The Kennet and Avon Canal - Bruce Tunnel through to Devizes.

Bruce Tunnel is the Kennet and Avon Canal's one and only Tunnel.

The Eastern Portal of Bruce Tunnel is situated just a little way from Crofton Toplock - it was opened in 1809 and is 502 yards in length. Named after the 1st Earl of Ailesbury (modern name is Aylesbury) Thomas Brudenell-Bruce, it was constructed as the Earl refused to permit a deep cut to be made for the canal through his land. The Kennet and Avon Canal's other connection with Aylesbury (Buckinghamshire) is the existance of the Aylesbury Canal Arm which leaves the Grand Union Canal at Marsworth Junction - the Aylesbury Arm was once planned to continue as far as Abingdon and ultimately provide a through route from Bristol to London.
A feature of the tunnel was it's width (barges were far wider than today's narrowboats) and that as there is no towpath inside the tunnel a chain ran the length of the tunnel which boatmen used to haul themselves through. The Kennet and Avon towpath goes under the present railway lines and then up steps to soon reach a narrow road - cross straight over and pass several houses before descending back to the towpath by the tunnel's west portal.

Wooton Rivers Bottom Lock 51 is the last lock for a while on the Kennet and Avons journey eastwards - it just happily wanders around the countryside following the contours. The next barrier (unless someone has left a swingbridge in the way) for boat owners occurs when the canal reaches Devizes - from there things change with a vengeance as the canal heads off towards Bradford on Avon.

The towpath on our photos of this stretch of the Kennet and Avon Canal may look easy to walk or cycle along but there are quite a few places where there are quite heavy ruts - the pictures were taken in July 2010 and this part of England had been extremely dry for weeks. These ruts and also several areas where there are near collapses into the canal itself indicates that if there has been even moderate recent rainfall the towpath would become certainly difficult to travel along due to heavy mud in places.

Stowell Park Suspension Bridge across The Kennet and Avon Canal

(picture above) is quite unusual - it was constructed around 1845 and is a small suspension bridge made of iron and the only one surviving of it's kind. Built in 1808 Lady's Bridge (shown below) is very ornate compared with the other canal bridges in the area - it was built by John Rennie and designed in this fashion at the insistence of the then landowners as a condition to agreeing to the acquisition of their land.
The stretch of towpath particularly between England's Bridge and All Cannings Bridge suffers badly from dog crap and in hot weather there are lots of flies about. There is a smallish parking area beside All Cannings Bridge and obviously dog owners park there and unfortunately then let their hounds do there thing along the towpath beside the canal.
There are several

Wiltshire white horses decorating the hillsides

in the area - for instance one can be seen from Alton Barnes and from Devizes Marina.

Almost straight away from leaving the centre of Devizes narrowboat and barge owners can get themselves warmed up as there are several locks before looking forward to the main event at the highly impressive Caen Hill Flight of locks a little further along the route. From Kennet Lock 50 there are 29 locks to negotiate over a 2.25 mile stretch of the canal ending at Caen Lock 22 - a descent of 230 feet. This total descent does of course include the canal's trip down the magnificent Caen Hill Flight of Locks where there are 16 locks immediately following each other - with the sequence taking the Kennet and Avon canal on a descent of just under 131 feet.