Braunston tunnel horse path.

[MoominPapa]

Quick question. Is the path over t he top of Braunston tunnel easily traversable by a bike?

 

MP.

 

[cuthound]

I think so, at least it was when I last walked it with my old dog 5 years ago.

[alan_fincher]

Never tried it, but I'd say a lot of it would be, but unless you are into serious offroading there are some sections that probably might not be.

 

Much of it is quite a good surface, (part of it is actually road access to a farm), but I suspect after rain some bits could be a bit of a quagmire.

 

EDITED TO ADD:

 

I would expect you to be able to ride more of it than you might choose to get off and push for, though.

Edited February 13, 2019 by alan_fincher

[matty40s]

It is all OK on a bike, most of it is farm track with rubble/stone base. A bit jiggly but do-able.

[alan_fincher]

Picture from "Halfie"  blog.

 

Much of the part to the North of where the road crosses the track is lot like this......

 

11 minutes ago, matty40s said:

It is all OK on a bike, most of it is farm track with rubble/stone base. A bit jiggly but do-able.

If you can do the entire first part ascending from the towpath at the Braunston end without pushing any short part of it, you are a lot more agile on a bike than I am.  It's only a short bit, admittedly, but going South I would certainly walk some of the very first part of the ascent.

[roland elsdon]

Its a great ride . But  the bit by the tunnel itself is challenging. We normally dont go to the tunnel mouth but end up on the bridleway by the nelson. The other route is up to the nelson up the bridleway up the a45 footpath ( illegal but no one walks on it) back on bridleway at top of hill, and then past housing estate on bridlway to tunnel mouth.

daventry has truely excellent cycleways.

[Rick-n-Jo]

15 minutes ago, roland elsdon said:

..... But  the bit by the tunnel itself is challenging.

 

 

East end is an easy slope, Braunston end is as you say, interesting.

[roland elsdon]

Cant see the problem. Put the horse in the boat (we once had sheep in ours) and leggit

 

[zenataomm]

You can see it on Google maps …. https://www.google.co.uk/maps/place/Grand+Union+Canal/@52.2846729,-1.1844774,156m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x4877050f17fedb13:0x7edf4743e89e1ff7!8m2!3d52.158392!4d-0.9284807

[alan_fincher]

6 minutes ago, zenataomm said:

You can see it on Google maps …. https://www.google.co.uk/maps/place/Grand+Union+Canal/@52.2846729,-1.1844774,156m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x4877050f17fedb13:0x7edf4743e89e1ff7!8m2!3d52.158392!4d-0.9284807

I wonder if you blew that up and studied it carefully that it would be obvious that the middle of the three air shafts isn't actually on the line of the tunnel, but set off to one side........

 

....... probably not, but I'm not going to try!

[MoominPapa]

Change of plan: will be walking back to Braunston. I cycled the new, red, folding bike from Braunston back to Dunchurch Pools today and met the CRT hedge-bashing team, who were covering the towpath with thorns. Predictably, I got Dunchurch with two flat tyres. Grrr.

 

MP.

 

[zenataomm]

Well I had a go, it's not easy to make it out in the copy I'm pasting here, and of course there is the famous kink to allow for.

[alan_fincher]

19 minutes ago, zenataomm said:

Well I had a go, it's not easy to make it out in the copy I'm pasting here, and of course there is the famous kink to allow for.

 

It really isn't much of a kink, or you would not be able to see clearly the whole way through the tunnel from one end to the other, (despite many publications repeating the myth that you can't!)

 

I'm trying to remember (and failing!) exactly where the kink is in relation to the Eastern most ventilation shaft.  Might it actually be closer to the tunnel mouth than the shaft is, I'm not sure?

[zenataomm]

According to the 6" OS 1888 the first two are smack in the middle of the bore, and the third one is more to the Southern wall.

[matty40s]

10 hours ago, alan_fincher said:

It really isn't much of a kink, or you would not be able to see clearly the whole way through the tunnel from one end to the other, (despite many publications repeating the myth that you can't!)

 

I'm trying to remember (and failing!) exactly where the kink is in relation to the Eastern most ventilation shaft.  Might it actually be closer to the tunnel mouth than the shaft is, I'm not sure?

The Western shaft is about 8 - 10 feet South of the tunnel bore.....approx 670  yards in. The kink is between 300 and 500 yards in from the East end

[alan_fincher]

43 minutes ago, matty40s said:

The Western shaft is about 8 - 10 feet South of the tunnel bore.....approx 670  yards in. The kink is between 300 and 500 yards in from the East end

Middle shaft, surely?