Bridge over untroubled water

I was more than ready to strike out on Monday and get 2023's adventuring under way. Nothing to do with the fact that I also have a new pair of walking boots [bought with a birthday voucher] which needed christening! We had arranged to meet my friend H, but sadly she was unwell. However, TYM surprised us [as he does from time to time] by asking us if he could come instead. It's always a pleasure to spend some family time together and he enjoys being out in the countryside as a contrast to working in London.

This time we headed for Loxwood to pay a return visit to the canal. For a change we headed in the opposite direction to the way we normally go. Bar a couple of dogwalkers we virtually had the route to ourselves and it was blissfully quiet. The Wey and Arun Canal was opened in 1816 to provide an additional navigation route between London and Arundel. With the meteoric rise in popularity of the railways this water based method of transportation fell out of favour at an equally rapid pace and the system had closed by 1871. In 1970 a plan was hatched to restore the whole length and in the intervening years and thousands of hours of work by many volunteers they have now successfully reopened over half of it [rebuilding bridges and locks as they go] and are still working towards its total completion. Every year brings new stories and one of the recent snippets from their latest newsletter I read was that they'd recently unearthed an iron stirrup with a length of chain attached. This would have been stretched across the canal on the Lord's day to stop any navigation. For this reason it was known as a "Sunday chain".

As a keen recycler, one of the things I admire about the work the Wey and Arun Canal Trust do is their reuse of old materials. The picnic bench below is made from the metal brackets which came from the original lockgates at the Devil's Hole lock and the arty looking bench is constructed from wood and ironwork which came from another pair at Gennet's bridge.

Here are my chaps...they're looking rather wry having muttered about me asking for them to pose for a photo when I'm known for not liking it myself! Am I repentant? Am I heck!!

Having reached my personal fill of locks and bridges for one day....I have a lower threshold than the other two they decided to carry on up the other side of the canal whilst I kicked my heels around the village turning up the first batch of weird and wonderful for the New Year. That's when the magic happened for me💜

Correct if I'm wrong, but I am sure that the sign below has a tippee with a llama inside....I know not why.

Off the leash I had a chance to nip into St John's which is a fairly attractive redbrick church dating from 1901. I thought the naive quality of the Nativity scene rather charming and the church windows intriguing. The bottom one is of a pair made by Penelope Neave [cousin of the MP Airey Neave] in 1981. I've not seen an expressionist style window before and I loved it for being so different.

Just before I turned round to head back I crossed over the road because experience has taught me that it's easy to miss little gems. This mellow fellow was so well camouflaged standing there watching the world go by that I almost didn't spot him! Homemade folkart for all to enjoy.

All rather splendidly rounded off with an impromptu half of Fursty Ferret in the village pub.

Arilx