Almost a disaster.

Hello Friends and Followers.

It has been so lovely being back in Birmingham. Yesterday (Thursday) we wanted to look for Keatleys, who sell metal. We were looking for some brass strips for the top of our back cabin doors. We had been given directions from a friend and so after the usual morning stuff, we set off down the Farmers Bridge Locks to find the road and the factory.

Down the flight you get a great view of BT Tower, which dominates the Birmingham sky line. Almost down to the bottom of the locks, we walked up on to the road and there it was Keatleys and hopefully the brass we wanted. As we walked in through the doors, on the right hand side there was shelving, with off cuts of metals. We spoke to the gentleman behind the counter and he suggested we search through the piles, find what we want and he would trim it for us to the right size. We did indeed find the brass we wanted and it was trimmed down for us and we were charged £1 for the off cuts, this was a complete and utter bargain. Having left the factory, we walked back into Birmingham, had a cuppa at the market cafe and a quick wander around the market, where I bought six large sausage rolls for £1 and they are beautiful, because we had one each for our lunch. After lunch, I thought we should lift the floor in the back cabin and check all the nuts and bolts, to see if it would cure the knocking.

We lifted the first board and all seemed fine, but no sooner we lifted the second board, I saw the problem immediately and so a slight disaster was averted on Thursday afternoon. From Saturday, when we came up the Lapworth locks, we have had various tapping knocking noisy, progressively getting worse. Discovered what was causing it. One of the universal joints on one of our prop-shafts was coming unbolted! All tightened up again, but we think we need to have split pins fitted through the nuts to stop them coming undone. Even some nylock nuts were loose! To think what could of happened, had we been on the river, actually it does not bare thinking about. Both Keith and I were really chuffed we had sorted it and all nuts and bolts were checked and will be regularly checked whilst we are out. Thursday evening was spent with friend having dinner at their place, we had a wonderful time.

Birmingham looks fabulous at night.

I enjoyed taking night shots.

This morning (Friday 10th March), we were going to put our repairs to the test, as we were heading off.

We set off at 9.20 am and there was not a knock or a bang to be heard thank goodness. The weather was very overcast with low cloud and drizzle, which did not bother us much, I relit the back cabin stove to keep the chill off and to boil the kettle and later on more sausage rolls would be heated up. Along the way we called into Caggy’s to see if he would be able to help us out with split pins, but he was unable to help us, so we will wait now until we get home. Our destination today was The Black Country Living Museum. We made it to Factory Locks, which were all set in our favour.

The pounds can be low here, but today we were fine.

Keith had that smoke gets in your eyes feeling.

We arrived at the Black Country Museum and there was only one other boat moored up, so we winded and moored up. We decided that would would do the Museum tomorrow and therefore we would go and find Aldi and do a shop. We donned our rucksacks and walked across the footbridge to the Dudley Tunnel building, we walked past the sanitary station and up the grassy bank, through the Dudley Tunnel car park to the main road where we turned left and walked up the hill and there was Aldi. It was not far to go at all. Shopping done and a downhill walk back to the boat. It has been a good day, but looking forward to tomorrow.