From Dark to Light

Now that the leaves have formed on trees, this section of the Shropshire Union Canal is dark, even when the sun is out.  It was the last major civil engineering accomplishment of Thomas Telford, who employed a cut and fill approach to limit changes of level.  Only two locks are employed between its most southerly point in Wolverhampton up to Norbury Junction some 15 miles away.

Here, just outside Brewood, the canal sits in a cutting some 12 metres deep, now tree lined so that the canopy for the trees on each side touch and cross above.  The scene through the arch of bridge 11 shows the section as the canal comes out of cutting and onto an embankment as it passes the village.