Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The stop lock and roving bridge at Hawkesbury Junction
.
The canal was barred from entering the park at Newbold Revell by the landowner so the
12 Brinklow Arches were built over the Smite Brook. Some were used as stables, forges, hay
stores and dwellings although 11 were filled in when the canal was widened in 1834.
A branch that served Norman's and Walker's Newbold Lime Works leaves on the right. It
is followed by Newbold Tunnel, 189m long, built with twin towpaths - unusual in 1834 when
it was constructed as part of the canal straightening programme - now with coloured lights.
The new alignment is NW-SE whereas the old tunnel ran N-S, its mouth remaining next to
the 15th century church.
Newbold Wharf at Newbold on Avon precedes Newbold Quarry Park. The Boat public
house has Northamptonshire or table skittles, unusual for the area. A canal loop to Cosford
was made redundant by the Cosford Aqueduct, a magnificent structure with a 7.2m cast-iron
trough 4.6m wide x 2m deep with four cast-iron segmental ribs underneath. Three of these
have had to be replaced by steel ones after being damaged by road traffic. The Brownsover
Arm Feeder, the longest remaining stretch of the loop, has been saved from being converted
into a road for the Swift Valley Industrial Estate and joins by the A426.
The canal crosses the River Avon that flows westwards, although it flowed north-eastwards
from the vicinity of Warwick before the Ice Age. After 600 years as an agricultural town,
Rugby became a railway town, then Dickens' Mugby Junction, before turning to heavy elec-
trical engineering. The name has become synonymous with rugby football, first played at
Rugby school in 1823; the school featured in
Tom Brown's Schooldays
. Rupert Brooke was
born here. Another building of note is the 14th century St Andrew's church with its 1879
nave and tower by Butterfield, probably the only church in England with a double peal of
bells.
Hillmorton has three locks to begin the 23m 13-lock rise to Marston Doles. In 1840 these
three were doubled with connections between the pairs so that they could act as side ponds
for each other. Unusually, the pairs remain operational but unconnected and pleasure boat use
is so heavy that they are needed.
