Now westlin' winds...

... and slaughterin' guns, bring autumn's pleasant weather, according to Robert Burns. I didn't hear any guns this afternoon but a walk along the Trent and the Grantham Canal certainly provided very pleasant, bright and breezy weather. A glorious afternoon for a few miles along the waterways, in fact, although as ever at this time of year there's a tinge of melancholy at the year's turning. The trees are never so beautiful as when they are on the verge of becoming bare for the winter.






















A slightly whimsical train of thought entered my head as I walked along the canal. A day or so ago I was praising the plan to invest heavily in new transport infrastructure for Nottingham - a forward-looking and bold investment in the future. Such was the Grantham Canal in its day - the end of the 18th century. Nearly £120,000 was spent - a very significant sum and one which stretched investors to the limit. However, once opened, the canal provided the fastest way to move goods and people between Nottingham and Grantham and it was a success. For a time.

The autumn of the canal's life was marked by the new-fangled railway, and indeed by 1845 the canal was owned by a railway company. Unsurprisingly, it fell into decline through neglect, and traffic stopped in the 1920s.

Over recent years, a lot of work has been done to make the canal an amenity for walkers and cyclists and a haven for wildlife. There's another post waiting in the wings to do with the short-sighted stupidity which very recently has probably put paid to the dream of re-opening the canal to water traffic, but that's for another day. Today the canal is sleepy, beautiful in a restrained way, and still an asset to the counties it passes through.



But not the asset its creators envisaged. I wonder how our descendants in 200 years' time will view the investments we're making now?

I'll leave you with that thought, and with the song referenced at the start of the post. One of my all-time favourites, performed by the mighty - and evergreen - Dick Gaughan.