Once the boat was free we proceeded upwards and were soon flying through the locks once more.
In actually fact, but for our enforced stoppage, we would have made a record passage, for us, up the Stourbridge Locks with the assistance of John enabling us to go ahead and set the locks. We saw no other boat in the flight and luckily, other than with a few leaky locks, every lock was with us. At No.3 there was another little arm with dual purposes purhaps.
After 16 locks we said goodbye to John and packed him up with a full bag of extras for his late lunch, ort future lunches and headed off into the interior following the winding contour canal that would have passed brickworks, foundries, coal mines etc., but now mainly new housing that we noticed were fitted with external charging points for the cars, but no solar panels on the roof! We were going to explore the Fen Pools Branch of the Stourbridge Canal, but following our delay we decided to leave it until another time.
As we passed the old site of the Ashtree Colliery we noticed these clouds. They were vertical rather than horizontal and in the main that is the way clouds usually develop. We wondered if they were the residue of con trails from aircraft but I think that it is more likely that there is a temperature inversion meaning the clouds are 'growing' vertically, but any plausible explanation is welcome.
These roving bridges served basin in works, probably the closest would be Ashtree Colliery and the further a brick works. I have not seen anywhere that has retained so many little works basin bridges as in the Birmingham canal netwrok. I'm not sure whether the likes of Manchester and London had so many and they have been lost, or they just used the main canal wharf front.
This is another flight of locks that if they had been in Northampton or Leicestershire would have been swarming with gogoozlers as the bywashes are like little Pennine waterfalls and the locks fall steeply down the 85'. There are also pubs galore in the area. Just the odd walker and cyclist to day who had seen it all before. That is until the second to last lock of the day, close to the top when this lad said he didn't envy us having all those locks to do! He obviously hadn't even realised that we were heading up!! The bottom of the Black Delph Locks is actually where the Stourbridge Canal terminates and the Dudley No.1 canal starts. They were supposed to be built almost as one bu they remained separate, although built at the same time and by a father and son team, Thomas and Thomas Dadford
The stable block near the top was provide for the boat horsed, giving them a rest for the flight. It is now used by the voluntary lock keepers , but none on today it seems.
You could almost be at Foxton Locks as it is a magnificent flight, easily worked but little known.
When you get to the last lock and look back you realise why, despite everything referring to nine locks, and the pub at the bottem being called the Tenth Lock, there actually only eight. Originally there were nine locks but the lock mines etc caused severe subsidence and the locks were always having trouble. By 1856 they decided to do away with most of the old locks, retaining the top and bottom locks and reducing the number to eight. The roving bridge is over the old route, and to this day the land of the old locks has not been developed and runs parallel to the current locks.
How many changes of name and logos have occurred since this was erected. Next to it was a board on to which stoppages could be advertised. What did we do before mobile phones, I phones or the internet? Stick up a notice!
Once out of the top lock we were very soon passing Merry Hill shopping centre. We decided not to stop at the moorings just above it, but continue on to the basin a little further. The Church of St. Andrew's on the hill at Netherton will be a constant companion for the next day or so as it can be seen from all parts until passing through the Netherton Tunnel to the other side. There is obvious signs of the parched earth and wild fires here too.
We moored up in the basin, opposite Weatherspoons and Helen was soon ready to set of into Merry Hill on the trail of wedding attire. I left her to it and headed in the other direction, to Brierley Hill to find new drinking holes.
On the way I found this little logo over a small sub station. It is very Dan Dare and dates from the 1930's. The Midland Electricity Corporation for Power and Distribution started in 1897 to supply electricity to the South Staffordshire area. In fact they were the first company to be granted statutory powers to distribute electricity over a large area. They had a power station at Oker Hill. By 1925 they were merged with several of the local councils to form the Midlands Electricity Board. That stayed intact until the privatisation of the industry in 1990. But it is a really great logo.
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