Monday 19th Aug 2024 – We are moored up opposite The Distillery on the CRT 14 day moorings, it is Monday morning and all is quite, so we take Obi our Sprollie (Springer/Collie Cross) to Snell Park to throw a ball about, he loves chasing a ball. Unfortunately, as we are leaving we can see he has cut his front paws, we did not see anything sharp, and it seems nor did he, so it is a slow walk back to the boat to clean his paws and spray on some disinfectant.
Obi is then left to catch up on his sleep, we have active monitoring on the boat, so we can see him and monitor the inboard temperatures.
We walk over to the The Bull Ring, it is tradition when we visit with our daughter, she is not with us this time, but it is a tradition. I have been watching a YouTube channel called “Floating Our Boat” and they mentioned a Indian restaurant called Tamatanga and we happened to pass it on our way back to the boat.
What a lovely lunch, we both went for the before 4pm special of a curry with either rice or nan bread and a soft drink. We did add some tama chips, we did not need them, but I wanted to try them, they were delicious.
The food was excellent, the meat was very tender and the sauces full of flavour. I had the Keralan Lamb curry and Sonia the Chicken Khurana, Sonia is milk intolerant, and they even had vegan nan bread. We will definatly be back.
After our late lunch it is back to the boat, via a small Tesco Express at the mailbox, to see how our dog Obi is doing, from what we can see he has been curled up asleep the whole time.
Tuesday 20th Aug 2024 – Today we are planning a walk along the start of the Birmingham Canal Navigations – Newhall Branch till we reach Lock No4. There we go up the steps to Saturday bridge, cross the main road and walk down Fleet Street to Newhall Lane. Our target is to find ‘The Holdout Building’ from our book ‘111 Places in Birmingham that you shouldn’t miss’ – we are working our way through this book, ticking off each place we visit.
On the way we pass The Coffin Works, which is currently open Wednesday to Sunday, so will be a subject of another blog post on a future visit to Birmingham. At the end of Fleet Street, we turn right onto Newhall Street and then cross Lionel Street and we are opposite our target, 83 Newhall Street. If you have seen the Disney Film ‘UP’ then this is kind of what we are looking at, each side of the building is a large far more modern 11 & 7 story building.
From here we wandered along Newhall Street to the end and turn left onto Colmore Row to visit what was in 1715 the Parish Church of St Philip’s , which then in 1905 became St Philip’s Cathedral Birmingham, the third smallest in the UK.
Outside the Cathedral you find the statue of Bishop Gore (1853-1932) the first Bishop of Birmingham.
Inside the Cathedral are four spectacular stain glass windows designed by Edward Burne-Jones and William Morris. The Nativity (1887), The Ascension (1884), The Crucifixion (1887) with the final Window The Last Judgement being added in the west wing thirteen years later.
After this we headed to down Temple Street towards New Street Station, where we found the new home of the Birmingham Bull, which we had last seen outside the Birmingham Library after the Commonwealth Games in 2022. What a great place to display it!
Leaving the station we then walked along New Street towards the Town Hall and then towards the Birmingham Library, which we visited a few years ago, there are some spectacular views from the viewing gallery.
Then back to the boat via Costa for a coffee, Obi is recovering well, paws still a little tender, so light duties for him for a few more days.
