River Kennet

Went into town today and was distracted by the contrasting river environment just before it flows through into the busy Oracle shopping centre in Reading. You can just see the line of cars on the flyover in the background.

One of the Kennet's sources is Swallowhead Spring near Silbury Hill in the county of Wiltshire, the other being a collection of tributaries to the North of Avebury. From there the river flows through Marlborough, Hungerford and Newbury before flowing into the Thames on the reach above Sonning Lock at Reading.

The Kennet and Avon rivers were joined to the Thames with the Kennet and Avon canal. They formed an 87 mile waterway across southern England. The two river stretches were made navigable in the early 18th century, and the 57-mile (92 km) canal section was constructed between 1794 and 1810. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the canal gradually fell into disuse after the opening of the Great Western Railway. In the latter half of the 20th century the canal was restored in stages, largely by volunteers. After decades of dereliction and much restoration work, it was fully reopened in 1990. The Kennet and Avon Canal has been developed as a popular heritage tourism destination for boating, canoeing, fishing, walking, and cycling, and is also important for wildlife conservation (information blatantly lifted from Wiki...).