As other reviewers have noted, the name of this site is somewhat misleading as there is no such thing as the ‘Pontcysyllte Canal’. Rather then Pontcysyllte Aqueduct forms part of the Llangollen Canal, which is itself just a branch of the much larger Shropshire Union Canal. It was constructed at the turn of the 18th Century to transport coal, iron, and other goods needed in the early days of the Industrial Revolution. This was to have been part of the grand Ellesmere Canal to connect the River Mersey in the north with the River Severn in the south, joining the great port cities of Bristol and the ex-WHS Liverpool, but the full canal was never realised. Today, the Llangollen Branch runs from the town of Llangollen (not much surprise there) in north Wales to the tiny rural village of Hurleston in Cheshire, England where it joins the Shropshire Union. From there, goods could be shipped north through Chester to Ellesmere Port and the Mersey, which was later connected to the mills of Lancashire by the huge Manchester Ship Canal. Alternatively, turning south the canal  eventually joins the endless maze of canals in the Midlands providing access to the great industrial metropolis of Birmingham, which is one of several places referred to as the ‘Venice of the North’ although perhaps less seriously so than Bruges, Amsterdam, etc.

Returning to the actual inscribed area, the first 11 miles of the Llangollen Branch forms the core zone out of the total length of 46 miles, i.e. just under a quarter of the whole canal’s length is inscribed. This begins to the west of Llangollen itself at the Horseshoe Falls, where water from the River Dee feeds the canal. The existence of this weir is an important part of why the canal was not abandoned in the early 20th Century despite having long outlived its commercial utility as it provided a source of water for the many canals of Cheshire that were still in use. One nearby point of interest is the 13th Century Valle Crucis Cistercian Abbey, by no means WHS material but a nicely preserved Medieval complex and only 1 km or so walk from the canal. From the falls, the canal runs east above the town of Llangollen, which is otherwise most famous for its International Eisteddfod music festival that occurs every year in the second week of July. It was here in 1955 that a twenty-year-old Luciano Pavarotti won first prize in one of the festivals competitions that he later credited with inspiring him to become a professional singer. I had actually been to Llangollen and walked along the canal several times in the past without ever realising that it formed part of a WHS. Llangollen lost its railway links in the Beeching cuts of the 1960s and so access by public transport is now only via bus. There are various examples of canal engineering at Llangollen, such as original lift bridges (picture attached) and wharfs, and there is an impressive section where a sheer rock face has been left from the hillside being cut away to make a path for the canal. From Llangollen Wharf, it is possible to take a trip on a horse-drawn canal boat for a true 18th Century experience. These run as far as the Horseshoe Falls, which is the only way to see these from the water as motorised boats cannot travel beyond Llangollen as there is not enough room for them to turn around. However, most of this section is fairly generic canal of the sort that can be seen anywhere else in the countryside of the UK. Incidentally, the double L in Welsh in Llangollen and Pontcysyllte is a sound not found in English that I have managed to approximate fairly well after years of family holidays to north Wales but couldn’t begin to explain how to pronounce. Wikipedia tells me it is a ‘voiceless alveolar lateral fricative’ – hopefully that means something to any linguists reading.

The highlight of this site is, as the name would suggest, the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct. I drove there for my visit and there was ample parking in the village of Trevor but it appears to be about an hours walk from Ruabon train station on the line from Chester to Shrewsbury via Wrexham. The aqueduct itself is a marvel of engineering, towering above the River Dee valley below. Typically, changes in elevation on canals are dealt with by means of a system of locks but to descend this valley and climb the other side would have taken far too many and so the great Thomas Telford designed this aqueduct. Indeed, there are no locks at all in the whole inscribed section of the canal, which is a remarkable achievement given the hilly terrain it passes through. Construction of the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct began in 1795 and was not complete until 1805, consisting of an 18-arch stone and iron structure 307 metres long, twelve-feet wide and 38 metres high. It supposedly remains the longest aqueduct in the UK and the highest canal aqueduct anywhere in the world. As marvellous as it is to behold, there isn’t a great deal to actually do here as a visitor. There is a narrow footpath that runs alongside the canal across the aqueduct that is free to access, although how this works in the era of social distancing I don’t know. Thankfully there are railings on the side with the path but there is no barrier on the other side, just a sheer drop from canal to the valley below. There are several options to take a trip on a narrowboat across the aqueduct but there is nothing to see from the boat that can’t be seen on foot so I did not partake.

I have not seen the canal beyond Pontcysyllte but the canal continues through the Whitehouses Tunnel then crosses another river, the Afon Ceiriog, on the Chirk Aqueduct. Chirk has a railway station on the same train line as Ruabon so a good idea might be to walk between the two along the canal via both aqueducts. Nearby is Chirk Castle, which I have visited before and was originally built in the 13th Century although most of the present construction is from the English Civil War era of the 17th Century. This is a decent place to visit with some nice gardens but nothing too spectacular. The Pontcysyllte Aqueduct and surrounding canal is, in a way, similarly not that special. There are several other grand canal aqueducts around the UK and, after the canals were supplanted by the railways, many much larger and more impressive railway viaducts were constructed in even more difficult terrain than this and that’s before we even consider sites outside Britain. It is probably the weakest of the UK’s trilogy of industrial WHS bridges, lacking the surrounding industrial landscape of Ironbridge and not as magnificent as the Forth Bridge. Nevertheless, the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct has an elegance in the simplicity of its design and is a noteworthy achievement for its age so is still a worthwhile place to see, although best visited en route to one of the many other nearby sites rather than as a trip in its own right.