Stourport

Stourport main basin

A Georgian corner

The weather was much improved this morning so we started early on the 4 miles and 3 locks trip to Stourport. Once we left the light industry of Kidderminster we were back into typical Staffs & Worcestershire scenery with the woods, River Stour and red sandstone cliffs.

We moored up in Stourport just after 11 and after a quick shop in Lidl (their fruit & nut muesli is very good and much cheaper than elsewhere) and lunch went for a wander round the town.

Stourport did not exist prior to the building of the canal. Brindley built 4 impressive canal basins here and locks down to the Severn so that goods from the new industries starting up in Birmingham and the Black Country could be transhipped for distribution around the country and abroad. The town was built around these facilities and because of the history has a large number of attractive and interesting Georgian buildings.

Although we enjoyed the canal basins and the Severn riverside, we were disappointed by the town centre. Where we had hoped for interesting restaurants, antique shops, deli's etc we actually found a good range of charity shops, several cheaper household goods shops, a coop supermarket, and at least five butchers. I do feel the town could make more of its assets.