Our Routes
Choose the journey as well as the destination
Every boat holiday starts and finishes at Linslade, near Leighton Buzzard. Compare the return-trip effort and locks before choosing a destination. You can choose your route after reserving your boat.
Stoke Bruerne and back
Planning guide: 3 nights
A northern short break via Milton Keynes and Cosgrove, turning below the Stoke Bruerne lock flight.
- Approximate cruising
- 10 hours each way · 20 hours for the return trip
- Locks
- 7 locks each way
Cruising times are approximate and exclude delays. Allow time for locks, stops and your return to Linslade. These are suggested itineraries, not separately booked routes or a guarantee that every waterway will be open.
Braunston Junction and back
Planning guide: 7 nights
Travel north via Stoke Bruerne, Blisworth Tunnel and Northamptonshire villages.
- Approximate cruising
- 21 hours each way · 42 hours for the return trip
- Locks
- 27 locks each way
Cruising times are approximate and exclude delays. Allow time for locks, stops and your return to Linslade. These are suggested itineraries, not separately booked routes or a guarantee that every waterway will be open.
Cassiobury Park and back
Planning guide: 7 nights
Head south over the Chilterns, through Marsworth and Berkhamsted. This week has more locks than the Braunston trip.
- Approximate cruising
- 25 hours each way · 50 hours for the return trip
- Locks
- 51 locks each way
Cruising times are approximate and exclude delays. Allow time for locks, stops and your return to Linslade. These are suggested itineraries, not separately booked routes or a guarantee that every waterway will be open.
Leave room for the holiday
Hours each way mean you need time to come back as well. Whole-circuit hours already include the journey back to base. Neither figure includes delays or time spent sightseeing. The detailed guide below retains the landmarks, maps and route restrictions.
New to boating? Start with the first-time guide · Ask us about your planned route · Find your boat holiday
Every Wyvern Shipping holiday starts and finishes at our boatyard at Linslade, near Leighton Buzzard. Based on the Grand Union Canal in Leighton Buzzard, we are 38 miles north of London and just 45 minutes by train from London Euston. From that one starting point you can turn north or south. Which route suits you is mostly a question of how many nights you have.
A narrowboat moves at about walking pace and locks take time, so the number that decides your route is cruising hours rather than miles. Every route page on this site gives both. The hours are approximate and don't allow for delays.
Short breaks of 3 or 4 nights
If you have less than a week, take a short break. On Friday-start boats a weekend cruise runs from 4.00pm Friday to 9.30am Monday, and a midweek cruise from 4.00pm Monday to 9.30am Friday. Saturday-start boats do the same shifted by a day, Saturday through to Tuesday morning or Tuesday through to Saturday.
Turn north and you follow the Ouzel Valley through the parks of Milton Keynes, over the aqueduct at Cosgrove, and on to the Northamptonshire village of Stoke Bruerne with its canal museum. Turn south and you climb the Chiltern Hills towards Marsworth. The reservoirs there were built to feed the canal summit and are now nature reserves. Six short break destinations, with the cruising each way.
| Direction | Destination | Nights | Cruising each way | Distance each way | Locks each way | Also on this route |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| North | Stoke Bruerne, foot of the lock flight | 3 | 10 hrs | 26 miles | 7 | 2 aqueducts |
| North | Gayton Junction, via Blisworth Tunnel | 4 | 13 hrs | 30 miles | 14 | 2 aqueducts, 1 tunnel |
| South | Aylesbury, via the Aylesbury Arm | 3 | 10 hrs | 15 miles | 11 wide, 16 narrow | None |
| South | Little Tring, via the Wendover Arm | 3 | 8 hrs | 11 miles | 18 | None |
| South | Cowroast | 3 | 10 hrs | 12 miles | 18 | None |
| South | Berkhamsted Station | 4 | 14 hrs | 15 miles | 26 | None |
Short break canal holidays has the booking times in full, and 3 & 4 day cruises describes each destination.
A week or longer
Seven nights takes you to Braunston Junction and back, or south to Cassiobury Park and back. Ten to fourteen nights puts Paddington Basin, Banbury and Warwick in reach. At fourteen you can get to Oxford, Stratford-upon-Avon or Lechlade.
Seventeen nights is enough for a ring. A ring is a circuit, so you come home without repeating any water. Twenty-one opens up the Thames Ring, which takes in the wide locks of the Grand Union, the narrow South Oxford Canal, and the tidal Thames at Brentford.
There are over two thousand miles of navigable rivers and canals in England and Wales. Hires of two to six weeks are arranged by phone.
| Route | Nights | Destination | Cruising | Distance | Locks | Also on this route |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grand Union South | 7 | Cassiobury Park and return | 25 hrs each way | 26 miles each way | 51 each way | None |
| Grand Union North | 7 | Braunston Junction and return | 21 hrs each way | 46 miles each way | 27 each way | 2 aqueducts, 2 tunnels |
| North Oxford & Ashby Canals | 10 to 11 | Snarestone Tunnel and return | 41 hrs each way | 95 miles each way | 31 each way | 2 aqueducts, 4 tunnels |
| Foxton & Market Harborough | 10 to 11 | Market Harborough and return | 32 hrs each way | 72 miles each way | 21 wide, 17 narrow each way | 2 aqueducts, 3 tunnels |
| South & London | 10 to 14 | Paddington Basin and return | 37 hrs each way | 51 miles each way | 63 each way | None |
| Banbury | 10 to 14 | Banbury and return | 34 hrs each way | 73 miles each way | 27 wide, 22 narrow each way | 2 aqueducts, 2 tunnels |
| Warwick | 14 | Warwick and return | 31 hrs each way | 60 miles each way | 50 each way | 2 aqueducts, 2 tunnels |
| Oxford | 14 | Oxford and return | 48 hrs each way | 101 miles each way | 27 wide, 39 narrow each way | 2 aqueducts, 2 tunnels |
| Stratford-upon-Avon | 14 | Stratford-upon-Avon and return | 50 hrs each way | 81 miles each way | 73 wide, 36 narrow each way | 2 aqueducts, 3 tunnels |
| Lechlade | 14 | Lechlade and return | 58 hrs each way | 126 miles each way | 74 each way | 2 aqueducts, 2 tunnels |
| Leicester Ring | 17 | Circular route | 108 hrs, whole circuit | 239 miles | 92 wide, 44 narrow | 2 aqueducts, 6 tunnels |
| Warwick Ring | 17 | Circular route | 95 hrs, whole circuit | 187 miles | 148 | 2 aqueducts, 6 tunnels |
| Thames Circular Cruise | 21 | Circular route | 116 hrs, whole circuit | 248 miles | 102 wide, 37 narrow, 36 Thames | 2 aqueducts, 2 tunnels |
Two more destinations sit on the route pages rather than in the table above. Northampton is a 7 night cruise of 18 hrs each way, 35 miles, 14 wide locks, 17 narrow locks, 2 aqueducts and 1 tunnel, described on Grand Union North. The Welford Arm is 24 hrs each way and is covered on Foxton & Market Harborough.
Choosing between them
Locks eat the day, more than distance does. Grand Union South and Grand Union North are both seven-night cruises, but the southern trip has 51 locks each way against 27 going north, and over a shorter distance. If nobody in your crew has steered a boat before, you'll find north the gentler week.
Point-to-point routes are quoted each way, out and back to Linslade. The three rings are one-way circuits, so their hours cover the whole loop.
Before you book
Boats are boarded between 1.30pm and 3.00pm. We hire from the middle of March to the middle of November, and we're closed for boat hire over the winter. Prices include fuel, gas, car parking, TV, DVD player, VAT, bedding and damage waiver. The Thames is run by the Environment Agency rather than the Canal & River Trust. You buy a seven day river licence from the lock-keeper at Oxford or Teddington on the day you join the river.
Check availability and prices, or download the canal holiday map.