The canal came out of the Wester Hailes pipes near Calder Crescent on the outskirts of Edinburgh, choked with filth

The scene is very different today - swans enjoy a swim along the restored, freely flowing canal

Local people enjoy trips on the Ratho boats at a 1996 canal festival at Calder Crescent

The new A71 dual carriageway crosses the canal on a huge concrete bridge. The old bridge 8 is just beyond

One of the canal's newest bridges, number 8A, built in 1999 to give access to a car showroom on the offside bank of the canal

One of the newest aqueducts on the lowland canals, the Scott Russell Aqueduct, takes the Union Canal over the Edinburgh City Bypass at Hermiston

Swans sit at the new Seagull Trust moorings by bridge 10

Gogar Station Road Bridge under construction, 1994

Gogar Station Road Bridge, completed in 1995. The canal maintains its full width, depth and air draught under the bridge

The Bridge Inn, Ratho - centre of most of the boating activity on the canal today

Seagull Trust boathouse at Ratho. The Bridge Inn is in the background

One of the Seagull Trust boats outside their Ratho base

The canal flows west from Ratho through a picturesque wooded cutting, among some old quarries

The unusually high bridge 17 leads to Clifton Hall School, shortly before the Almond Valley is reached

New benches and moorings by the Almond Aqueduct

The impressive 5-arched Almond Aqueduct, third largest on the Union Canal (and in Scotland)

West of the aqueduct, the surroundings revert back to open fields. This narrower-than-usual original bridge carries a minor road over the canal a few hundred yards before the M8 crossing

When the M8 motorway was built in 1970, it cut straight across the canal, causing a major blockage, seen here with bridge 21 in the foreground

In early 2000, the blockage was removed, and now bridge 21A carries the motorway over the canal. In this picture it is being navigated by the Pride of the Union from Ratho