Ironbridge; Friday, 12 August, 2011

The original plan had been that I would race up to town from work to get an early evening train up to Birmingham.

In the end the riots earlier in the week made that considerably easier as work had decided to close early each day, just in case. So shortly after 2pm I found myself at home packing my bags and preparing for a leisurely saunter up to Euston.

I arrive in Birmingham a little after 7, walked down to the hotel and checked in.

If my home town had been the graphic video images of burning buildings for the English riots, then Birmingham hadn’t been close behind, and the scars in the city centre were pretty obvious with lots of boarded up windows.

Having grabbed a bite to eat I wandered back to the hotel for a quiet night’s sleep