Lichfield Branch

walked down onto the towpath of the Wyrley & Essington Canal, which we followed as far as Beck’s Bridge. Here we climbed some steps onto the bed of the former Norton Branch, an important line that connected several colleries in the area (the bridge under the A5 west of Brownhills Common is still there). Below to our left was the private Slough Arm, and some of our group recalled mooring here before it was abandoned. The branch was fed by a spring (hence its name) and so the bed is still in water but now very overgrown. We left the Norton Branch and the

Slough Arm near the supposed site of a Newcomen Engine. We now entered Brownhills Common near Coppice Lane. Although there are industrial units all around, nature has reclaimed this area, and it has the feel of rampant, unmanaged woodland. We crossed the A5 by the (still) derelict Rising Sun pub and stumbled upon a wooden fingerpost dated 1777 –“Salop 35 ½ miles to the west and Atherftone 17 miles to the east”. Apparently, this distance marker is a replica (the original is in Stafford Museum) and thousands of motorists zoom past daily, unaware of its existence on a grass island that separates the two carriageways.

Our route took us through a housing estate to a steel foobridge erected across the M6 Toll and into Chasewater Park where we stopped at the café for refreshment, before following the Anglesey Branch as far as the aqueduct by the A5, at which point