Bartimaeus

We were woken early by the geese, no surprise there. Inaccessible spots are hard to drive in and so we ended up reversing through three locks as it was not possible to turn where we were. We had a chat with a friendly litter-picker, who had a T shirt saying “Wombling in Dudley” on it. He was enjoying emptying bins and switched to opening lock gates. He used to live in Wimbledon. Funnily enough someone a day or two ago sang Enya’s Orinoco Flow to us as we passed.

Having not achieved going into the Dudley tunnel we had arranged to meet Paul and take him through some tunnels. I drove through one ( first time I’ve had the helm in a tunnel, I think) which looked straightforward, but got smaller and less evenly surfaced as it progressed which required more steering and crouching than I thought. This picture appeared along it, in case you weren’t feeling nervous enough yet!

Paul joined us and we turned around and went back through (didn’t see the picture in the other direction) and through a much wider, wetter  and longer 2 way tunnel with pedestrian paths at the side.

We made stops to see a ruined mill and a disused pump station and in Birmingham got moored very near Paul’s house.  He took us to Shiraz, for some delicious Persian cuisine and generous portions.

Spotted a couple of cormorants on a roof and I lost count of  how many herons I saw. Always love them.