Grounded on a shopping trolley

I WAS interested to read Stuart Bryce's account (Talkback, Issue 189, July) of his recent trip and the problems he encountered. It all reminded me of our April 2018 visit following the same route from Stone. Nothing much seems to have changed.

We too found rubbish floating in various concentrations and littering the edges. However, it wasn’t just what you could see on the surface that was a problem, it was the stuff hiding under the surface.

We had thought of going down the Walsall Canal to the basin, but the amount of rubbish lurking round the locks at the top of the flight put us off. We winded the boat and were heading back to Birchills Junction when we came to a halt under a bridge, grounded on what turned out to be a shopping trolley.

Several passers-by came to our aid. It was later as we were going down the Rushall Canal that our propellor, fed up with the conditions it had been expected to work in, made a successful bid for freedom. Fortunately our excellent engineers had us under way again with a spare within 25 hours.