It’s been a strange first week of the year – combining unsettling new lessons and exciting experiences, with comforting returns to familiarity. All giving a chance to learn, reflect, and move better equipped into the months ahead.
We started the week on the Coventry Canal at Fradley Junction. The Mucky Duck aka The Swan proved an excellent place to share a celebratory New Year’s Eve drink or two with fellow boaters and the temptation to cruise on a crisp sunny New Year’s Day proved a delightful start to 2023. That took us onto the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal at Hopwas.
Set against the backdrop of ancient woodland now a military firing range, Hopwas is a delight. I say that despite having been caught out and locked in the firing range on a live firing day when out for a walk with the dog on our first stay there. Through locked gates, friendly locals gave escape directions whilst gently pointing out for future visits the need to look for the big red warning flag fluttering beside us…
The army was obviously on festive leave or strike duty this week, so the woods were safe. We didn’t have too much time to explore, with work on two days, one demanding a long drive on multiple motorways. As soon as work finished, we fixed the tiller pole, popped Jemima Puddleduck, our tiller pin in place, and set off once more.
By Fazeley junction we were back on the Coventry Canal, and from this approach it is possible to really enjoy Steve Edwards’s giant murals of a kingfisher and robin which he created in 2014 on the side of a timber yard. They’ve now been joined by a lively chaffinch and bullfinch created by artists from New Urban ERA UK.
Along this stretch of the canal, as with so much structure in urban areas, murals have been created as a response to graffiti, an example of what urban art can be. In many places this has worked – Birmingham, Leicester and Oxford being particular examples where stunning art enlivens buildings and cheers gloomy bridge holes. They are brilliant demonstrations turning negatives into positives, something we can all strive to do this year.
Splashes of colour en route this week have come from nature too. Large and small displays of vibrant beauty have cheered what can be a dreicht time of the year.
From Hopwas via the Glascote locks where we met some helpful bored young men only to happy to help push lock beams open, to Polesworth offering pub and poetry – neither of which we were tempted to take up – one illegible, the other a casualty of dry January.
From Polesworth – a glorious ascent of Atherstone’s 11 locks in sunshine with every single one in our favour and voluntary lock keepers to aid at the top. Such simple delights put a rosy glow on any day of cruising and they could be our last locks for a month or two!
On then past many moored boats, some coldly lonely, others with puffing chimneys indicating inhabitants warm and cosy inside, to a blissful mooring spot in woodland below Mount Judd ( also known as the Nuneaton Nipple). This man made mountain of spoil from what was once Judkins’ quarry has settled to become a local landmark, and it’s certainly useful as a location guide.
The barking of foxes and calls of owls in the woods beside us were the only sounds to be heard at night, and the moon the only light. Our original idea of a very early start to make the most of the time available to move before work meetings was delightfully delayed by the diurnal wobble. After the shortest day we think it’s going to become lighter but there’s a wobble for a week or two until things settle down. It was really apparent in the clear skies round the dark woods.
We’ve left some mornings at 7.30am recently and been able to see well to navigate our way, but not so on a Friday. This was the scene at the back of the boat at 7.18am
And this the scene at 7.34
By 8.04 our commute was underway, to the glorious accompaniment of the sunrise.
Past the telegraph pole, a landmark in its own right that appears on maps.
The nearer you get along the canal to Mount Judd, and the nearer to Nuneaton, the more apparent is the encroachment of man to the environment. Quarrying has ceased there now, and the area is rich in wildlife, although also sadly in litter, some remaining from pre-2009 when the quarry was a landfill site.
Our cruise brought us on to yet another canal – the lock-free Ashby.
A fondly familiar haunt, which I seem to remember saying we wouldn’t cruise again in winter because it’s narrow towpaths turn into a sea of mud, but here we are! We have wellies, and the dog at his great age retains a semblance of 4-paw drive!
The mud will give us a chance to remember fondly drier days and probably deliver the intention that the only mark we travellers should leave behind us is our footprints.
Pickingupducks 