The Lickey Hills

What's this - another review of stuff in Birmingham? Does Chair Club ever do anything outside the city?

The Lickey Hills Country Park lies 11 miles south west of Birmingham city centre and covers an area of 524 acres (or so the website says - I just got on a bus that went in the right general direction and got off when the driver said). It's one of those traditional Sunday afternoon outing places where you arrive, get lost of a couple of hours, find your way again, then head home - and, if your trip is anything like ours, you'll probably have a healthy coating of mud when you do.

There are lots of bridges at the Lickey Hills, however I was told by Emma that some of the things that look a lot like bridges are not, in fact, bridges at all! Whilst not a bridge expert, I have always considered myself capable of telling the difference between a real bridge and a fake one, but with the bridges at the Lickey Hills, I could not.

Maybe it was the heat, maybe it was the exhaustion from having to carry all the food and other accesssories Emma dumped on me, maybe it was the large amount of mud we had to fight through, or maybe I was just being lied to to prevent me from stopping every 5 minutes to take another photo - I really don't know.

Anyway, here are some 'proper' bridges from the Lickey Hills, most of which can be found on the red route, but there's a chance some of them aren't since the signs for the red route kept disappearing and we had to guess a lot.

This first bridge uses a 2-plank base, crossed with a number of shorter planks. It looks like it has been present for numerous years with no obvious signs of rotting or need of replacing any time soon.

This bridge is similar in design to the first, but is crossing a much deeper channel showing the versitility of the design. Note how over the years the ends of the bridge have been enveloped by the banks on either side.

This is a much more modern bridge and incorporates a railing safety feature as modelled here by Emma (who has been digitally disguised for security reasons). It looks pretty sturdy, however it is not recommended that you try and sit on the railing as there is a good chance it will start to wobble about, with a high risk of breaking and resulting in a very wet person.

Bridges don't get much simpler than this - four planks laid across a stream. Construction time was probably in the seconds, but it serves its purpose well. Emma happily walked across without any fear of plumetting to her death in the deadly waters below.

This is just a selection of the bridges at the Lickey Hills. I would recommend you visit yourself and have a look at them all in person, and also inspect the various 'fake' bridges that are apparently at the site. And if you get really bored you can always go for a game of golf.

- Damian, June 05

birmingham uk europe world