Top 8 Easter canal boat holidays
Easter is a great time to take a narrowboat holiday in England, Scotland and Wales
We’ve published a guide to our top 8 Easter canal boat holidays in 2025.
Canal boat holidays are fantastic for families, offering the chance to set off on an adventure together. Everyone can enjoy learning how to work the locks, spotting wildlife, exploring traffic-free towpaths and visiting waterside attractions along the way.
Drifters’ prices this Easter currently start at £761 for a short break (three or four nights) on a boat for up to four people, £1,026 for a week.
Here are our top 8 Easter canal boat holidays destinations in 2025:
1. Visit the World’s biggest Cadbury shop at Cadbury World
Perfect for beginners, you can travel lock-free to Birmingham in around five hours from Alvechurch on the Worcester & Birmingham Canal near Bromsgrove. Along the way, you can stop off at Bournville to find handmade Easter eggs in the World’s biggest Cadbury shop at Cadbury World. With more canals than Venice, boaters can travel right into the heart of the City where over-night moorings are available at Gas Street Basin. Here you are close to Brindleyplace with plenty for families to see and do, including visiting the Planetarium at Birmingham’s Science Museum Thinktank.
2. Follow Wallace & Gromit across ‘The Stream in the Sky’
On a short break from Chirk on the beautiful Llangollen Canal in North Wales you can cruise across the awesome UNESCO World Heritage Pontcysyllte Aqueduct. Wallace & Gromit boated across the aqueduct in the BAFTA and Oscar nominated ‘Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl’. The Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, also known as ‘The Stream in the Sky’ stands 38 metres high above the Dee Valley. With not even a hand rail on the south side of the aqueduct to obscure the stunning views of the valley below, crossing the aqueduct by boat you literally feel like you’re floating above the earth. After you’ve crossed the aqueduct, you can continue on to Llangollen Basin and moor up visit he pretty Eisteddfod town of Llangollen on the edge of the Berwyn Mountains.
3. Join the Easter Boat Gathering at the National Waterways Museum
Over the Easter Weekend (18-21 April 2025), the National Waterways Museum at Ellesmere Port in Cheshire celebrates the start of the summer boating season with a large boat gathering and music and activities for the whole family. From our base at Bunbury on the Shropshire Union Canal in Cheshire, it’s a 10-hour journey to Ellesmere Port. You’ll travel 21 miles through 12 locks, passing through the historic City of Chester along the way, perfect for a week away.
4. Celebrate the Jane Austen 250th anniversary in Bath
On a short break from Hilperton near Trowbridge in Wiltshire, you can travel along the beautiful Kennet & Avon Canal and reach Sydney Gardens in around seven hours. There are three locks to pass through each way. From there, it’s a short walk to Georgian Bath’s City Centre attractions, including the Roman Baths and the Jane Austen Centre, celebrating 250 years since this remarkable author was born.
5. Visit Drayton Manor Theme Park
On a week-long holiday from Great Haywood on the Trent & Mersey Canal in Staffordshire, you can cruise to moorings close to Drayton Manor Theme Park. The journey there and back travels 48 miles, passes through 10 locks (five each way) and takes around 22 cruising hours. Along the way you’ll pass through the Cannock Chase, Fradley Junction and Nature Reserve, and a series of villages with canalside pubs. You can moor up between Tolson’s Footbridge and Coleshill Road Bridge on the Birmingham & Fazeley Canal and walk to Drayton Manor Park.
6. Step back in time in Mary King Close in Edinburgh
On a week long break from Falkirk you can travel through the Scottish Lowlands to Edinburgh and back. The journey starts with trip through the iconic Falkirk Wheel, the world’s first and only rotating boat lift, which lifts boats 100ft from the Forth & Clyde Canal to the Union Canal above. You’ll pass through Linlithgow and Ratho along the way. Once in Edinburgh, you can moor up in Edinburgh Quay to enjoy the City’s attractions, including a tour of Mary King Close frozen in time beneath the Royal Mile.
7. See the Zog Live Show at Warwick Castle
On a short break from Stockton, on the Grand Union Canal in Warwickshire, you can cruise to Warwick and back. Once there, you can moor up to explore Warwick Castle, said to be Britain’s greatest medieval experience. From 12 April to 28 September 2025 the daily Zog Live Show will bring this popular children’s book to life. The journey to Warwick and back travels 23 miles, passes through 44 locks (22 each way) and takes around 17 hours.
8. Star gaze in the Brecon Beacons
Isolated from the main canal network, the beautiful Monmouth & Brecon Canal runs through Bannau Brycheiniog (Brecon Beacons) National Park. Stretching 35 miles from Brecon to Cwmbran, this peaceful waterway has very few locks so it’s great for beginners. It offers canal boat holiday-makers incredible mountain views. There’s a series of historic village pubs to visit along the way and dark skies perfect for star-gazing on clear nights. On a short break from our base at Goytre Wharf, near Abergavenny, you can cruise lock-free to Llangynidr and back. You’ll pass the Lion Inn at Govilon and the Bridge End Inn at Llangattock. On a week’s break, you can travel on to Brecon, passing through Talybont-on-Usk with its popular Star Inn.
