May – a month of promise, of blossom and new beginnings and for us, the distinct possibility of embarking on a voyage to unknown waters where we could very well get lost.
“Not to have passed this way is to have missed something unexpectedly impressive and extremely important to the understanding of modern history”, said Robert Aickman, co-founder of the Inland Waterways Association about one particular section of this waterway.
Others have labelled where we are off to less enthusiastically, and to be honest as complete nightmare. “Black satanic mills, locks everywhere, whole days spent down the weed-hatch untangling complete households from the prop in the rare moments when not being stuck on submerged cars, HGVs and tanks, in a hostile environment.” (BCNS) They then comfortingly add…“But it’s not!”
We are headed to Birmingham. We visited briefly 4 years ago heading into Gas Street Basin and out almost immediately. Now we are set to spend at least a whole month exploring its canal network. The Birmingham Canal Network (BCN) is the largest system of canals in the UK. At its height it had 159 miles of waterways. Bradshaw’s 1928 Canals and Navigable Rivers of England says: “The system is a very complicated one, owing to many improvements and fresh canals which have been added to it from time to time.”
Research indicates 49 canals and branches, innumerable loops and ‘stubs’ which are short dead ends and the 4th longest tunnel in the UK- the Dudley at 2.13miles. We will be experiencing “The Curly Wyrley”, visiting Bumble Hole as well as discovering the Ikon Gallery at Oozells Square, The Coffin Works (a dead end museum perhaps?), the Birmingham Back to Backs, The Roundhouse (a Canal & River Trust and National Trust combined heritage project and of course the Black Country Living Museum which now accepts dogs two days a week (Boatdog is impressed).
Encouraging people to boat the BCN has led to several initiatives. The Inland Waterways Association (IWA) has a Challenge for boaters to encourage them to visit far flung or rarely visited parts of the entire UK network. The BCN contains 7 of these – the highest number of Silver Propellor Challenge locations in a relatively small area.
The BCN Society also promotes the use of the network, as one would expect. They organise exploration cruises with boaters who know their way around, and can take those new to Birmingham to the highlights. Since 1967 they have also organised a 24-hour Marathon Challenge. Competitors get points for visiting canals, loops, stubs and for the number of locks they tackle as well as bonuses for collecting rubbish, decorating their boats and finding answers to questions en route. It is a marathon about tactics, logistics and certainly not about speed.
The ingenuity of those who love these waterways and encourage others to do just the same is heartening. With enthusiasm like this the BCN is assured of attracting more boaters to discover what it has to offer.
We are glad to take up the challenge to spend time getting to know Birmingham’s web of waterways. We have our remaining barge pole ready to fend us off silt and sunken debris, our weed hatch gauntlets to hand and maps galore to try and prevent us getting lost in the twists and turns of the area that is said to have “More Canals than Venice”.
Maybe a month isn’t enough?
Pickingupducks 