Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Audlem with the Shroppie Fly and Audlem Mill beyond. The railway crane is a recent import
.
The section through Shelmore Wood should have been simple but it was to prove a prob-
lem. Lord Anson of Norbury Park didn't want his pheasant covert disturbed or farmland split
up so the 1.6km long Shelmore Embankment had to be built 18m high across lower ground to
the west. Construction of the embankment took six years; delaying the opening of the canal
by two years.
Norbury Junction was at the end of the Newport Branch of the Shrewsbury & Newport
Canal, of which the first 200m remains in water. There are hopes of full restoration. The
Canal & River Trust have a maintenance yard here but the crane is not original. The Junction
Inn is a popular public house.
Grub Street Cutting is 1.6km long and 27m deep, not to be confused with Woodseaves
Cutting despite the proximity to the first village of Woodseaves. It is crossed at High Bridge
by the A519. Telford built a number of very tall arches on this canal and this one is braced
across, halfway up. Canals, like railways, became popular routes for lines of telegraph wires.
The bracing has the top of a telegraph pole, now without wires, left standing on top, a surreal
location for it. A headless horseman sometimes gallops over the bridge. Another peculiar-
ity of the cutting is a black creature like a monkey that has haunted it since a boatman was
drowned in the 1800s.
North of the end of the cutting is High Offley with its large 15th century church. The An-
chor Inn is an unspoilt boatman's public house. After the arched Shebdon Farm, the Wharf
Inn has a crane at the start of Shebdon Great Bank, this one 1.6km long and 18m high, again
with a history of having constantly shifted, partly collapsed and consistently leaked, includ-
ing in 2009.
