A STOPPAGE WITH A DIFFERENCE!!!

 

Shot at Dawn

We are experiencing plenty of stoppages on the system this year. It wouldn’t surprise you to know, that most of these are being caused by the very hot dry weather we are having, causing very low water in many places, and more than a few broken locks.

But the stoppage we had at Barton Turns was for something completely different, and not water related at all.

But I get ahead of myself. We left Willington on Sunday and headed for Burton on Trent, only 1 lock today and it was Dallow lock, the first single lock on this canal. We moored near Shobnall Fields, the moorings here are very good and plentiful, but its a bit of a walk into the town. Lidl is about a 15min walk, which was handy as we needed a good shop. We had a quiet afternoon and evening and didn’t bother with the pub. I did Google the nearest, and we happy to see that the Alfred had reopened. This pub was open the first time we passed through Burton, and we had had a very enjoyable afternoon in there. But it had closed the next time we passed through.

After shopping we decided to give it a go, and was very pleasantly surprised. It has a lovely community feel to it, and the Captain was very happy with Top Dog stout from Burton Bridge brewery. They have various things going on through out the week, so maybe on our way back we will call in again.

https://www.thealfred.co.uk/

Before we headed into the town next day to pick up a few bits we wanted, the Captain was approached by a teenage fisherman, who quite seriously asked if we would move the boat, bearing in mind there was plenty of room in front and behind us the request was ridiculous. The Captain of course said no, and we thought that was the end of the matter, but then later the young man proceeded to yell at passing boats for disturbing his fishing session. Did he not realise the canals were built for boats not for fishing, most strange.

We called in at the Alfred on our way back from town.

As we are still killing time it was only a very short hop to Branston Waters next day. We took a short walk round the lake and then headed to The Blacksmiths Arms, a nice pub with an interesting menu. We had our 2^nd pint in The Boat, which is right on the canal. The Boat is not really a pub but an Italian Restaurant, we still got a drink and the food we saw come out looked delicious.

Our next stop was Barton Turn, after calling at the marina for a pump out we moored below the lock. I wanted to moor here as the pub has changed hands since last we were in, and the new landlord uses Facebook a lot to advertise what’s on.

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100095390771168

This is when things took an interesting turn, the Captain received a notification from CRT that the canal was closed, between Barton Turn lock and Alrewas lock, due to an unexploded WW2 bomb that had been uncovered at a gravel pit at the side of the canal. Like I said not your usual stoppage.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clye0l63zv9o

As the afternoon wore on we were joined by boat after boat, some had heard about the bomb, and some hadn’t. We headed off to the pub, and on the way had a chat with people off the other boats, everyone was friendly and not bothered at all about the hold up.

The pub was great and we were soon joined by another boater, didn’t get his name, but he had a lovely little sausage dog called Lily who happily sat on my lap as we talked.

The bomb was exploded at around 7.30pm by the bomb squad, and we actually heard it even though it was some way away. We later found out it was a 500lb bomb, so no wonder we heard it. Here's a video of the event

https://youtube.com/shorts/dsA-dttPW9g?is=l7Er9zbk009dGDMm

All the other boats where up and gone by the time we surfaced next morning, we were only going as far as Alrewas and staying there for a few days. Alrewas is very popular with boaters, as it has a selection of shops including a Co-op and a Butchers. There are 3 pubs as well. There are plenty of moorings, but it does get very busy. Much to our surprise we managed to moor just past the bridge, which gave us easy access to the village. As we needed milk we headed to the Co-op, but stopped off at the George and Dragon for a quick pint, and on the way back we couldn’t miss the Crown, which was extremely busy.

https://thecrownalrewas.co.uk/

Next day and we planned to catch a new bus service which takes you to the National Arboretum Memorial. The last time we had walked, which meant we had to take our lives in our hands to cross the very busy A38 road. The bus went from outside the George and Dragon and cost me £5 return, but the Captain nothing with his bus pass.

The Arboretum is a wonderful place, with memorials to the armed forces, and all sorts of other groups who were involved in conflict. One of my favourites is the one to the Showman’s Guild, men who ran the travelling fairs up and down the country before joining up, are commemorated with a galloper from a carousel.

Showmans Guild Memorial

https://www.warmemorialsonline.org.uk/memorial/247949

The Shot at Dawn memorial represents 309, mainly teenage boys, who were executed during WW1 for various minor military crimes. They were all pardoned in 2006, when it was recognised that they would have not been ‘shot at dawn’ at other times for what they did.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shot_at_Dawn_Memorial

It was a lovely afternoon, but there is so much to see, so we will be back. To finish the afternoon we called in at the Crown for a well earned pint or 2.

After a busy day we moored near Handsacre, but first we did the locks through Fradley Junction, passing the start of the Coventry canal and our way home. We didn’t go to the pub, but will probably call on our way back.

The final destination on this leg of our journey was Rugeley, as we will be winding and heading back to Trent Lock after a few days here. We cruised to Rugeley passing 3 boats we know, first, Wee May owned by Paul Lumsden, he does a vlog called Narrowboat Nattering which is worth a look.

https://www.youtube.com/narrowboatnatterings

and Bearwood Boster, we met Trina and Paul in Lincoln many years ago, and finally Rogue lll, Yvonne Plant’s boat who we met in Nottingham when Sam, one of our cats that we had at the time, took up residence on a bench in the hot weather, the Captain put a note on the bench explaining where she lived, and that she was fine, this was after a concerned local thought she was lost and was going to take her home. It caused a lot of people walking and cycling the towpath to come to a halt and read the note. Yvonne had heard the story and stopped to say hi to Sam.

Sam's Bench

We have seen a kingfisher, the first for a while YIPPEE.

21 miles, 14 locks and 1 canal.