6.10 Lapal Canal - California to Selly Oak

[@jameshill3244]

Walked all around the cut and every path or place shown, Lived 700yds from Somery Bridge , Lived there 1953-1975 What a great place to grow up. This Video really has brought back wonderful memories.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Glad you enjoyed it James

[@getubelogin]

Another great vido, I look forward to your restoration episod on the Dudley No 2 Canal. Keep up the good work.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Coming soon!

[@growyourownfreedom2191]

Hi, great video! Having grown up in brum and having been fascinated by the canal system my whole life, I am in love with this whole canal Hunter series! Btw Weoley is pronounced “wee-lee”

[@jameshill3244]

Played all along that cut as a kid. Walked to Selly Oak Park many times along the cut .Also went up the tunnel loads of times on home made rafts, great fun. After moving there from the slums in Lozells in 1953,Weoley Castle was a great place to grow up .Many happy memories . My Grandkids love the stories I tell them about it. There was an old artillery range quite close to the cut, we used to dig up old shell casings and bullets. Also Copes Motor Cycles built a training road nearby, We used to take our old motor bikes there on the night .I was ten when I got my first motor bike. Great times. Monk's dock became Monks scrapyard ( Reservoir Motors ) Remember Old man Monks who lived in a house in the yard with his family.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Di you go in from the Weoley end? If so how far was it to the roof fall?

[@raymondkirkham3815]

Well done Andy on a excellent quest really enjoyed all the series and regularly revisit all episodes thanks for all your hard work . recorded for future generations to watch and enjoy . Ray Kirkham

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Thanks for your help Ray - the Stourbridge Ext episode was a particular favourite.

[@davidjones8680]

Very well done Andy, something to be proud of. I have learnt a lot from you about the canals here in the Black Country. Keep up the good work.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Thanks David.

[@jonjon9047]

Great as ever, Andy.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Many thanks!

[@jimblack5596]

Congratulations on completing this series. Well done!

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

More to come Jim! - but there may be a short gap....

[@neilandrew4540]

Thank you brilliant , can’t wait for the next series

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Thanks Neil - glad you enjoyed it.

[@mikehaldane4061]

I have been catching up, after break, with your vlogs using my TV rather than the computer. Whilst I can easily do the thumbs up on the TV, writing anything is rather like using parchment! Anyway your work on the Lost Canals has been very interesting and I would like to add my thanks for them, the BCN was rather a dark area of my interests of canals but your work and the the shoulders you stand on has certainly brought the history home, and I speak as a Scot many miles away. I'm sure that the work that has gone into them has been a massive undertaking, so thank you. I look forward to watching the other vlogs you have done and I look forward to to Union Canal ones, I hope that the nose bleed has stopped as you had to travel so far north, lol.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

HI Mike - they are a pleasure to make and my weekly outing to a remote parts of the network offer a winter time canal fix. The Union Canal at Easter was great - so fortunate with the weather. Because our party included my grandchildren progress was stop go and that meant we never got to Glasgow - but thats another bit of canal added to the bucket list!

[@nickcaunt1769]

Well done Andy! What a great and entertaining record. So many will have thought about this sort of project but never got started. You did it and completed it. So many questions have been answered and so much evidence documented. I look forward to whatever else you have planned.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Glad you enjoyed them Nick.

[@davidthomas6859]

Well done on your hard work ,have enjoyed all the episodes.Looking forward to future episodes.Thx Andy 🙏

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Glad you enjoyed it David.

[@olly5764]

Andy, I have loved your Canal hunter videos, every one has provided an interesting insight into a lost waterway, I look forward to what ever you have planned for the next series / project.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Thanks Ian - I have rally enjoyed putting them together.

[@dennisporter753]

I always look forward to another Canal Hunter episode.. Andy you are awesome.. So glad this journey will live on.. I have learned alot , opened my eyes to a whole new world from across the pond in Missouri USA.. Cheers Buddy!

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

I have enjoyed having your consistent company all these months Dennis.

[@grahamhall8249]

Hi Andy, a brill video as usual, and a shame the series has came to an end. All the history you give us fits in with my questions and wonderings. I shall look forward to your next project. My thanks for a very well made series. Take care.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Glad you enjoyed it Graham. The drone fly by project is proving popular and is fun to make so I will run with that before getting back into a more historical one.

[@nedseagoon5101]

Not an area I’m over familiar with, (I’m more Tipton, Wednesbury, West Bromwich etc) but I’ve enjoyed the series immensely. Thank you.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Glad you enjoyed it Ned - its at the far corner of the area for me too.

[@neilrose8618]

Brilliant Andy ending at Selly Oak its actually opened my eyes to where the lapel branch was whilst going through from Alvechurch to Lichfield on train as going through Selly Oak you can see Birmingham to Worcester canal and wondered about the finer details where they joined as old railway and other older industrial sites are abound. Battery park i thought was a old car battery factory, never realised what was there . Ps went down A5 Chacewater way from M6 to A38 looking out my lorry window Anglesey branch went past plus other canal hunters eye openers made the journey more interesting than normal , Neil

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

I am glad the whole series have increased your enjoyment of the area - thats my aim I guess.

[@1961Jezza]

Nice one Andy the whole series has been very interesting and enlightening thanks.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Glad it hot the spot!

[@terryrigden4860]

Thanks for a great series, its been fascinating

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Thanks Terry, I am glad you enjoyed it.

[@ColinOBear]

Thanks for this informative film, my grandparents moved to Paganel road in the slum clearance of streets of hockley and the jewellery quarter (your drone flew right over the house I was born in! The only thing I would take issue with is your pronunciation of 'Weoley' we always pronounced it 'Weeley"!! I am guessing that your pronunciation is the correct one - you're clearly an expert at research - but I doubt anyone in the streets that line the lapal would recognise the name as you say it. 🙂🙂 Once again, thank you so much for a fascinating film, I wish my father was still alive to see it.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

i am glad you enjoyed it - pronunciation - the bane of my life. As you can tell, I am not a local lad and I am forever falling foul of local pronunciations! That said I am red hot on place names in norfolk where I was raised. Weely - I will remember that.

[@lrmwharf864]

Fantastic- perhaps a series further south in the future ? We have some old/disused canals in and around Portsmouth/Winchester which may “float your boat” 😀

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

There are so many canals and so little time! I try to pick off the ones remote to the West Mids when an opportunity presents itself.

[@brynvjones6679]

Raymond Kirkham's comments endorsed.

[@longie751]

Awesome 👍

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Thanks - back soon.

[@trevorsurplice1582]

Great.Andy All your hard work will be BCN Bible for all of use to relate to.Having lived and bought up in Smethwick, I have lived and work close to a canal some where. Presently living close to Hawen Basin.The leasowes park and nature have been granted a wild life and nature area of scientifice interest there for the canal from Hawen basin to the old stop lock? will get re warterd Hopfuly in our life time

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

We live in hope Trevor!

[@nicholasvipond2205]

Fascinating video, I live close by in Bournville and I had no idea about this lost stretch of canal history. Just a not though, it’s pronounced Weeley and not Woley Castle 👍

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

The danger facing every non local!

[@martinmessiah7130]

Thank you for that series, it would be interesting to know about all these canals that have been built on,what happened to them having a right of way that would of been established on them.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Glad you enjoyed them. After the canals closed many bits were sold off and all rights over them lost.

[@katherinekinnaird4408]

How about that, I'm watchimg this episode from Bakersfield California in The USA

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Very neat achievement Katherine!

[@jameshill3244]

We pronounced it " Wheelie Castle "

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

So I later discovered!

[@jameshill3244]

@@lifeat2.3milesanhour57 After searching my memory the small tunnels that were on the sides of the cutting that were higher up were drainage tunnels possibly from the road on the right hand side and the stream on the left hand side as you look at the main tunnel entrance. Didn't stop us going up them !

[@peterfisher6348]

Woe, Woe, Woe! every mention of Selly Park should be Selly Oak Park as Selly Park is the other side of Raddlebarn Road over a mile away. You have been picked up on this before. Also unlike Woe, Weoley is pronounced Wheely, or possibly Whee-oly just as Daw is pronounced Doe you get all the locals upset by pronouncing names wrong! Surprised by no mention of the 2 arms opposite the Dudley #2 canal at Selly Oak Junction and the adjacent limekilns, particularly as they have been made a feature of in the landscaping under your feet when you finish this episode.

[@lifeat2.3milesanhour57]

Wheelie - no excuse apart from ignorance! Selly oak park- that’s how it was in my notes - the oak just kept getting lost between brain and mouth. Basins opposite - well that are Worcester Birmingham so best left for the follow up episode on the restoration…… :-)