Leeds to Wakefield 07/02/22

10 miles, via Camp Field, Pottery Field, Hunslet, Hunslet Carr, Belle Isle, 

 Sharp House, Robin Hood, Lofthouse, Lofthouse Hill, Lofthouse Gate, 

  Outwood, Newton Lane End, Newton Hill, St John's, and Kirkgate. 

Brevity is the theoretical theme for the blog as we move into Season #11, keeping the writing abbreviated as we move through and beyond the southeastern quarter of West Yorkshire, starting out by giving the year a framework to be hung upon, starting with s god handful of road treks, starting by travelling from Leeds to Wakefield via a novel route, alighting onto an almost pleasant Winter morning and leaving the railway station at 9.35am, out of the south entrance and making a way our via the brick  arched vault of Dark Neville Street, which has somehow never featured before. From Neville Street, it's over the Aire via Victoria Bridge and on down Victoria Road,along the edge of the Holbeck Urban Village and the historical Camp Field, Making a way around the traffic islands above the M621 and heading over the top of Dewsbury Road, to join Jack Lane, passing over the old railways and the locomotive works of Hunslet at Pottery Field to meet the A61 South Accommodation Road, which is crossed as we meet the suburbs of modern Hunslet. The Oval is followed, between Morrisons and the local playing fields, to meet the sentinel spire of St Mary's church, where Balm Road is joined, taking us over the railway by the freightliner depot and uphill through Hunslet Carr, meeting the Bile Beans sign ahead of passage under the M621 and starting the climb of Belle Isle Road, rising with the wide boulevard through the vintage council estate and passing across the middle of the Circus as we go. The city view retreats behind us as we rise up the long lane to land at the same latitude as the Middleton estate, passing over the end of the local Ring Road as Throstle Nest Road and Sharp Lane take us into the suburban band beyond, forming the outer edge of the city, before briefly passing into the countryside to pass over the M1, before we land on the edge of Robin Hood, where the A61 Leeds Road is met, to continue due south.

Dark Neville Street, the Dark Arches below Leeds Station

The Grove inn, enduring on the edge of the Holbeck Urban Village.

The former locomotive works, Jack Lane Hunslet.

St Mary's Hunslet.

The Bile Beans sign, Balm Road, Hunslet Carr.

Belle Isle Circus, Belle Isle.

The Middleton Ring Road, Belle Isle.

The edge of Suburban Leeds, Sharp House.

Pass the Halfway House inn (already!) and  the site of the colliery which named the village, before passing between the old schools and over the E&WYUR by the Gardeners Arms and pass into Lofthouse, forming Leeds's remotest suburban enclave in this direction, spread out along the roadside as it comes around to pass over the M62 by Christ Church and the Wakefield Limes hotel, before our route crests over Lofthouse Hill, passing the village pubs and the former golf club, north of the Lofthouse Colliery country park. Downhill we surge, into Wakefield district, with barely an open field being crossed before we've already arrived in the greater city beyond at Lofthouse Gate, passing through the outer suburban band and bottoming out at Lingwell Gate Beck, before starting another rise that takes us past the Star Inn and up over the Methley Joint Lines, now cycle-pathed, before the Woodman Inn and Co-op store and the rise up towards the urban village of Outwood. We rise to another crest, this one on the watershed 'ridge' (indeed we are travelling from Aire to Calder again!) where we pass the clock-towers Sunday School, across the road from St Mary Magdalene's church and the Kirklands Hotel in the old vicarage before we head downhill again, past the Wetherby Whaler in the old Empire theatre and along the terraced frontages with the St Leger inn among them, passing the Methodist church and meeting the Memorial Hall, the pit wheel monument and the Deep Drop inn, which all emphasize the coal mining history of this area. 

The Halfway House inn, Robin Hood.

Colliery Terraces. Lofthouse.

The Methley Joint Line, again, Lofthouse Gate.

Lofthouse Hill.

The Sunday School (former), Outwood.

The Memorial Hall and Pit Wheel Monument, Outwood.

Beyond the Newton Lane End corner, we start the long run down into the city proper, through, and over Newton Hill, where terraces crowd the roadside, making you feel like your'e getting deep into the late 19th century city, which is actually a long an narrow ribbon of it which reaches out to the north, which as one marked kink and sudden descent along its length, before continuing all the way down to the A650 island at Newton Bar. Follow the Leeds Road down, past the rapidly urbanizing industrial site which reside on the remains of Wrenthorpe Colliery before we tangle up with the Bradford Road, switching onto it as we meet the best part of Georgian Wakefield around St John's Church and Square, where most of the Clayton Hospital site has been cleared, but educational establishments endure, as the Girls' High Schools are met ahead of Wakefield College, before we meet the Coronation gardens, County Hall and the Town Hall and Courts complex. Wood Street presses us into the city centre, across Bull Ring and down Cross Street to observe the steeplejacks at work atop the Cathedral Church of All Saints, before we head down Kirkgate, which has had an aggressive campaign of prettification going on, ahead of meeting the rather depressed section beyond, noting that a new sightline has been opened up to the railway station at its southern extremity, approached by passing West Yorkshire History centre and crossing the renewed path of the A61 by the Grey Horse inn before rising to our conclusion at 1.20pm.

Traversing Newton Hill, Leeds Road.

Tangling Up Leeds Road with Bradford Road. 

St John's church, St John's Square, St John's.

County Hall and the Town Hall, Wakefield.

Wakefield Cathedral, Kirkgate.

The West Yorkshire History centre, Kirkgate.

Is that good brevity which enhances your reading pleasure? or does it feel like I'm giving the flattest quarter of West Yorkshire the short shrift treatment again? I really can't tell, but this did all get out of my head in super-prompt time, unlike the long drags of the 2022 season, so perhaps you'll just have to indulge me as I try to work out a renewed blog style that's plenty descriptive without absorbing every other fragment of my free time to create.

5,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 5294.7 miles
2022 Total: 10.0 miles
Up Country Total: 4831.7 miles
Solo Total: 4963.1 miles
5,000 in my 40s Total: 3888.5 miles