Cruising to Norbury Junction - what junction?

Tuesday, 24 March 2009 19:36

Fortunately the wind died down in the night, so we set off for Wheaton Aston lock. It is always windy here, as it is very exposed, and at the tail there is a very fast by weir to contend with. We passed one of our favourite watering holes - The Hartley Arms, but no time to stop today!

We did stop however for diesel, at Turners Garage, just past Tavern Bridge. The price here is usually the cheapest on the cut. Today we paid 46.9 pence/litre and took on 110 litres. We declared our usual consumption percentage. John also managed to buy a couple of mooring chains and the right size bit to repair the door catch into the back cabin. A good stop, then!

There were a number of boats on the move today. We are in hire boat country - Anglo Welsh, Napton Narrowboats, two Black Princes and one Shakespeare Hire Cruisers was the tally for today!

The Shroppie continues to follow Telford's preferred straight cut-and-fill characteristics after the one lock at Wheaton Aston. Some of the bridges have a different style, with high ones over the cuttings. All around there are miles of countryside and farm land. Church Eaton lies off to the east as we pass the "Onn bridges". Little Onn and High Onn, named, I suspect, to reflect their respective heights.

Cowley Cutting is where Telford planned a long tunnel, but faults in the rock meant that the tunnel is considerably shorter than the intended 690 yards.

The final Cowley tunnel is actually 80 yards long and hewn out of the rock

Gnossal follows and this is a good place to stop with a choice of two pubs, a general store (now further away than it used to be!) and very pleasant surroundings. But we continued on.

The one mile Shelmore Embankment (one of Telford's "fills") is impressive. It gave Telford a headache though as shifting millions of cubic feet of earth is an immense task without modern machinery. As the contractors struggled to complete it the bank slipped and collapsed time and time again.

It eventually took 5 and a half years to complete and opened in 1835. Telford meanwhile had died and William Cubitt had the satisfaction of enabling the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal to be a through route.

The floodgates at either end can be closed if a breach occurs and were closed at night in WW II, in case of invasion.


At the end of the embankment is Norbury Junction. We moored on the visitor moorings just before and went to explore.

It is not obviously a junction, but a careful investigation will show that by the Junction Inn, under the footpath bridge there are the remains of another canal: the Shrewsbury, Newport and Trench branches. There was once a long flight of locks down into Newport.

The only remains are the top lock, now used as a repair dock and the lock cottage:

We spied a well known boat, safely right at the far end of the dock, awaiting it's refurbishment!

Wildlife tally for today - two kingfishers: one too shy to photograph, the other seen too late to photograph effectively. One buzzard, one dead rabbit, plenty of moorhens and loads of ducks!