From the visitor centre door, turn right, and walk along the canal about 30 metres, and up the brick-built bridge on the right, over the junction to the Dudley No. 2 canal.
1. Windmill End Junction.
Below is the junction of the Netherton Tunnel approach opened in 1858, and the Dudley No. 2 canal, opened in 1798, which linked to the Worcester and Birmingham Canal at Selly Oak, but now terminates just past Hawne Basin, Halesowen.The canal passes the old sites of Doulton’s ceramic pipe-works, Old Hill gas works, and Stewart’s & Lloyds Combeswood Tube works, which provided the last commercial canal traffic in 1969.
The canals were important in transporting materials and finished goods in and out of the Black Country, and here there would have been a steady stream of working boats and horses serving the local industries. Visible on the bridge abutments and handrails are grooves worn by towropes which hauled the narrow-boats along the canal, and some bridges and canal structures are listed features.
The canal is now used by narrow boats for leisure purposes, and Bumble Hole is the site for an annual September boat festival.
Retrace your steps, and turn right to cross the junction by an iron footbridge, and walk 20 m. to climb the black and white cast-iron ‘Netherton Tunnel Bridge’ which crosses the canal.
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