Up the 24 locks and into Birmingham

 We haven't travelled many miles today - about 4.5, but we have worked our way up 24 locks - I did the winding for the first 11 which made up the Aston Flight and then Chris did the 13 that make up the Farmer's Bridge Flight. As a result we both have some tired muscles this evening. 

We left our residential morning quite early today as was our plan and headed off up the canal through Aston.  As you know I love reflections and this one is very satisfactory - especially with the wonderful blue sky, but it's the fact that the water is not covered with plastic and other muck - to be enjoyed I fell.

Some of the locks were some distance apart and I had time to enjoy the flowers in between!

as well as the rather quirky canal signs.

It's easier to celebrate lock flights visually when they are in the middle of the countryside, but this is what this one looks like, 

in both directions.

We got to the top of the flight in just about two hours largely because all the locks were set for us, which really makes a difference to how long each lock takes to travel through.

This was the last lock on the Aston Flight with a very lovely stone bridge and some less lovely modern buildings. After that we turned right and along the branch that lead to the Farmer's Bridge lock flight.

I'm not sure what 'is what it is' but it's a rather unusual end to a building anyway!  We've been up this flight before - the first time we came with our boat to Birmingham in 2022.  We went up this flight then and it is one of the most extraordinary experiences.  There was some very impressive as we got into the flight.

This image was really interesting, Chris thought.

It's called Mad 3D and you can see what the artist meant!  This next bit could be called mad 3 D too as we go into a trio of locks underneath this hi-rise building.  Its a really bizarre experience of where late 18th Century planning and design is over-written by early 21st Century planning and design.  

This is what you see looking forwards - think about it with trees and hedges on the sides and it's like many other lock flights.  But this is what you see when you look to the side,  and there's water pouring down around the locks too, so the sounds are very different.

Chris was now nearly at the half-way point up this flight.

The canal is so constrained in by the buildings either side of it.  It must look pretty oppressive on a wet day.

We came upon this footbridge which was closed off as it was broken in some way.  My guess is that it might date from 2000 or so.  Not a great success in comparison to the bridges of our canal makers.

We got through this set of locks in record time too.  Oddly they hadn't all been set for us - just most of them with the odd two or three needing to be emptied.  So at 1.30pm we were moored up at the top of the flight having lunch which was very satisfactory!   We got rid of some of our rubbish - thankfully there is no evidence of streets full of stuff following the dustmen's strike here.  Gas Street Basin and it's immediate area have been really developed since the first time we came here in 1982 when there was oil all over the canal, polystyrene blocks floating on the surface and all sorts.  Definitely not a place to moor and leave your boat.  Now it feels altogether safer and certainly much cleaner and vibrant is the word with people of all sorts of backgrounds using the area for social life or to walk through. 

This is the International Conference Centre of which Birmingham is proud,

And this is Gas Street Basin itself which is mostly for residential moorings.

The old and the new...

There is some quite fun street art around here which I discovered when walking to a laundrette to get the washing done! this one is outside a modern building.

And this one on a walkway at The Mailbox which is at the end of the Gas Street Basin's canal section, and within sight of our boat.  We had dinner there this evening which was very enjoyable.

So tomorrow we have a day to explore Birmingham and need to plan some bits to explore properly! It's good to be here in good time for my meeting on Saturday / Sunday.