Planes and boats and trains

We had a walk along the canal this afternoon, starting at Wilmcote and heading towards Stratford.

There were so many things to see, I could have had a month’s worth of Blips in 1 hour.

We saw several trains on the track that runs close to the canal, then a hot air balloon and a small plane close by, then a kayak with a young chap on one knee with the other leg in front of him to balance, paddling along and going like the clappers. I guess he had to lift the kayak out and walk around the locks, but it looked very lightweight and VERY narrow, goodness knows how he balanced on it. I would have a job balancing like that on the carpet!

We also saw lots of runners, doing a cross-country marathon. Some were in fancy dress, one young Japanese girl was dragging behind her a round life-belt with a bucket in the centre of it (I didn’t ask!) and some were really hobbling and looked done-in. They still had about 4 miles to go, but had been across several fields as well as some roads by the time they reached us.

This is Santa with his (her actually) little elf helper. The elf was gathering all of the red and white striped plastic ribbons that were tied on the trees along the route to guide the runners, so presumably she thought she was the last runner. However, there were lots more after these two, who kept asking us if they were on the right path (you can’t really go too wrong down this section as it’s about 5 miles of towpath) so maybe Santa’s Little Helper was more of a hindrance really.