The Mystery Busker

Went in to Birmingham today, the main reason was to take L's phone in to have its battery changed, as it was giving a service advisory.  I remember with many of the original smartphones that you could actually remove the casing and swap out a battery quite easily (with the exception of one 'fruity' manufacturer).  Nowadays they all seem to be in sealed units so a service to exchange a battery is useful.

I had to wait for about an hour for the work to be done so had a walk around the city, coming across this guy, who I assume was genuine in his reason for busking, as he had taken so much effort to keep his identity secret.

After I picked up the phone I started out along the Birmingham Main Line Navigation for a walk back towards home.  My plan was to get to one of the intermediate railway stations rather than walk all of the way home (which was about 24 miles).  As I checked the map on the phone it suggested it was about 6 miles to the station.  That of course was a direct route, not along the canal towpaths.  In the end I took 11 miles to get to the station, one of my longer recent walks and I definitely felt it.  

I've got out of the habit of walking long distances, but hopeful to get back in to the swing of things soon.  My regular walking partner has started to suffer with his back again, but I messaged him this morning as he was due in the operating theatre for a nerve ablation on his back.  Last time he had it done there was an almost immediate improvement, so fingers crossed for him the same happens again.

On the walk I did put the drone up to capture a shot of a canal, crossing over another canal at Engine Arm Aqueduct (see extra).  The Aqueduct near Smethwick, was built in 1825 by Thomas Telford to carry a water feeder, the Engine Arm, from Edgbaston Reservoir over the BCN New Main Line canal to the adjacent and parallel Old Main Line.  This was needed as the old main line utilised a number of locks to climb up and over a hill at Smethwick, which was previously served by two pump engines to return water to the high point.