Marine Cruises canal holidays on the Warwickshire Ring

Canal Holidays on the Warwickshire Ring

warksRing The Warwickshire Ring makes is a great canal holiday route, a mixture of narrow and wide canals, countryside and cityscape and with lots of optional detours if you want to explore

Take your time and possibly explore the Ashby Canal, visit Stratford Upon Avon, or explore some of the network of canals around Birmingham, such as the Stourbridge Canal. You can travel in either direction around the ring, we describe the clockwise journey.

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From our Kings Bromley base you must head east on the Trent & Mersey for just a few miles to join the Black Country Ring at Fradley Junction with its picturesque canalside houses and the famous Swan pub.

Turning left opposite the Swan onto the Coventry Canal, then passing through rural scenery and the beautiful green woods of Hopwas on a high embankment looking over the River Tame, you soon reach Fazeley Junction from where the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal heads directly into Birmingham. However Birmingham is still a few days away on this ring, so you continue down the Coventry Canal through pleasant rural countryside which was once the scene of much coal mining activity.

At Marston Junction you pass the entrance to the lock free Ashby Canal, well worth a detour if you have time. Next comes Hawkesbury Junction, or Sutton Stop as the boat people called it, where you take a sharp left turn onto the northern Oxford Canal, through Newbold Tunnel with its coloured lightshow and down Hillmorton locks to Braunston, where you head right and then join the Grand Union Canal at Napton Junction

The Grand Union can take you up the famous Hatton Locks all the way to Birmingham, or you can try an alternative route via the Stratford Canal at Kingswood Junction. From Birmingham the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal takes you back to the Coventry Canal and you can return to our Kings Bromley Marina base via the Trent & Mersey Canal.

Warwickshire Ring facts…

Canals Trent & Mersey Canal, Coventry Canal, Oxford Canal, Grand Union Canal, Birmingham & Fazeley Canal.
Length 59 miles
Time to cruise about 50 hours
Locks 90
Junctions Coventry Canal at Fradley Junction, Oxford Canal at Hawkesbury Junction, Grand Union at Napton Junction, Birmingham & Fazeley Canal at Salford Junction, Coventry Canal at Fazeley Junction, Trent & Mersey Canal at Fradley Junction.