Sunday 12th
July; Hopwood to King’s Norton
Sun greeted us as we opened the curtains – how lovely! It always surprises us how far it is from
Hopwood to the southern portal of Wast Hill Tunnel. In spite of the sun the
wind was chilly, so jumpers stayed on, and it wasn’t too long before we were
donning waterproofs and getting the brolly out for the tunnel. We were surprised to see a large bat fly
around in front of the tunnel light for a short spell – we must have woken the
poor thing up. It may have been a
Daubenton’s, which is one of the bigger UK bats known to roost in
canal tunnels. The tunnel was wet in
places, as usual, and we were glad of the brolly. Meg had been shut inside of course for the
transit, which we achieved in about 22 minutes as there were no other boats.
Once we were through and she was allowed out again, Meg
quickly realised where we were. After
taking on water we moored at her favourite spot on the entire network (except
maybe Spiceball Park
on the Oxford)
– King’s Norton Recreation Ground. The mooring
was a bit overgrown but not too much – a few snips with the shears on the
nettles and we were fine. I went off up
the main road for some shopping in King’s Norton Green.
It’s the second Saturday of the month and the Farmers’ Market was in
full swing.
There was a one-way system in place, with hand sanitiser at
both ends. I bought blackcurrants, some
beautiful tomatoes, some free range chicken pieces, and a sourdough loaf. There was even musical
entertainment – a young chap was playing old songs and country & western
tunes on a steel drum, just one of him but it sounded great. We had no idea that it’s such a useful little
centre here – there is a Co-op, pharmacy, restaurants and bars, and plenty of
hairdressers and barbers should you need them, all set around a little green.
I went back to the boat after rather a delay – the socially
distanced queues took some time to move, especially for the Co-op. Meg had persuaded Dave to spend some time in
the rec, and as we boiled the kettle for coffee we decided to stay put for the day. And before lunch I set off once more. My mouth has suddenly become very sore so I had dropped
into the pharmacy for advice – without asking to have a look I was diagnosed
but they didn’t have the relevant gel, so gave me directions to another pharmacy in Cotteridge,
which is less than a mile up the road. It was an
easy walk from the boat, across the playing fields and up the Pershore Road. That pharmacist did ask for a look and
prescribed a mouthwash instead. Let’s
hope it works!
I walked back down Pershore Road towards King’s Norton Green,
cutting through the churchyard. There is
a half-timbered building behind the church, in years gone by the old grammar
school, where suffragettes once broke in with arson in mind, but were so taken
with the beauty and peace of the room that they didn’t do it, just leaving a message
to that effect. There were other
buildings too
 |
| St Nicolas Court |
I visited the Farmers’ Market again to buy strawberries and
samosas for a little extra at lunchtime.
In the afternoon we took Meg and visited King’s Norton Park,
which is across the road from the rec.
It has some lovely walks
And copper beech trees too.
When we got back, I found an old toothbrush and tackled the
window-frames on the port side, which were as green as the ropes, and some
lockdown birdshit which took quite a bit of elbow-grease to remove, so I washed
the side of the boat too. Dave took over to
rinse and polish it but was detained by a passer-by keen to relate his own
boaty experiences, which included having his boat stolen when moored at the
junction. The upshot was that it rather
messed up the polishing which will have to be done again. The evening was sunny, but we only got the
sunshine filtered through the trees, which made for an interesting effect on
the TV screen.
2 miles, Wast Hill Tunnel (wet), one very very happy doggy
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