Seems like a very long day today, perhaps because we have gone back down memory lane. Coventry was where R was living shortly after we first met and so all our early courting was done here. Many a train journey I took from London to Coventry and in those days we used to jump over the metal barrier to cross the ring road, rather than use the walking bridge provided! I didn’t remember exactly where R’s flat was in relation to the canal basin. I don’t even remember the canal! Yet, we turned right out of the basin, where we had found a space to moor the boat, walked up a hill for a couple of minutes and there we were at the flat. I just about remembered it but I think we were last here 37 years ago. The canal then was not a pretty feature and I don’t remember seeing many boats. It has been lovingly bought back to life by energetic volunteers and CRT maintenance. Locals are encouraged to use the well maintained wide towpath for exercise and enjoyment. It’s a 5 and a half mile stretch back to Hawkesbury Junction and that is what we travelled down today through many a changing vista. Some lovely green trees and bushes, graffiti good and bad, rundown housing, new building works and attractive canalside dwellings. High rise buildings and industrial estates. Loads of volunteer CRT members litter picking and a few joggers and one or two fishermen. One warned me that under one of the bridges yesterday a narrowboat got entangled with a couple of supermarket trolleys that had thoughtlessly been thrown into the canal. I made sure I kept to the right hand side of each bridge, as far from the towpath as possible. There were some challenging turns, not helped by canal boats awkwardly moored.
There were a few heavy showers to contend with but the highlight of the trip was rounding a bend and there on the towpath was a swan with her newly hatched cygnets. It was a magical moment and so unexpected amidst the builtup area that we were in. R held the boat to the side of the canal whilst I gingerly made my way back along the footpath to take some photos and a video to capture the moment. Back on the boat R was in conversation with a man who wanted to walk past the swan on the towpath but was nervous that she would take fright and launch at him. Swans have enough power in their wings to break an arm I have been told.
Continuing to the basin, just about to pass through the last bridge I then saw a duckling with her baby chick’s. Another heartwarming sight although R was a little more impatient this time, a fact noted by our daughter. I sent her the video of the duck and all she heard was her father in the background telling me to get a move on, with her response ‘OMG dad is so unsentimental’!!
The basin was quite full and our best bet was to moor behind two boats moored abreast of each other but on either side of the canal. First we had to turn our boat around. Then we had to skilfully reverse between the two moored boats without bashing into either one. Somehow this was accomplished. We realised, seeing the occupants returning later that both boats were at the time unoccupied ! I would not have been so anxious knowing this. You really want to avoid bumping any boat you possibly can although sometimes it is just inevitable.
The weather was cold, wet and white, not enticing at all to make us want to leave the boat in any immediate hurry. Looking at the weather forecast, tomorrow is set to be a far sunnier day. So I made soup to warm us and then we settled down to do nothing much until patches of blue were seen in the sky and the sun occasionally peeped through the clouds. It was late afternoon when we left the boat to find R’s flat and then wander into the city centre to see the sights. The most magnificent by far being the two cathedrals, side by side. The old and the new, the bombed out and the beautiful. Yes, modern and maybe not to everyone’s taste and yet the beauty of the stained glass windows and the rebirth out of destruction. Sadly we could not go inside as the cathedral had closed for the day and the old part is surrounded by metal fences to keep everyone out. There is something very sobering about having such a reminder of WWII staring you in the face.
There was quite a buzz in the city itself (it has been selected as the city of culture for 2021, under the banner ‘Coventry moves’) with many bars and restaurants open with outdoor seating. Some of these looked very cold indeed (you could see it on the faces of those trying to look like they were having a good time!) but one bar we had passed earlier had little sideless sheds in the forecourt with heaters in the ceiling. I had suggested to R we might go there to toast our return to Coventry. Firstoff R had to pay a visit to Wilko – yet another of our hose watertap fittings had been inadvertently left on the last tap we had used. Luckily we had a ‘Wilko’ spare to hand. R went and bought a further 2 – at £1 each that doesn’t break the bank but it gives us peace of mind!
We enjoyed the bar, me toasting with prosecco and R a cask ale, our return to this city of our youth. It was slightly complicated ordering via the app but we are getting more adept. We opted to share a vegan chickpea curry. Turned out the whole menu was vegan but looked rather confusing as they had things like bacon and cheese on offer but I had to remind R they weren’t the bacon and cheese he was expecting! Our heater wasn’t working either! Nor were the heaters of quite a few ‘sheds’. They rectified the problem by bringing us calorgas heaters which certainly helped keep the chill out. I couldn’t but help think of the British resolve that we won’t let the weather beat us – images of chill, wet picnics come to mind and the stiff upper lip resolving that we will have a good time! Reminds me of R’s 60th birthday with his twin sister. They wanted a seaside picnic in June and decided to go to a beach 10 miles from the seaside house the family own, right on the beach! Arriving at the picnic spot the heavens opened and we endured it as long as we could with soggy sandwiches and wet bottoms. Then we returned back to the house on the beach to find there had been no rain there and we could not only have had a dry picnic but, if the weather had turned, could have been inside in double quick time!!
Back on the boat the stove soon had us toasty warm and we enjoyed, as per usual, an episode of ‘Endeavour’.
NarrowboatTLC 