Normal life in The Midlands

Brian, Brian, Jackie and John with The Wrekin hill behind

It’s all been more of the same really. We are still waiting for the man to come and start the patio. We know things happen, and his dad has had a fall, but just tell us you are not coming without us waiting in and nagging! The kitchen fitter came today to have a look round, at 10.00 not the original 9.00 and we are still waiting for the quote for new windows! There does seem to be a recurring theme here!

Our back garden may not have altered very much yet, but when it does next doors cute little cat Luna is going to miss it. She loves hiding in that bush and prowling through the undergrowth, but all that is going, to be replaced by a nice patio (we hope!) She may not speak to us again!

We’ve been out walking with John and Brian (see Relive video of the walk: click here). This week we got the train to New Street (as usual, where the day starts with a breakfast at Grand Central Kitchen, a really good cafe) and then on to Wellington near Telford so we could walk up an over the Wrekin, so we could all finally say we’ve “spent all day going round the Wrekin” one of those Midlands phrases that no one quite understands. Trying to keep up with John was an issue, he was going uphill very fast. I told him this could be a problem as he’s going away on Saturday on a walking fortnight. He could really be ‘John no mates’ if he goes at that pace!

Jackie and John negotiating a steep downhill bit on the Wrekin

We’ve been to the Wednesday tea dance, and Saturday Argentine tango. There are other dances around, but these two seem to work for us. Brian enjoyed the last tango lesson much better than the first couple so that’s good and we both really like the atmosphere at the Wednesday dance.

Nearing the summit

It’s been a fairly ‘walky’ week, Sunday was such a lovely day, we had to take advantage. It was also my birthday so didn’t want to spend all of it in the garden or anything like that! (Here's another Relive video: click here) Then the Wrekin on Tuesday and yesterday we were out with Denise and Paul though this was a little more sedate as Brian was having a look at some electrics which seemed to miraculously just work. We also didn’t want to go anywhere muddy after the ridiculous amounts of rain we had on Wednesday. It was mostly about seeing them, catching up and eating and drinking, but we like that! (Yet another Relive video: click here)

We ran to get past John and reach the trig point first but all arrived together. Brian, however was having none of it so there he is bringing up the rear

Monday was a curry with the Monday Club boys and two of three wives (Old Moseley Arms for drinks followed by curry at Diwans). Brian is currently out for a run with Mark which hopefully won’t kill him, even if Mark doesn’t get out of breath (nice little run along Tardebigge canal lock flight: click here for Relive video)

Summit photo

Other domesticated things like taking my phone in to be sent off which meant getting everything transferred to a standby phone. Collecting Alex from Halesowen, and catching up with her and Rob. Making the final decisions on the kitchen involved going round in lots of circles but it’s finally been ordered. Pottering in the garden. Tax returns. All those normal things that we haven’t had to do for such a long time. Just wait till we start on the decorating when I really will be talking about watching paint dry!

Nice view from here. For those that don't know, the Wrekin is a small hill (407m) in Shropshire that stands on its own amongst fairly flat land. It's a remnant of an ancient volcanic plug that resisted erosion to stand prominently in the countryside. Its name gave rise to the saying 'All around the Wrekin' which is only known and used in The Midlands and is used when someone is taking a very long roundabout route to get somewhere rather than the most direct route. It applies when someone is travelling (in a car, walking or cycling) and is also used if someone is being asked to do a job or task whereby the instructions are confusing, long or contain needless additional tasks. 'You're leading me all round the Wrekin'. As a child it was a fairly commonly used phase, even though I had no idea what the Wrekin was. I didn't even know how to spell Wrekin. It was some years later that I learnt it was a hill but I have no idea why the phrase exists. It was my first ascent up there and I was very pleased to be able to say finally that John and Brian were leading us all round the Wrekin!

The were rocks near the summit so Brian and I had to scramble over them

John managed to snap a photo of a deer with his super zoom lens

I decided to take a photo of Brian taking a photo of the deer as I only had my phone camera with me. The deer are just visible in this photo if you care to zoom in

Sunday birthday walk with Jackie and what a day it was, blue skies and  warm all day. Here we are passing the canal side Crown in Alvechurch, one of five village pubs. We're heading out over those hills

Heading towards Barnt Green

A Jay crosses our path on the way to the Lickey Hills

Enjoying an ice cream at the Lickey Hills Visitor Centre

View from the top of Birmingham. The building just below us is on the site of the old Austin Morris, later Rover car factory at Longbridge, The three white towers in the left distance is the Queen Elizabeth hospital and the high buildings are in the city centre 

Down from the hills and in Cofton we came across a bit of history. Those tracks are all that's left of an old tram line that connected Cofton and the Lickey Hills to Rubery. This used to be the turning circle at the terminus for the trams

We went past Cofton reservoir, over the fields and over the railway connecting Alvechurch with Birmingham. It was a very pleasant 9 mile walk through countryside 

Diwan curry with old friends. LtoR: Mark (who I went running with today), Jackie, Martina, Tim, Fiona and Bill

Out for  a walk chat and pub dinner with Brian's sister Denise and Paul