Heading back to Worcester

The short Brandwood tunnel on the Stratford Canal near Kings Norton

Passing through Kings Norton guillotine stop lock (now permanently open)

Our journey now takes us via King's Norton Junction in Birmingham down the Worcester & Birmingham canal to Worcester, which we left about 4 weeks ago.

Back to yesterday - in the evening we visited the Blue Bell Cider House, conveniently about 100 yards from our mooring. A couple of glasses of cider was enjoyed (each). This is the real stuff - slightly cloudy and flat but very tasty.

This morning we set off at 9am, carrying on up the Stratford Canal. The weather was cooler with a strong blustery wind, not quite as pleasant as previous days.

The first point of interest was the Shirley Draw bridge, an electrically-powered boater-operated bridge that carries a fairly busy road over the canal. We successfully held up 3-4 cars as we raised the bridge and passed by.

The Shirley bridge marks the start of Birmingham, but from the boat you would never know it. The Stratford canal carries on through wooded cuttings for much of the journey to finish at Kings Norton, well inside the urban area. Here we turned south down the Worcester & Birmingham canal, and after passing through the 2700 yard Wast Hill Tunnel, one of the longest on the system, we moored at 15:30 just outside Alvechurch, a total journey of nearly 13 miles.