We woke hungry with only Bill’s tin of Pringle chips and the Thornton chocolates to eat. We needed to shop. We had a cup to tea and walked fifteen minutes into Alvechurch to find a shop that was open. Thank goodness for the Cooperative shop in the village. We bought our breakfast requirements as well as lunch and spare food to see us through for the next few days.
The day was very grey and as Bill and Henk motored along the rain started to gently come down. They were ok as they both had their wet weather gear on. Lyn and I stayed indoors and kept dry!
Just prior to mooring at lunch time Henk and Bill rescued a boat which had got bogged on the side of the canal. With one decent tug of their boat’s rope tied to our boat they were able to get to boat free.
We moored the boat at Bournville which is the home of Cadbury. From Bourne Brook comes the name Bournville, “ville” being added at a time when it was fashionable to consider all confectionary to be French. Lyn and Bill happily stayed on the boat and Henk and I set off and toured Cadbury World. They had visited the place a couple of days ago. We happened to visit Cadbury World on the 20th anniversary weekend since the place was opened and it was very busy. The closer we got to the factory the more we saw the colour purple painted everywhere including the railings, the lamplights and street signs in Bournville. We could also smell the increasing aroma of hot chocolate the closer we got. Henk and I spent a couple of hours at Cadbury learning all about the establishment of one of the world’s largest chocolate factories. It was very interesting and we came away with our free chocolates.
When we returned we motored to Birmingham about an hour and half further along the canal. We were really lucky and secured a mooring in a good position in the middle of the city. It didn’t take us long to get off the boat and have a look around. After all the negative reports we had heard about Birmingham we were all totally impressed with the city. It was buzzing with people, had modern buildings, lots of summer flowers and a wide range of eating places. And this was on a Sunday!
Henk and I thought we would introduce Lyn and Bill to a Wetherspoon pub. It was a wrong decision and after finding out that they had run out of steaks and the roast of the day was also not available we decided to eat Chinese at “Tin Tin”. It was a good choice and we had a very enjoyable evening.
When we returned to the boat we finished the evening with tea and Thorntons chocolates which was a much better option than having chocolates for breakfast!
Photos: Bill and Henk steering in the rain; Getting off the boat at Birmingham; The canal through Birmingham
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