Alone Beneath The Sky: Wakefield Way #1 - Wintersett to Bretton Park 30/05/15

14.8 miles, via Haw Park, Walton Common, Newmillerdam, Notton & Woolley.

Official trails means Selfies!
at Anglers Country Park

Still May, eh? This is the month that just keeps giving, and a good cue is given to start on the next scheme for 2015, using the top of the year (already!) for the fifth and final of the West Yorkshire circular trails, the Wakefield Way, and it has to go down this year as it's been on my last three to-do lists. Time to get familiar with the district's buses on the course of this trail, riding out to the hamlet of Wintersett on the #196 for a start after 9.30am, not the most auspicious of start points but a half mile short of the official start at Anglers Country park, and that's not an extra mile along Haw Park Lane that I can be certain of walking twice. Fresh Spring weather will be the order of the day as the lane is taken between the ACP and Wintersett reservoir, heading into Haw Park woods, for nice broad woodland tracks for most of the way until a very sketchy route directs us to the towpath of the Barnsley canal, eventually. Not always keen on retracing old paths, but I'll make an exception for this one, as Walton Park cutting might be my favourite place in the county (no, really), and that send us onto Sike Lane and to Rose farm before hitting the field boundaries on Walton Common, passing over the old North Midland mainline and along the lane so named to the descending path through the barley down to the beck crossing and then uphill through fields of rapeseed to the microwave mast on Gallows Hill.

Good views across to Kirklees are tobe had to the west before passing along Chevet Lane and then downhill through fields and across five fairways of Wakefield Golf Course to meet the path that follows the south edge of the Pledwick housing estate, leading out to much older houses at Hill Top and down Hill Road sharply to find the A61 crossing the dam of Newmiller Dam at Newmillerdam. Plenty of company to be found after the initial quiet miles, as folks come out to enjoy the urban reservoir park, and the long path along the western bank through Kings Wood is met to provide some shade as the path sets off south again, going all the way out to Bushcliffe wood before swinging on to the path north of the beck and heading out into open fields. Cross the beck again and follow the rising filed path that ascends to cross over the cutting of the Midland Railway's Royston to Dewsbury line, one which has still not gained my walking attention, and then the field boundaries offer a long walk over to Notton, avoiding the route into Manor farm and being led around the suburbia that has grown on this village, eventually rolling up on the village green for lunchtime. The latter half of the day has the route's twistiness getting even more pronounced, departing the village via Applehaigh Lane to the south before swing west through Applehaigh Clough, a lovely wooded glade, and then it's south again, to find we are ridiculously close to Royston, its house and chimneys just across the next rise, and then it's east again, through Notton park plantation, and this trail does love its woodlands. Field walk over to Keeper Lane, still tacking east, and over the A61 again, to Warren Lane and the bridleway that takes us northwards towards Woolley, via more fields and tracks, and past the liquid fertiliser works which ensures all sorts of pleasant bucolic smell for the neighbouring golf course.

New Road leads into Woolley, where the new developments have been kept separate form the old buildings and the place still retains some bucolic charm, with farms still operating close to the village green, and we loop around High Street and Church Street to pass through the graveyard of St Peter's church and out of the village across the common pasture. We leave the village about one field over from the way we came in, making this the craziest of the day's turns, rising to Back Lane and Woodhouse Lane, and tacking south, rising on a field walk onto the barren crest of Woolley Edge, getting a fine view over the district to the east, feeling certain that the feint hills beyond the Aire valley power stations has to be the Wolds, so close at hand just a week ago. Head along the perimeter of Wheatley wood and pass the site of the high shaft of Woolley Colliery, offering a reminder of the industry that once lived among these fields, and no sign is offered of what might have been making all the sounds of gunfire that had been ringing from off the ridge for most of the last couple of hours. Meet Woolley Edge Road, and again carefully pace the verges as attention is drawn towards Barnsley to the south, and the wrinkles of the Dearne Valley and beyond to the west, eventually escaping the traffic by slipping down the steep footpath through the high edge woods and continuing downhill along the edge of the Woolley opencast site, through Near Moor Farm and out onto Haigh Lane. Pass under the Wakefield to Barnsley railway and pass around the island of Junction 38 of the M1, crossing the River Dearne twice without noticing it either time, and having a brief jaunt into South Yorkshire as we go, re-entering the correct district along the side of the A637, and then it's only a short stroll to the south lodge of Bretton Park and the end of the day's exertions. No café to be found at the lesser entrance to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, but it does have a toilet, thankfully, and we are done just before 3.30pm, having had one of those days that has gone about 8 miles as the crow flies, but took nearly 15 miles to get there, and there's not even much time for me to ruminate on the day or finish my lunch before the hourly #96 bus roars into view to take me away.

5,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 1712.3 miles
2015 Cumulative Total: 310.1 miles
Up Country Total: 1585.9 miles
Solo Total: 1500.3 miles