The Cannock Extension leaves the Curley Wurley at Pelsall Junction and could not be more different as its dead straight with not a curve in site. The canal passes through a rural setting its straight route being seen at Wyrley Grove Bridge, just before the canal meets a busy road that heralds the end of the Extension.

Back at the junction are grouped a number of old canal side buildings, some empty others occupied. As has been stated earlier the area has been the site of a number of rallies. The area is usually devoid of boats but the following photo's are from one of the rallies.

Its terminus is just about a mile from the junction with two boat yards at the end. There is also a pub just before the end, farm shop on the main road, the old colliery basins not far from the terminus are know moorings. A winding hole is available near to the boat yards, where the canal is surrounded by small factory units, but the rest of the canal is totally rural.

From Pelsall Junction the Wyrley & Essington canal continues to live up to its nickname, crossing and re crossing the Lichfield Road until Brownhills is reached. Bridge names continue to give its past away as there are now no collieries, "Jolly Collier Bridge", "Coopers Bridge" the canal passing thro open land. Then houses, factories then yet more houses recently built on the meadows on the approach to Brownhills. At Brownhills the canal turns sharply, on the bend is now housed a canoe youth centre with other boats moored in the arm alongside. Some amendities are offered but the main one is a much improved security factor, with a daytime BW presence on occasions.

After the sharp turn we then passes along a straight section with a large Tesco's store with a petrol station. Brownhills High street is behind the supermarket with a Post Office and Banks nearby. Plenty of moorings are available on the newly construction towpath.

Along this very straight section we head towards Catshill Junction. After passing the supermarket and large car park that holds a market every Tuesday we pass across the back of houses as we approach the junction. Photograph shows the old single steel foot bridge spanning the canal, it had very steep steps and linked the shops to the nature reserve and the paths to Clayhanger.
It has since been replaced with another bridge not a traditional brick one but a very modern steel construction that conforms to all the disabled and safety regulations required today.

At Catshill Junction the Anglesey Branch goes off to the left, whilst the main track becomes the Daw End Branch. The Anglesey Branch is the start of the Lichfield section of the "Lichfield & Hatherton Restoration Project", and will drop down numerous locks from Ogley Junction to Huddlesford Junction on the Coventry Canal.

At Catshill Junction the Anglesey Branch Canal goes off to Chasewater Reservoir being at the moment a dead end, but when the Lichfield section of the restoration of the Lichfield and Hatherton canals is complete this canal will be a gateway canal. At present the junction is set behind newly built houses and a tall block of flats. The flats on the junction are due for demolition in 2004 so the setting for the junction will change.

Turning into the Branch we find a set of narrows with the first bridge in sight with a welcoming pub with a terrace overlooking the canal. The road is the Chester Road and is very busy, being the road that goes straight thro Brownhills and connects to the A5.

The busy road with a T junction right on the bridge is quickly left behind and the canal becomes very rural. We move across on our left the back of a school and then houses but to our right we have uninterupted views across fields.

Ogley junction appears, its not a junction at present but this is where the old and hopefully the new canal to Lichfield starts. The society erected a sign here to mark the efforts of the restoration group who have been making huge strides forward to re open this section. It has unfortunately been vandalised, by pushing over the complete sign casting and all into the canal. Erected again with yet more concrete at its base, when rescue from the canal the top finial could not be found, so she stands without a top casting. We have dredge the area without success, so someone probably has a finial for 'Ogley Junction' hanging in their bedroom?
The junction at the moment consists of a sharp turn to the left. Under the bridge at the junction was once a boat yard recently vacated, with a small basin now empty of boats.

Behind the boat yard is a garden centre that stands on the first of the lock chambers of the Ogley flight, the locks fall away from the BCN to Huddlesford Junction on the Coventry canal. The Branch continues from the junction on its rural route under main roads and over an old railway line until it reaches its newest feature the new Northern Relief road,or M6 toll.

It was feared that this road would spoil the rural peace of this waterway, but know its built, the impact of the road is much less than feared. Once pasted the new road the area of Anglesey Basin seems as remote as always. The coal shoots are still present and the canal ends at the base of the dam of Chasewater Reservoir in very pleasant surroundings.

The area around Anglesey Basin is worth an over night stop. The whole area is know Chasewater Urban Park and is part of Mercia Wood much tree planting having taken place(in its early days yet). The new road has not spoilt the area but added more interest and tidied up some of the more run down sections. Chasewater itself is a large expanse of water with a light steam railway on its far side, with both power boat and sail racing on the lake.

From Catshill Junction the canal goes left into the Anglesley Branch covered already or straight on becoming the Daw End Branch. This area used to be full of working quarries but now meanders thro housing developments and nature reserves caused by the flooded quarry workings.

This canal has always suffered from sub-sidance the canal walls having been constantly added too, when the quarries and mines where working.
A new towpath has smarten up the canal corridor as it winds its way to Walsall Wood Bridge. The canal today due to subsidance of the surrounding land and the constant re building of the walls along its course, stands on an embarkment with houses below.

The landscape remains the same with in places huge drops into quarry workings being just feet away from the canal. In this photo to our right is at present a huge drop into an old quarry that has just been prepared to be a land fill sight. In years to come instead of a drop away from the canal the track will probably wide thro hills caused by the infill.

After Walsall Wood Bridge, where access to a doctors surgery/chemist/shops/Post Office/and food take aways can be found, the canal passes behind houses, still with drops into old quarries. But infront of use we see a new industrail area, as we near Aldridge.

The canal leaves the industry behind and never really gets near to Aldridge where yet more shops can be found. Aldridge Wharf Bridge being the nearest it ever gets. After this brush with industry we slowly leave it behind, the track becoming semi rural until we come to an old stone cottage with brick arched bridge called "Brawns Works Bridge". From here all the bridges are like the old shown at Winterley Bridge, with the canal becoming quite rural all the way to Longwood..

We pass two pubs one with a terrace that is crowded with people in the summer. The next pub (Manor Arms) is easily missed from the canal, hidden behind a hedge with just a gate with a notice on it to tell you where the gardens are.

This pub is one of the oldest pubs along the canal dating from 1895 the Manor Arms, can be missed if you are hurrying. So do not hurry, you will find it difficult anyway as the track is fairly shallow. This canal is worth visiting just for this section alone.

Both establiashments are worth a visit as are the Lime Quarries just yards away, that now form a nature conservation area. The canal is good in this area for mooring so do stop. To continue we pass thro open fields finally arriving at Longwood junction where we find a BCN house number 93 alongside the top lock. This is know the headquaters of the Longwood Boat Club whose members boats are everywhere.
Ahead of us are nine locks that start at house 93, at first the locks are spaced out, but towards the bottom become close together.

At Longwood the canal becomes the Rushall Canal dropping down the nine Rushall locks thro a corridor that is flanked by housing estates. The houses back onto the canal giving the impression they are not interested, but the canal is pleasant with willow trees everywhere. A very pleasant and rural scene is to be found at Fiveways Bridge, a setting that would grace any canal side location, in the middle of a busy housing estate.

The traveller will have noticed that the canal has know become very straight unlike the Daw end section that followed the contour of the land. The locks at first are strung out but by the time we reach the busy A34 the locks are close together and we soon reach the bottom lock. This very pleasant canal soon reachs Rushall Junction and the Tame Valley Canal, with the busy motorway nearby.

The Tame Valley Canal starts on the Walsall Canal at Tame Valley (or Doe Bank) Junction. Once this junction stood beneath the buildings and Cooling Towers of Ocker Hill Power Station, all long gone. On the junction stands the old BW Offices, vacanted by them after one of thier many re organisations, the building today is occupied by a firm. A Canal Arm filled with moored boats runs down one side of the offices, and is a safe place to moor over night, being fenced off from the rest of the world.
This junction is know straddled by a modern road on the Tame Valley arm of the junction, traffic thunders over head. But once into this canal we leave the traffic quickly behind passing by the side of an electricity sub station, that is flanked by factories. We cross over water courses and under old railway lines that have left there bridge supports.

The canal is straight, very straight passing the surrounding landscape on embankments or cuttings all the way to Rushall Junction. It passes under the Metro line, with no access or station being nearby. This section of canal has been the subject of a number of BCN Clean-ups, is much improved but the track can be rubbish shrewn in places.
Some would say that this canal is boring, but it was built to speed up traffic that was congested on the Farmers flight. We have no locks on this section so we cover a good distance in a short time, but will soon find thirteen locks beyond Rushall to slow our progress. To the working boaters this route became known as the "new thirteen".

The Canal comes out of one cutting with roads high above us and then crosses an aqueduct that carries it over railway lines, onto an embankment with a station and busy road below. Then almost immediately onto an another aqueduct that carries the canal over the M5 with a busy motorway intersection ahead that joins the M5 and M6 motorways at Rayhall.

Vehicles on this busy motorway can be presented with the view of a canal boat( rarely seen) apparently suspended above them, its great to just stop and watch the busy world go by.(But we probably should'nt do this as drivers will be looking at us and not the road?).

The canal is above houses that line the canal, motorway and railway line. The motorway is fenced off from the houses to deaden the noise, and from the estate below the hieght of the canal becomes apparent.

A nearby sewage farm fills the air with a sweet smell, as we cross a river before arriving at Rushall Junction. This is a very busy area with a lot happening, the rest of the world is thundering by either by road or rail with any canal user being just a spectator.

Once over the one motorway we run alongside another that forms part of Ray Hall intersection M6/M5, sometimes moving faster than the queuing traffic. We then met Rushall Junction that could be in the country side if it were not for the roar of the traffic. We then enter another deep cutting that has two bridges one road and the other a foot bridge. The bridges are aptly named locally as High Bridges, the real names are, "Scott Bridge" the road bridge, the foot bridge being called "Chimney Bridge".

The cutting becomes another embankment where once Hamstead colliery with its many coal wharvies used to be. Today all evidence of this has gone the track being straight and unbroken.
The embankment is high above the surrounding land its true hieght can be guaged as the canal crosses Spouthouse Lane on Spouthouse Lane Aqueduct. Another aqueduct, Piercy Aqueduct is crossed and in front of us can be seen the Walsall Road Bridge and the busy A34. Just after the bridge is the Top lock of the new thirteen with cottages and full services alongside.

Once out of the cutting and we are at Perry Barr Top Lock. On our left just before the lock is a water point with on our right housed in the old stable block are a full set of amenties the last in either direction for sometime. On one side of the lock is a BCN cottage numbered 86, with on the other side a house that used to be the Guaging Weir House. The locks in front of us number thirteen and are known as the "New Thirteen", seven of the locks are grouped together and fall away from the top lock disappearing under the motorway that yet again appears.

Once the first flight of seven locks finish the Perry Barr locks start to spread out finally finishing at the bottom lock with the canal and motorway junctions of Salford ahead of us. We will have passed yet more BCN cottages numbered 77 and 78, one lock from the bottom at Deykin Avenue Bridge.

The gardens of these cottages being in contrast to the factories that crowd the canal. Below the Bottom lock we pass through what used to be a large factory complex that belonged to the General Electric Company (GEC). Most of the buildings have gone being replaced with modern warehouse units, but the chimney to the old power station in the factory still stands. This building plus its crane can be just seen in Roy Kenn's photo from 1987 behind the lock cottages.

The factory complex used to be supplied with coal by canal and if you look carefully you can still see camaflage paint on the remaining walls left over from the last war. Soon we are travelling under spaghatti junction and arrive at Salford junction. In the photograph Phoenix is towing a loaded butty, both boats full of rubbish from the 2003 clean up, with the supports of the junction everywhere. Most of the rubbish had come from out of the section beneath the motorway and was mainly building materials etc.

At Salford Junction we link up with the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal. With the busy motorway junction of Salford or Spaghetti above us. With the junction of the Birmingham & Warwick Junction Canal joining just after. So its straight ahead for Fazeley, 1st right up to Birminmgham via the old thirteen locks, or 2nd right to go towards Warwick.