Midlands meanderings

4/7/2019

Loughborough, steam train to Leicester on an old section of rail, walking back to boat, the bomb squad. 

A WWII grenade had been pulled from the canal by a magnet fisher.  Apparently the Home Guard AKA Dad's Army, used to practice nearby.

Excitement over, we set out for Leicester by boat, finding a mooring in the city centre, a pontoon provided as part of a new waterside apartment development.

The Richard III story, the discovery of his remains under a car park, formerly Greyfriars Priory, has boosted visitor numbers- from 20000 to 140000 pa. Interesting detective  work to locate the grave, and to also find 2 descendants of the maternal line for DNA matching.

From Leicester we hired a car and scooted north to cousins in Lancashire, a quick sortie into Wales, a visit also to some long case AKA grandfather clocks.

Now approaching Market Harborough, where JJ has high hopes of more uranium glass. Lovely rural landscapes, hungry swans.

Weather fine, sunny. Expecting a drought to be declared anytime.

Brexit an ongoing mess, whatever happens there will be long term casualties.





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Heading west

Image
 Where shall we go for our last Santiago voyage?😢 initially we thought Llangollen,  over that amazing unpronounceable aqueduct  the Pontcysyllte. But time is short, still Scotland, Portsmouth, Lancashire, Yorkshire and London to fit in to our last 5 weeks So we settle on Chester. Not so many miles or locks as Llangollen. Funnily enough the River Dee runs through both, in Chester close to the sea, in Llangollen high in the Welsh hills, feeding part of its flow into the canal, enabling the transport of stone. So we travel back through the Harecastle tunnel, approximately 40 minutes, the Cap'n  sensibly wearing a lifejacket. Falling into an unlit tunnel, banging your head on a metal boat...it has happened, but not to us.
Read more

Chester

Image
 No heroics  we agree. That is we won't stand on the back of the boat, charging into pouring rain. Even gentle English rain is wet. Who would've thought  it. So we get a bit wet, then moor up, about 15 miles east of Chester, on the beautiful Shropshire canal. It wends nor west from below Birmingham towards the Mersey. On an earlier trip we pushed west from Chester to Ellesmere Port. From there you can 'ferry across the Mersey' to Liverpool.  We were organising this, using a pilot, some years ago, but bad weather kyboshed that. Moored up yesterday afternoon in Central Chester, 5 min walk into the ancient town centre, from the city walls 🧱 , second only to York for their intact remains. After dinner on the boat, plus a reviving GnT, we strolled into the melee of coronation madness. The odd, very, hens' parties. Bah humbug. A pic of boaters dressed up for the coronation. And 2 of the canal. The odd round building with a pixy hat was the lock keeper's hut when comm
Read more

22 April Oberhafen

Image
 This small town fringes Lake Thun, trad wooden chalets climbing up towards pine forests. An ideal place to live or for a tourist A small cafe at the ferry wharf, so a coffee before heading east to Interlaken, or west to Thun.  Or a guacamole bagel for lunch! Our friends' house is a recent build, the roof covered in solar panels. K is an artist with fabric..a  puppet leans at leisure, quilted birds against a wall. Such skill and patience. Nearby a pool complex,  well used, a practical protocol of pre showering, shoe removal etc, that allows a high patronage with courtesy observed. Everywhere garden corners  fit in the urban landscape.
Read more