16th - 21st September. Slow road to Dudley.

On Friday we moved on to Brewood (pronounced Brood don't you know) which has an excellent butchers and a nice tea shop - so all the crew were happy. We sailed over Watling Street (the A5) on the way. The canal and road make a perfect cross on the map.

On Saturday Jo headed home with some of our stuff and Robin revisited the butchers and dined on the best faggots he's ever had. On Sunday he discovered that the Brewood moorings have the disadvantage of a large community of pigeons living in the trees above. He spent the morning washing pigeon poo off the boat before taking the boat a mile or so southwards. He spent Monday doing repairs and generally pottering and on Tuesday moved down to Autherley Junction. This marks the start of the Wolverhampton conurbation and is 10 minutes from the bottom of the Wolverhampton lock flight. Jo returned on Tuesday evening with clean laundry and a food parcel. On Wednesday morning, after a sustaining breakfast we successfully scaled the 21 locks of the flight and arrived in Wolverhampton town centre. We didn't stop except for Elsan and dog chores, deciding to plough on the Dudley. After a short distance serious rain began, soaking the captain for the last few miles.  We made a short detour off the main line towards Dudley and took the last spot in the decent moorings there.  We'll head back to the main line tomorrow and will stop in Gas Street basin if we can. Apparently it's pretty busy with canally things going on in Birmingham this weekend.  We have until next Tuesday to get back to Warwick. After that, winter work commitments call us home.  

Going into the first of the Wolverhampton locks. Its not as rural as it looks; there's a housing

estate on one side and a science park on the other!