Fenay Bridge, Birks, Almondbury Common, Bottoms, The Lumb, Castle Hill, Catterson,
Lower Park, and Robin Hood Hill.
The last walkable Saturday of the year also gets dropped from the schedule, but not because of seasonal rain, rather a projected maximum temperature of 4C gets me feeling that I'd rather be in bed on such a day, but as we still have a 3+C warmer Sunday to use before my birthday week of being NIW, so we head out for another rail replacement bus ride that seems to be a regular fixture of the mornings at present, taking us out to Mirfield for a tilt at a viewpoint as my planned finale route got walked a fortnight ago. Hop off the bus at the Huddersfield Road bus stand at 9.20am, five minutes walk away from the station, and thus only ten minutes later than a ridden rail would have gotten me out to the heart of the middle Calder valley, but as we set out along Hopton New Road the intense cold of the morning air is felt in the lungs and the view across the fields to Holme Bank Mill and the woods beyond reveals the wisps of a morning mist that has only recently dissipated, and there's frostiness on the pavements too as we arrive at Hopton Bridge to cross the River Calder. Once on the end of Granny Lane, and passing the Flower Pot inn in Lower Hopton, we find ourselves on a familiar path, retracing steps up the suburban ribbon up Hopton Lane at a predictably slow rate thanks to the pitch of the climb, as the alternative field walk seems seasonally unsuitable, meeting the turn to the main body of Upper Hopton with Hopton Hall Lane, passing the old manse and Park farm on the edge of the suburban estate that surround them, getting views over the reverse to the middle Calder as we go. Land by the long wall that contains Hopton Grange and soon come up past St John's church and its vicarage, ticking another Kirklees church off the list, and then come past Hopton Old Hall with its timber framed wings that suggest a lot of vintage, opposite the hall farm, and the arrivals of a late 20th century vintage, joining Jackroyd Lane as it rises on, past the old village school and the last suburban outliers, heading south as we come up level with the woodlands that cover the southern bank of the Calder. Pass Hopton Green farm, and the Clough terrace that sits at an odd remove from the village, and to avoid a twisting road detour, we hit a short and rising field walk between Covey Clough and Benroyd farms on the shoulder of Dransfield Hill, a choice that proves challenging as the waterlogged soil and icy covering make for some hard going on the elevation up to the B6118 Liley Lane, dirtying up the boots something proper as we take our last looks over the middle Calder for this year, territory that still needs further investigation even after 8 years of walking.
The sunny day promised seems to have slipped away as we meet the early season path that rose up towards Whitley Park, splitting from this pavement at Dransfield Hill and Croft House farms, to follow the descending Healey Green Lane as an ominously dark cloud settles over Black Dick's temple on its rise to the south, while sightlines beyond the Holme Valley reveal snow on the flanks of Black Hill, Holme Moss and the distant Dark Peak fringe, while the way to Castle Hill, flanked by the tops of Meltham Moor looks clear thanks to being lower down and having road surfaces to pace for the whole route onwards. We descend, with the brain thinking that you must be headed for the Shepley Dike (et al) valley, but we are actually in a side valley from there, one which Houses Hill sits, though this hamlet mostly sits away from the hillside that names it, and despite having passed through this way in 2014 I couldn't be sure where I'd walked then as the former chapel and its surrounding cottages don't look immediately familiar as Sands Lane drops down among them to meet the stream side, which we follow as it flows downhill to merge with the larger Rods Beck. This leads us down to the site of Whitley Willow mill, which has gotten the brownfield redevelopment and executive makeover treatment to create an urban enclave at quite a remove from its neighbours, with none of the local roads feeling suited to such a site, as Addle Croft Road pulls uphill past its eponymous farm to meet Lucy Lane, which elevates us further to another look back to Whitley Park from a completely different angle. The map, my long-suffering E288, needs to be checked to get ourselves orientated, to see exactly where we are relative to nearby Kirkheaton and Lepton, and also to get fixes on the stray hamlets up on this hillside, as the Botany Bay terraces and Gawthorpe (the one that isn't near Ossett) appear on the local horizon in splendid isolation, before we come up above the side valley of the Colne that we will have to traverse, with the southern spread of greater Huddersfield reaching into it, and with Castle Hill rising again to tease its apparent proximity. The descent starts in earnest by Highfield Farm, sending us down Chimney Lane to meet the air shaft vent that names it at the side of the A642 Wakefield Road, which we cross to head down among the trees on Croftflat Drive, a recent development that has infilled an old claypit, with the high banks retained by the woodland and its base forming the Fenay Bridge Park housing estate, which offers a view to the next side valley into which we are headed, between Almondbury and Farnley Tyas, all too briefly as we navigate our way along Thorgrow Close to Station Road.
Arriving in Fenay Bridge, we've got a descent to finish that takes us down past a long sweep of terrace and semis on the curving lane, arriving by the remaining abutment of the bridge that once took the L&NWR branch south to Kirkburton, across the road from the Fenay Bridge station site, which is now home to the close of Station Court, and the A629 Penistone Road lies beyond them, where we bottom out in the valley, passing the convenience store and Harvey's Bar/Kitchen in the old Star Inn, and also note the former mission room by the bridge over Fenay Bridge Dike, possibly the most unassuming bridge chapel in the county. Previous steps then have to be retraced again, as Fenay Lane offers the only available route into the valley that we're seeking to walk through, with no alternative path available to pass through Brewery Yard or the grounds of the Jacobean Fenay Hall, so we have to rise up as far as the Birks Lane corner, where we split off between the early 20th century villas and head downhill past the high wall concealed Fenay Grange, and drop down the quiet lane to bottom out by Birks farm, near Rushfield Dike and between the uplands that Almondbury and Farnley Tyas reside upon. The banks of Birks Wood cover the southern side of the valley as we drift westerly, among the cottages and suburban outliers along Arkenley Lane, passing below the grounds of King James's school, the former Almondbury Grammar, and rise some along the boundaries of the local cricket and rugby fields, as the south side of the lane gains a suburban coating to make the most of the apparent remoteness of the edge of greater Huddersfield, the ribbon of housing leading us to the heart of Almondbury Common, where Northfield Mills have been made-over as a residential complex. Sharp Lane leads to Lumb Lane, and eventually away from this landscape of suburbia in the countryside, but soon enough drops us by the rural Bottoms terrace and its associated market gardening poly-tunnels by Clough Ings house, before we rise on among the patchwork of fields past the stray rural cottage sand Fletcher House farm before we try to pick out where the Holme Valley Circular brought us across this road, calling it incorrectly a couple of times due to the August and November landscapes looking quite so different. Get sight of our target as we approach and pass through the farm hamlet of The Lumb, with its prominently placed weaving cottages, and hit the steepening pane beyond, pulling us away from the valley traverse and directly uphill towards Castle Hill, with the autumnal sunshine finally reappearing as we recreate our first approach to the hilltop ahead of us, coming up past Lumb Head and Ogley farms to land below the ramparts, and to get the reveal over the Holme Valley and its distant perimeter.
That's landscape that has completely ceased to be alien over the course of this year, and it needs to be taken in further as we rise up the stepped path at the west end of Castle Hill, all the way up to the Victoria Tower (too late to in the season to ascend it as its openings ended two weeks ago) and wandering around its base among the other lunchtime visitors on a kind of victory lap, taking in the surroundings of Kirklees that have served be so well this year, and looking north beyond Huddersfield to where 2020's paths will hopefully be leading me. Break to water and look at the autumnal colours finally taking hold of the lower Holme Valley, from Honley Old Wood to Beaumont Park before we descend again, and start the road walk to our finish line, retracing steps down Ashes Lane, among the farmsteads that the old OS maps gives the collective name of Catterson, ensuring that we take a look back down the rising HVC path route as it rises up through the Cold Hill farmsteads, before we keep on with the footway to Castle Houses and then onto the roadside for the descending Park Lane. This narrow lane takes us below the Stanley Hill terrace and down toward the Holme valley, with the saddle of Meltham Moor on the far horizon and the woodlands around Netherton below, sights that are lost as we pass between thick banks of Holly bushes and are regained as we pass the farmstead clusters of Lower Park, briefly getting a view towards Honley before we twist with the lane downhill, passing over the Penistone Line's Robin Hood tunnel before we meet the suburban enclave of Rodin Hood Hill. The descending old road leads us among the remains of a low lost corner of Berry Brow, where only a couple of old terraces remain of a one extensive district across the way from the tower blocks at the far side of the A616 Woodhead Road, which gives the Golden Fleece Inn a bit more landscape context, and its neighbour, Milly's Chicken & Ribs would be an ideal takeout for my end of season feeding if it wasn't that bit to far away in time and space from Berry Brow station, and thus we pass on, up the steep and slick cobbled causeway up to the suburban close of Deadmanstone. This may be named after the prominent rock outcrop that sits at its tree shaded corner, which we pass on our way around to Bridge Street, which we cross but don't make an immediate beeline to the station as we need to carry on up School Lane, past the parade of bungalows to meet the old Berry Brow station site, a quarter mile closer to Huddersfield, where the Railway inn and the station house sit over the site that operated from 1850 to 1966, which we examine before we set of along Birch Road to meet the 1989 new station, where the 2019 walking season wraps up at 12.45pm, having beaten my previous annual mileage record by nearly 4 (count 'em!) miles.
5,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 4266.5 miles
2019 Total: 616.1 miles
Up Country Total: 3803.5 miles
Solo Total: 2860.3 miles
Miles in My 40s: 2860.3 miles
Next Up: So, what have we learned in 2019?
The last walkable Saturday of the year also gets dropped from the schedule, but not because of seasonal rain, rather a projected maximum temperature of 4C gets me feeling that I'd rather be in bed on such a day, but as we still have a 3+C warmer Sunday to use before my birthday week of being NIW, so we head out for another rail replacement bus ride that seems to be a regular fixture of the mornings at present, taking us out to Mirfield for a tilt at a viewpoint as my planned finale route got walked a fortnight ago. Hop off the bus at the Huddersfield Road bus stand at 9.20am, five minutes walk away from the station, and thus only ten minutes later than a ridden rail would have gotten me out to the heart of the middle Calder valley, but as we set out along Hopton New Road the intense cold of the morning air is felt in the lungs and the view across the fields to Holme Bank Mill and the woods beyond reveals the wisps of a morning mist that has only recently dissipated, and there's frostiness on the pavements too as we arrive at Hopton Bridge to cross the River Calder. Once on the end of Granny Lane, and passing the Flower Pot inn in Lower Hopton, we find ourselves on a familiar path, retracing steps up the suburban ribbon up Hopton Lane at a predictably slow rate thanks to the pitch of the climb, as the alternative field walk seems seasonally unsuitable, meeting the turn to the main body of Upper Hopton with Hopton Hall Lane, passing the old manse and Park farm on the edge of the suburban estate that surround them, getting views over the reverse to the middle Calder as we go. Land by the long wall that contains Hopton Grange and soon come up past St John's church and its vicarage, ticking another Kirklees church off the list, and then come past Hopton Old Hall with its timber framed wings that suggest a lot of vintage, opposite the hall farm, and the arrivals of a late 20th century vintage, joining Jackroyd Lane as it rises on, past the old village school and the last suburban outliers, heading south as we come up level with the woodlands that cover the southern bank of the Calder. Pass Hopton Green farm, and the Clough terrace that sits at an odd remove from the village, and to avoid a twisting road detour, we hit a short and rising field walk between Covey Clough and Benroyd farms on the shoulder of Dransfield Hill, a choice that proves challenging as the waterlogged soil and icy covering make for some hard going on the elevation up to the B6118 Liley Lane, dirtying up the boots something proper as we take our last looks over the middle Calder for this year, territory that still needs further investigation even after 8 years of walking.
 |
| Holme Bank mill, and the morning mists, Mirfield. |
 |
| The sunlit rise between the Hoptons. |
 |
| Hopton Old Hall, Upper Hopton. |
 |
| The field walk on the shoulder of Dransfield Hill. |
The sunny day promised seems to have slipped away as we meet the early season path that rose up towards Whitley Park, splitting from this pavement at Dransfield Hill and Croft House farms, to follow the descending Healey Green Lane as an ominously dark cloud settles over Black Dick's temple on its rise to the south, while sightlines beyond the Holme Valley reveal snow on the flanks of Black Hill, Holme Moss and the distant Dark Peak fringe, while the way to Castle Hill, flanked by the tops of Meltham Moor looks clear thanks to being lower down and having road surfaces to pace for the whole route onwards. We descend, with the brain thinking that you must be headed for the Shepley Dike (et al) valley, but we are actually in a side valley from there, one which Houses Hill sits, though this hamlet mostly sits away from the hillside that names it, and despite having passed through this way in 2014 I couldn't be sure where I'd walked then as the former chapel and its surrounding cottages don't look immediately familiar as Sands Lane drops down among them to meet the stream side, which we follow as it flows downhill to merge with the larger Rods Beck. This leads us down to the site of Whitley Willow mill, which has gotten the brownfield redevelopment and executive makeover treatment to create an urban enclave at quite a remove from its neighbours, with none of the local roads feeling suited to such a site, as Addle Croft Road pulls uphill past its eponymous farm to meet Lucy Lane, which elevates us further to another look back to Whitley Park from a completely different angle. The map, my long-suffering E288, needs to be checked to get ourselves orientated, to see exactly where we are relative to nearby Kirkheaton and Lepton, and also to get fixes on the stray hamlets up on this hillside, as the Botany Bay terraces and Gawthorpe (the one that isn't near Ossett) appear on the local horizon in splendid isolation, before we come up above the side valley of the Colne that we will have to traverse, with the southern spread of greater Huddersfield reaching into it, and with Castle Hill rising again to tease its apparent proximity. The descent starts in earnest by Highfield Farm, sending us down Chimney Lane to meet the air shaft vent that names it at the side of the A642 Wakefield Road, which we cross to head down among the trees on Croftflat Drive, a recent development that has infilled an old claypit, with the high banks retained by the woodland and its base forming the Fenay Bridge Park housing estate, which offers a view to the next side valley into which we are headed, between Almondbury and Farnley Tyas, all too briefly as we navigate our way along Thorgrow Close to Station Road.
 |
| The path to come, from Healey Green Lane. |
 |
| Houses Hill. |
 |
| Whitley Willows mills (former). |
 |
| The path just travelled, with Whitley Park, from Lucy Lane. |
 |
| The air shaft at the bottom of Chimney Lane, by the A642. |
Arriving in Fenay Bridge, we've got a descent to finish that takes us down past a long sweep of terrace and semis on the curving lane, arriving by the remaining abutment of the bridge that once took the L&NWR branch south to Kirkburton, across the road from the Fenay Bridge station site, which is now home to the close of Station Court, and the A629 Penistone Road lies beyond them, where we bottom out in the valley, passing the convenience store and Harvey's Bar/Kitchen in the old Star Inn, and also note the former mission room by the bridge over Fenay Bridge Dike, possibly the most unassuming bridge chapel in the county. Previous steps then have to be retraced again, as Fenay Lane offers the only available route into the valley that we're seeking to walk through, with no alternative path available to pass through Brewery Yard or the grounds of the Jacobean Fenay Hall, so we have to rise up as far as the Birks Lane corner, where we split off between the early 20th century villas and head downhill past the high wall concealed Fenay Grange, and drop down the quiet lane to bottom out by Birks farm, near Rushfield Dike and between the uplands that Almondbury and Farnley Tyas reside upon. The banks of Birks Wood cover the southern side of the valley as we drift westerly, among the cottages and suburban outliers along Arkenley Lane, passing below the grounds of King James's school, the former Almondbury Grammar, and rise some along the boundaries of the local cricket and rugby fields, as the south side of the lane gains a suburban coating to make the most of the apparent remoteness of the edge of greater Huddersfield, the ribbon of housing leading us to the heart of Almondbury Common, where Northfield Mills have been made-over as a residential complex. Sharp Lane leads to Lumb Lane, and eventually away from this landscape of suburbia in the countryside, but soon enough drops us by the rural Bottoms terrace and its associated market gardening poly-tunnels by Clough Ings house, before we rise on among the patchwork of fields past the stray rural cottage sand Fletcher House farm before we try to pick out where the Holme Valley Circular brought us across this road, calling it incorrectly a couple of times due to the August and November landscapes looking quite so different. Get sight of our target as we approach and pass through the farm hamlet of The Lumb, with its prominently placed weaving cottages, and hit the steepening pane beyond, pulling us away from the valley traverse and directly uphill towards Castle Hill, with the autumnal sunshine finally reappearing as we recreate our first approach to the hilltop ahead of us, coming up past Lumb Head and Ogley farms to land below the ramparts, and to get the reveal over the Holme Valley and its distant perimeter.
 |
| The missing Kirkburton branch line, Station Road, Fenay Bridge. |
 |
| Arkenley Lane, Birks. |
 |
| Northfield Mills, Almondbury Common. |
 |
| Rural cottages between Bottoms and The Lumb. |
 |
| Castle Hill, seen from every angle this year. |
That's landscape that has completely ceased to be alien over the course of this year, and it needs to be taken in further as we rise up the stepped path at the west end of Castle Hill, all the way up to the Victoria Tower (too late to in the season to ascend it as its openings ended two weeks ago) and wandering around its base among the other lunchtime visitors on a kind of victory lap, taking in the surroundings of Kirklees that have served be so well this year, and looking north beyond Huddersfield to where 2020's paths will hopefully be leading me. Break to water and look at the autumnal colours finally taking hold of the lower Holme Valley, from Honley Old Wood to Beaumont Park before we descend again, and start the road walk to our finish line, retracing steps down Ashes Lane, among the farmsteads that the old OS maps gives the collective name of Catterson, ensuring that we take a look back down the rising HVC path route as it rises up through the Cold Hill farmsteads, before we keep on with the footway to Castle Houses and then onto the roadside for the descending Park Lane. This narrow lane takes us below the Stanley Hill terrace and down toward the Holme valley, with the saddle of Meltham Moor on the far horizon and the woodlands around Netherton below, sights that are lost as we pass between thick banks of Holly bushes and are regained as we pass the farmstead clusters of Lower Park, briefly getting a view towards Honley before we twist with the lane downhill, passing over the Penistone Line's Robin Hood tunnel before we meet the suburban enclave of Rodin Hood Hill. The descending old road leads us among the remains of a low lost corner of Berry Brow, where only a couple of old terraces remain of a one extensive district across the way from the tower blocks at the far side of the A616 Woodhead Road, which gives the Golden Fleece Inn a bit more landscape context, and its neighbour, Milly's Chicken & Ribs would be an ideal takeout for my end of season feeding if it wasn't that bit to far away in time and space from Berry Brow station, and thus we pass on, up the steep and slick cobbled causeway up to the suburban close of Deadmanstone. This may be named after the prominent rock outcrop that sits at its tree shaded corner, which we pass on our way around to Bridge Street, which we cross but don't make an immediate beeline to the station as we need to carry on up School Lane, past the parade of bungalows to meet the old Berry Brow station site, a quarter mile closer to Huddersfield, where the Railway inn and the station house sit over the site that operated from 1850 to 1966, which we examine before we set of along Birch Road to meet the 1989 new station, where the 2019 walking season wraps up at 12.45pm, having beaten my previous annual mileage record by nearly 4 (count 'em!) miles.
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| Castle Hill is the best ancient viewpoint in Kirklees. |
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| Cold Hill and the wooded lower Holme Valley. |
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| The Lower Park farmsteads. |
 |
| The Golden Fleece and the lost corner of Berry Brow. |
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| The old Berry Brow station house. |
5,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 4266.5 miles
2019 Total: 616.1 miles
Up Country Total: 3803.5 miles
Solo Total: 2860.3 miles
Miles in My 40s: 2860.3 miles
Next Up: So, what have we learned in 2019?
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