Distance: 9.1 miles

Difficulty of the terrain: medium

Get the route: via Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox

Walk primarily in north west Warwickshire, mostly on canal towpaths, from Water Orton Railway Station to Fazeley where the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal converges with the Coventry Canal.

The Story

The Walk

Getting Back

Staffordshire’s Gas Street Basin Connection

At fifteen miles in length, the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal is a similar length to the Peak Forest Canal and the modern truncated version of the Caldon Canal. Like those two waterways the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal is a mixture of the incredibly urban and the bucolic.

It begins at Gas Street Basin right in the heart of Birmingham and ends at Fazeley in south eastern Staffordshire, having wound through the outer suburbs of Birmingham and the north Worcestershire countryside.

Fazeley is where it converges with the meandering Coventry Canal, is an outer suburb of Tamworth, though it has a distinctive suburban identity of its own.

As canals go, the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal was constructed quite quickly. Work began in 1784 and finished in 1789.

The canal is notable today for forming part of the Warwickshire Ring, popular with boaters for its stark contrasts between the urban West Midlands, rural areas on the outskirts, and mixture of towns like Tamworth.

Fazeley is arguably not where the canal originally ended. The same company constructed a northern arm running beyond Fazeley towards Whittlington close to Lichfield. This section however, is today considered part of the Coventry Canal, which winds its way across the north western slither of Warwickshire which was left after what is now Solihull and the bulk of Birmingham was transferred out of Warwickshire into West Midlands in 1974.

The Walk

Get the route via: Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox

This walk was created using Ordnance Survey Explorer. To subscribe and also get Ordnance Survey Maps on your phone, click the banner above.

This walk to Fazeley, primarily along the towpath of the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal, begins from Water Orton Railway Station.

Upon leaving Water Orton Railway Station turn right. Walk straight downhill along a road which runs towards the edge of Water Orton.

On the edge of Water Orton you come to a very old, very narrow bridge across the River Tame. Walk across it, taking care of the heavy traffic which makes use of its thin ancient span.

Once you are on the far side of the river you have crossed from Warwickshire where Water Orton is situated to Minworth in Birmingham.

Here turn left and follow the road around as it runs towards one of the forest of warehouses and factory units which populate the eastern edge of Birmingham.

Continue walking straight until you reach a roundabout with warehouse units to both the left and right and a cluster of houses straight ahead.

There is a straight road which looks like it was designed for HGVs lined with trees off to the right. Turn right and walk along it.

At the end of the road you come to the busy A4097, an offshoot of the A38 which runs off towards where the M42 and the M6 Toll converge.

Here, turn left and walk a short distance towards some traffic lights opposite a pub on the right.

On reaching the traffic lights turn right and cross the road to the side beside the pub.

Walk straight a short distance passing the pub. Here on the right there is a steep narrow road running uphill. Turn right and head up this steep narrow road.

At the top of the slope there is a bridge across the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal. Here to the right there is a ramp running down to the Birmingham and Fazeley Canal. Turn right and walk down to the towpath.

Once on the towpath turn right and walk along the long straight line of the canal.

Keep on walking straight ahead approaching the edge of Birmingham district. The surroundings are already pretty rural.

Continue walking until you reach the cutting leading up to the Curdworth Tunnel, just north of the village of Curdworth, the first settlement inside Warwickshire, once you leave Birmingham again.

Walk through the short Curdworth Tunnel and continue along the towpath on the far side.

Soon you approach the bridges which carry the M6 Toll and the A446 over the canal.

Carry on walking approaching a cluster of locks on the Curdworth flight.

Keep on walking down the lock flight.

Presently you pass an old lock keeper’s cottage and continue along the towpath having passed it.

Off on the right there is Kingsbury Waterpark. It is created from old gravel pits.

Continue walking straight along the towpath passing another former lock keeper’s cottage.

Having passed the cottage you continue along a long straight stretch of towpath.

Keep on a fair distance further. 

Presently you approach the edge of the Tamworth built up area. You approach and walk beneath a distinctive footbridge which looks like a castle gateway.

Carry on walking passing a cluster of moored barges and underneath a road bridge.

Continue walking, crossing a bridge over the canal which leads to a marina.

On the far side of the bridge continue walking, approaching the centre of Fazeley where the Fazeley and Birmingham Canal converges with the Coventry Canal.

You walk underneath a bridge and arrive at the point where the two canals meet.

Cross the bridge here and walk down the other side.

This is where the walk ends.

Getting Back

Fazeley is near Wilnecote Railway Station, as well as Tamworth Railway Station. It is also served by a small number of buses many of them local, but others which (at the time of writing in January 2024) served Birmingham, Sutton Coldfield and Tamworth.