Little Bridges #1616 Wendover Arm 4
The Wendover Arm Canal was originally planned in 1793 as a feeder canal to convey water from Wendover, where there was a plentiful supply from the streams and springs in that area, to the Grand Union Canal (known originally as the Grand Junction Canal) at Bulborne. However, it was finally completed in 1797 as a fully navigable waterway and carried commercial horse drawn barge traffic to and from Wendover.
One of the major problems facing the builders and designers of the Grand Union Canal was how to maintain the water in the “Tring Summit”, (which is where the canal passes over the Chiltern Hills at an altitude of 390ft), at a sufficient depth to allow uninterrupted navigation of boats across the summit. Every time a boat passes over the summit it passes through two locks (one at each end of the summit) and over 50,000 gallons of water are lost each time a lock is used. A continuous and plentiful supply of water was therefore required to replace that lost by the passage of boats across the summit and in order to supply this need and maintain a navigable depth in the main line of the Grand Union Canal, the Wendover Arm along with the reservoirs that you can see in the local area, were constructed.
The canal continued to operate until 1904 when continuing problems with leakage during the late 1800’s, along its middle section, caused the canal to be closed to navigation beyond the pumping station at Little Tring. The middle section of the canal was “dried” but, to ensure the supply of water was maintained, a pipeline was sunk in 1912, under the dry canal bed from Drayton Beauchamp to Little Tring. At Drayton Beauchamp, the water flowing from Wendover was fed via a sump into the pipeline, which then fed the water into the local reservoirs from where it was pumped up into the canal by Tringford Pumping Station at Little Tring.
Initial attempts to reopen the canal following the formation of the Grand Union Canal Society in 1967 were unsuccessful, but interest revived in 1985, and soon after a decision by the Department of Transport in 1988 to build a navigable culvert where the new Aston Clinton bypass would cross the arm, the Wendover Arm Trust was formed in 1989.
The Wendover Arm Trust is a charitable body whose aim is to promote and restore this long neglected beautiful and unique Chilterns waterway. After completion the canal will once again be a fully navigable and operational canal, following its original route from its junction with the Grand Union Canal at Bulborne through to Wendover, a total of 6 3/4 miles. The Trust split the task of reopening the canal into three phases, and phase 1 of the project, the first 1.3 miles (2 km) from the junction at Bulbourne to a winding hole near Little Tring Farm, was completed and reopened in 2005. Using Bentonite matting, they relined the section which leaked so badly and at Easter 2015 the first 0.25 miles (0.40 km) of phase 2 were filled with water for the first time since 1904.
The Trust are continuing with the restoration and they completed the work between Drayton Beauchamp bridge and the footbridge 4A some time ago. They are currently focussing on profiling and lining the canal between the two footbridges 4A and 4 and past the site of the old Whitehouses pumping station. This cache will bring you right to the heart of the current restoration, along the public towpath above Wilstone Reservoir.
More information about the Wendover Arm Canal can be found on Wikipedia and on notice boards along the towpath. The website for the Wendover Arm Trust is also worth a visit and is regularly updated with progress on the restoration of the canal. Many thanks to all three sources for the above information.
And now onto the cache...
This is a simple offset Multi-Cache and at the posted coordinates you should be standing on the towpath in front of bridge 4 where you can see some stanchion plaques. First of all, have a look for the following digits:
- A - John S. Cottrell A.12.A3 - 15.7.09
- B - "Dotty" 1999 - B015
- C - Chiltern Branch 200C
- D - Simon Blackett 196D - 2005
- E - Michael E. Mussell 29.E.41 - 20.2.11
- F - Grand Junction Arms, Bridge 1FF
And now substitute your values into the following equation to work out where the cache is hidden:
N51 48.ABC W000 40.DEF
The special tool you require is a set of tweezers and they are to help extract the log. There is no need to use excessive force to open the cache and don't forget to bring your own pen.
Good Luck!
The Little Bridges series was started by Stanthews in 2009 to highlight small footbridges in remote parts of Wiltshire. Since then the series has been expanded by others all over the country and starting to spread fast. There is a stats listing run by Billiethecat, so you can see how many Little Bridges you have found, you can find it here:- https://littlebridgesseries.wordpress.com/ . If you would like to add to the series, please contact Stan on stanthews@aol.com and he will give you a number for your bridge, to qualify, the bridge must be a foot bridge too small for vehicles, please make sure your title exactly matches “Little Bridges # xxxx then the name” including spaces so it will get picked up and added to stats list.