Birmingham City Centre

Here I am Rune

Distance 4 miles

Total 887 Locks 46 Tunnels

Running total mileage 1294.6miles

I do start to wonder how long this period of strong wind will go on for. By my reckoning it has been blowing strongly since about last Saturday and, since we don’t intend moving tomorrow the likelihood is that it will abate then! As it happens on most of our awkward manoeuvres today the wind was actually assisting us, except for the initial casting off in Engine Arm which needed a quick bit of acceleration to get away without hitting anything. The end of Engine Arm was OK however as the wind was blowing us in the right direction to go towards Smethwick locks. They were all fine although due to the light use at the moment they were all full of crud so I decided to haul the boat through them on the rope rather than trying to power them through the locks and gathering all of the crud around the propeller.

The trip around the Solo loop was relatively uneventful, passing Winson Green Prison on the way, it appears that there was once an entry from the canal into the prison under a bridge, now sealed off. The point of interest from relatively recent history is that Winson Green Prison was where the serial killer, Fred West, hanged himself. Also adjacent to the site was the All Saints Mental Asylum but this closed in 2001 and the land is now used by the prison.

We took lunch at Hockley Port halfway around the Soho loop, this has an unusual dry dock in that the gate through which you pass to enter the dry dock is of the ‘guillotine’ style (see photo), not generally seen on the canals. Finally moored up at Brindley Place having come around Oozells Street loop. We are OK moored here until Friday when we shall look for another mooring nearby as we’d like to remain in Birmingham City Centre until about Monday.

Guillotine Gate at Hockley Port dry dock

Having arrived in the City Centre we just had to go and have a look at the drained section of canal where they are repairing a leak. It was interesting to see just how deep the canal is, and just how much rubbish there is on the canal bed!

The Dam holding back the canal.........

.......and a view of all the rubbish on the canal bed.