Route
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The race follows the Kennet and Avon Canal for 52 miles (84 km) from Devizes through Pewsey, Hungerford and Newbury to Reading. From Reading the race follows the non-tidal River Thames for 55 miles (89 km) through Henley-on-Thames, Marlow, Maidenhead, Windsor, Staines and Kingston before reaching the tidal River Thames at Teddington Lock. The tidal river is followed for the final 18 miles (29 km) through the western suburbs of London to Westminster. The 2008 race was the 60th anniversary of the event.
The course requires competitors to portage their boats around 77 locks. Starting from Devizes, there are four locks before the 502-yard (459 m) Bruce tunnel, and another 31 locks before Newbury wharf, and the end of the first stage, is reached. Stage 2 contains 22 locks on the Kennet and Avon Canal, before the junction with the River Thames is reached, and a further six locks on the Thames, before the stage ends above Marlow lock. Stage 3 includes 14 locks, ending below Teddington lock, while stage 4 contains a single lock at Richmond before the final 18 miles (29 km) on the tideway. Richmond lock is only operational at some states of the tide, and so a portage may be avoided if passage is made during a period of 2 hours either side of high tide.
Read more about this topic: Devizes To Westminster International Canoe Marathon
Famous quotes containing the word route:
“A Route of Evanescence
With a revolving Wheel—”
—Emily Dickinson (1830–1886)
“By a route obscure and lonely,
Haunted by ill angels only,
Where an eidolon, named Night,
On a black throne reigns upright,
I have reached these lands but newly
From an ultimate dim Thule—
From a wild weird clime that lieth, sublime,
Out of space—out of time.”
—Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849)
“A route differs from a road not only because it is solely intended for vehicles, but also because it is merely a line that connects one point with another. A route has no meaning in itself; its meaning derives entirely from the two points that it connects. A road is a tribute to space. Every stretch of road has meaning in itself and invites us to stop. A route is the triumphant devaluation of space, which thanks to it has been reduced to a mere obstacle to human movement and a waste of time.”
—Milan Kundera (b. 1929)