Homeward Bound!

Wow, Birmingham was just amazing!

We arrived in Brum on Tuesday 3rd December after a gruelling two days of travelling through some of the roughest areas we have seen – even worse than parts of the Rochdale Canal! The below picture was taken at a CRT point where we were hoping to fill up with water!

Graffiti adorned almost every surface we saw and, in places, we had to keep Zak on board as the floor was littered with broken glass and needles. Luckily we managed to moor up overnight outside Aston University where we were relatively safe.

At one point as we were approaching the City, I thought we were going to have to call in a dead body, until it suddenly sat up! See if you can spot it below 😂

Arriving into the City Centre was like arriving at an oasis in the desert. Or like that scene in Robin Hood when they sail into London with the dead King’s crown (Russell Crowe version). It was amazing – we were greeted with lots of smiles and waves and we felt a bit famous 😂 There are so many different paths you can take, it really was like a UK version of Venice (not that I’ve ever been).

The City Centre was beautifully clean and the Christmas festivities were clear to see. We were lucky enough to bag a mooring in the Gas Street basin, which is right in the heart of the City. Endless visitors to the City posed for a picture in front of Daisy and we felt quite safe.

We visited the German Christmas market for beer and sausage and we have pretty much finished off our Christmas shopping! We have had to go ‘small’ this year as there is limited space on the boat for Santa.

On our first night, we had a catch up with Matt Kelly who I used to work with at Timms and he introduced Paul to the delights of Black Country ales. After Matt had caught the train back home, Paul and I carried on partying, euphoric at being in such a fantastic place and we ended up partying until around 1am!

Whilst in Brum, we also went on the big wheel and had a catch up with Ray, James and Gordon (the fellow boaters we met on the Hatton flight).

As with the rest of the UK, we were hit by Storm Darragh, and it was without doubt the worst weather we have had yet. The wind turned the canal into a wavy channel and the boat was rocking constantly. We had to secure everything as best as we could – even the solar panels and neither of us slept on the Friday as we kept checking the ropes etc.

On the Saturday, we decided that we would treat ourselves to an early Christmas present and so we booked into the Hyatt for two nights to escape the storm. We periodically checked in on Daisy as she was moored right next to the hotel and she did just fine.

Meanwhile, we soaked our frozen bones in a hot bath (I stayed in for around 2 hours) and we made the most of the super soft king sized bed. Zak too was in his element and was rather miffed when we had to leave!

We left our mooring this morning and have done around 21 locks to Aston. We were fortunate enough to have the assistance of a couple of CRT lockies for the first 13 locks for which we were very grateful.

Next we are headed on to the Birmingham & Fazeley, then the Coventry, then the Trent & Mersey to Kings Bromley where we hope to arrive at the marina on Saturday. Fingers crossed that all the fallen trees have been removed by then!

Love to all,

Jo & Paul xxx