Canal Boat Holiday Base Information - Base 30

From base 30, near Nuneaton, you are connected to the whole system of canals and rivers and, given time and inclination; you can voyage to any part of this system. For an ideal easy cruise, we are close to the lock free Ashby Canal which is 22 miles long and level so should you wish to just meander, there is no better place. At Hawkesbury Junction you can go through a lock with a rise of just a few inches and onto the Oxford Canal, cruising for a day before you arrive at another lock. You can also explore the Coventry Canal, making your way to the historic city of Coventry without having to get out of your boat. There are many pubs on route and an abundance of interesting things to do and see. For those with a week or longer, you have a choice of various out and back routes or two cruising rings - the Warwickshire Ring and the Leicester Ring.

ONE WEEK ROUTES

The Warwickshire Ring
This is a voyage of immense contrast and there is a choice of three routes to complete the ring:

Via Gas Street Basin and the Stratford Canal, approximately 54 hours - 119 locks - 5 tunnels

Via Digbeth and the Grand Union Canal, approximately 51 hours - 94 locks - 4 tunnels

Via Bordesley Junction, approximately 49 hours - 93 locks - 3 tunnels

Most choose to navigate the ring in an anti-clockwise direction. Once reaching Fazeley Junction you would turn left and be heading in a southwesterly direction along the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal completed in 1789, and in its heyday one of the busiest and most profitable canals built. Onwards and upwards, Curdworth locks, towards Curdworth Tunnel and, at just 57 yards in length, the shortest tunnel on the ring.

You eventually reach Salford Junction - this once open scene now nestles under the piers supporting the M6 motorway! Here, you stay on the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal and head towards Farmers Bridge and Gas Street Basin. Salford Junction to Gas Street Basin is a mere three and a quarter miles, but has 24 locks, leading up to Aston locks, with derelict industrial buildings, having a feeling of an industrial past. It is possible to imagine what it might have been like a hundred years ago - smoky, acrid and bustling with busy hard-working people. A short distance after Aston Junction you arrive at the bottom lock of the Farmers Bridge flight under the former Great Western Railway station of Snow Hill. It's a subterranean world of mystique - the sound of splashing water, and the smell of damp - a perfect Victorian scene. It has not changed in over a hundred years.

You emerge from this underworld at Cambrian Wharf and the junction with the BCN - 'Birmingham Canal Navigation'. Here you turn left and enter the new world of Gas Street Basin. Once the terminus of the BCN and the Worcester Birmingham Canal separated by the once famous Worcester Bar. These two canals were enemies in the early years and boats had to be unloaded on one side of the bar and reloaded on the other so that goods could proceed on their journey. Fortunately, common sense prevailed and a link was constructed between the rival canal companies.

From here you head southwest along the Worcester Birmingham Canal, running parallel to the old Midland Railway and through Edgbaston Tunnel - 105 yards past Bournville and on to Kings Norton Junction. Here there is a fascinating Motor Museum. You turn left and enter the Stratford Canal.

However, if you like tunnels, you could continue along the Worcester Birmingham Canal and go through West Hill - 2726 yards, Shortwood - 613 yards and Tardebigge - 580 yards, turning at Tardebigge to return to Kings Norton Junction.

You will pass under a guillotine lock and meet several swing bridges before you reach the Lapworth flight of locks. At the bottom of this flight you turn left again at Kingswood Junction and onto a short canal that connects the Stratford with the Grand Union. Turn right onto the Grand Union Canal (formerly the Warwick and Birmingham and the Warwick and Napton Canals) and proceed in a westerly direction. You will head through Shrewley Tunnel - 433 yards and, before you know it, will be at the top of the Hatton flight - 21 wide locks built in the 1930s to replace the old narrow locks. Evidence of their existence is in the form of weirs.

Through Warwick and Royal Leamington Spa and up a few more locks, Fosse, Bascote, Stockton, and Calcutt - 20 in all. A short distance to Napton Junction. Turn left onto the Oxford Canal and left again at Braunston. The Oxford Canal is mentioned in the Leicester Ring.

The Leicester Ring
This is a voyage for those with energy. It will take approximately 70 hours to navigate - 101 locks - 5 major tunnels - in all, 164 miles of canal and river. It can be completed in a week's holiday but early morning starts are essential.

It is better to go around the ring in an anti-clockwise direction so that when navigating the Soar you will be going downstream. The route passes through the magnificent Hawkesbury Junction where you will meet your first lock, with just a few inches of difference. You will now be on the Oxford Canal, which was once an important route to the Thames and London and was completed in 1790. It passes through Newbold Tunnel - 250 yards, a taste of what is to come. It then rises through Hillmorton double-locks and on through Rugby to join the Grand Union Canal at Braunston.

The Grand Junction Canal later known as the Grand Union Canal was opened in 1780 but had two major tunnels at Blisworth (opened 1805) and Braunston (opened 1796). This route was shorter than the old Oxford and was built with wide locks. It became the main route to London and the south.

You now have to negotiate 6 wide locks before entering Braunston Tunnel, at 2042 yards the longest on the Leicester Ring. Turn left at Norton Junction and up the Watford staircase locks. There are now 22 miles of level waterway, meandering through the countryside, 412 feet above sea level. Crick Tunnel - 1528 yards, Husbands Bosworth Tunnel - 1166 yards and on to one of the wonders of canals, Foxton Locks. These will lower you 75 feet. The remains of the Foxton Inclined Plane are worth exploring. There is a museum and plans are in progress to rebuild the inclined plane.

You are now heading towards Leicester and one last tunnel, Saddington - 880 yards. You will continue to fall through the locks until you turn onto the River Soar, a beautiful river with some very deep locks, then down to Trent Junction, an impressive site. Here, you turn left and soon reach the beginning of the Trent and Mersey Canal, opened in 1777 - in all it is 93 miles long.

Sadly, unless you hire the boat for a couple of weeks, you will have to turn left at Fradley Junction, just 26 miles along this beautiful canal, and onto the Coventry Canal to make your way home. The Coventry Canal was completed in 1790. You pass the defunct Huddlesford Junction with the Lichfield Canal (soon to be restored to its former glory). Next is the junction with the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal. Here, you will have to keep left and pass by Tamworth, up Glascote locks and on towards Atherstone, where you will be greeted by a flight of just eleven more locks. In an hour and a half you will be once again be on level water on the way back to Springwood Haven.

Additional information
Some boats do not allow all male/all female groups.