The Washburn Valley (Bottom Half) 29/05/16

17.1 miles, via Bramhope, Pool in Wharfedale, Leathley, Lindley Wood Reservoir,
 Dobpark Bridge, Swinsty Reservoir, Fewston Embankment, Swinsty Hall, Dob Park,
  Newall Carr & Otley.

Spring bank holiday weekend, and with Saturday scratched from the schedule, it makes more sense to make good use of Sunday for a walk of decent duration rather than only doing 10 miles or so on the Monday, so the reduced service is tested on the buses as I set course for lower Wharfedale, where more trails need to be blazed, in search of its only major tributary. Start by St Giles church in Bramhope, at 9.40am as a descent into Wharfedale with accompanying views seems like a good idea, but my chosen path down Staircase Lane stops being a residential road pretty quickly and soon becomes a shady dirt track ripe with the smell of Wild Garlic, offering no panoramas of any kind. Still, it's the quickest route down to Pool in Wharfedale, arriving on the upscale edge along Pool Bank Road, descending over the old railway site and down to the village centre, around the White Hart and St Wilfred's church, and it's another off the list of notable West Yorkshire settlements that hadn't had a visit yet. Over the Wharfe at Pool bridge, hitting the lane out towards Leathley, with views aplenty to back Caley Park and the Chevin, but few in the direction we are headed, but the road needs to be walked, rather than taking the continuing field route, as the B6161 takes us as close as can be gotten to the confluence of the Washburn, the river that we will be keeping company today, which makes occasional appearances at the roadside on the way up to Leathley, a village scattered around the parkland and church of St Oswald at it heart. Soon away from the upscale country living though, as the footpath at the side of the Washburn is met above the old mill and some quiet river walking can commence upstream, rising to the site of a trout hatchery, which the path skirts along the old goit channel and rises to meet Lindley Bridge, an impressive structure over the modestly scaled river at the valley floor.

Yorkshire Wolds Way #2 - South Cave to Londesborough 24/05/16

14.4 miles, via Weedley Dale, High Hunsley, Swin Dale, Newbald Wold, Hessleskew, Arras
 & Goodmanham.

National Trail means Selfies!
#2 at South Cave

I'm not going for consecutive days of walking, even when the weather is spectacularly warm and clear, I still need my rest days and Monday will be spent on Retail Therapy and Fish'n'Chips in Hornsea (both rather belatedly) and driving around Holderness to watch the continuing disappearance of the caravan park and WW2 era battery at Kilnsea. Back to the trail on Tuesday then, with the parental taxi taking me to the edge of South Cave for a 9.45 start, with the sun blazing down once again, and after the gentle start to day one, we are straight into the hard stuff today, hitting the pull and ascent away from Beverley Road and up to Little Wold Plantation, for some shady going and the rise to Comberdale Hill for what ought to be our last views back to the trail seen before and our long time companion the Humber Estuary. The descent down to Weedley Dale is made through is subsidiary branch Comber Dale, and the high sided valley below would be a fascinating feature in itself but becomes even more interesting with the presence of the former Hull & Barnsley main line running through it. I've mentioned that the H&BR was a late arrival and always doomed failure in competition with the NER, and had to build a heavily engineered route through the Wolds as their rival had already claimed the easiest path, and part of that line, operational from 1885 to 1959 can be found here. The Drewton Estate might not want us to walk the Wolds Way down their chalk cutting anymore, but I'll have a trespass when at this close proximity, westwards down to Weedley Tunnel, short and in good condition, though gated off, and eastwards to Sugar Loaf tunnel, also short but in much worse condition with deteriorating lining, but accessible right through to the cutting infilling at its eastern portal. Worth a look with no one around to chase you away, and that will satiate my need for railway relics for now, as the mile-plus beast of Drewton Tunnel is too remote and inaccessible for the casual visitor.

The East Leicestershire Village Circuit, v.2.0 23/10/15

14 miles, via Scraptoft, Houghton on the Hill, Gaulby, King's Norton, Little Stretton, 
  Stretton Magna, Stoughton & Thurnby.

Down country again for an emergency visit to Leicestershire as My Dad is in hospital after a fall and My Mum is need of some moral support after a minor incident a couple of weeks back has evolved into something more serious, with a diagnosis of him having a Subdural Haematoma, and currently being in the care of the LRI's stroke services, awaiting an MRI scan to check the extent of his brain injury. Thankfully he's mostly still there, but looking extremely tired and responding like a his battery has run almost flat, and My Mum is demonstrating all the qualities of a trooper as the scenarios shift almost daily with the hopes and fears that come with them. The whole family is down for a long weekend, so My Dad can have some company daily and I can not feel to bad when I feel the need to get out of the house to get my head clear, and the first Leicestershire walk that I had plotted for 2016 can go down on the Friday, which looks like the best available day whilst I'm down here, and my tilt at 2000 miles before I'm 41 and 600 miles before the end of 2015 can be completed whilst among family and in the lands of my birth. If nothing else, it will give me some extra good news to report to My Dad when visiting him over the weekend.

So, the second tour of the villages of East Leicestershire kicks off at 9.30am, My Mum dropping me off at the top of Scraptoft Lane, just along from All Saints church and a mile or so from the family pile, setting course eastwards along Covert Lane, which has been a road to nowhere for as long as anyone can remember, but now has started to gain traffic thanks to the redevelopment of Scraptoft campus, and now it's lane popular with those doing jogging as exercise. I push on, beyond the old Polytechnic's sports grounds and make my way to the bridleway that departs on a southward path through Square Spinney, setting off with great purpose before reaching the fields and disappearing from view, leaving us with hedges to follow down to the very obvious railway remnant stretching across the landscape. Heading eastwards on a rising gradient is the alignment of the GNR branch from Leicester Belgrave Road to Marefield Junction, operational from 1882 to 1964, and hosting a few relics on the half mile that is now a farm access track, namely an overbridge that carries the bridleway, an aqueduct carrying Willow Brook over the cutting close to its source, and most impressively the west portal of Thurnby Tunnel. Despite being sealed and partly infilled, a hole cut in its plating means it is accessible but I don't have the torch with me that I hopefully took to Barndale and Crigglestone, so what's left of its 516 yards will have to go unexplored, odd to think that such a significant structure could have gone unvisited in all my years in Leicestershire. Return to the fields in the direction of New Ingarsby farm, and the easiest path to continue my circuit in the direction of the A47 is up the farm driveway, which has no PROW, I'm guessing, but it gives me the best access to the paths that head into Houghton on the Hill from the south, its continued expansion convincing me that this village is still a growing satellite beyond the city of Leicester. Main Street still has most of the village's old face along it, and I had never really acknowledged its elevation as a settlement, but the fact that the spire of  St Catherine's church is possibly the only distinctive man made landmark on the local horizon suggests the 160m of its location must be considerable.