Glasshoughton to South Milford 28/05/22

9.7 miles, via Junction 32, Holywell Wood, Toll Hill, Townville, Holmfield, Ferrybridge, 

 Brotherton, Fairburn, Monk Fryston substation, and Lumby. 

Back from holidays with 46 miles of a completed trail under my belt, and feeling pretty sanguine about my trip despite the relatively mediocre weather, and as we now stand on the cusp of the High Season, it's time again to dig into the unknown by expanding the walking bubble to the east and south, and seeking out new destinations too, which is where we start with this trip, seeking out the one railway station that sits within the field of experience, passed by at close quarters on two occasions in 2015 but never travelled to or from. Thus we return to where we were spending our early season weekends, taking a leisurely ride out to Glasshougton as we have large but inflexible time window for this trip, alighting at 10.25am having ridden out the long way round from Leeds and aiming ourselves east once we've gotten off the footbridges, immediately away from the shadow of the Xscape complex and the Junction 32 retail park, but wholly in the commercial and post-industrial landscape still as the A639 Colorado Way leads us past the Aspen Way retail park with its stores and fast food outlets as head out to meet the A656 Park Road, taking a left turn to take us on into suburban Castleford. Note that the former bingo hall has been demolished since we came this way in March, as we rise up to the KGV WMC at the corner of old Glass Houghton before taking a easterly turn again with the B6136 Holywell Lane, rising uphill with the views south to Pontefract Park and ahead to the ancient and enduring Holywell Woods before we dig into the landscape of semis, with nothing of any vintage showing up along the rising lane, before coming up to the top of Toll Hill, where the old pub on the corner of the Fryston and Airedale estates is still refitting. It's certainly a bit of a culture shock being in an urban scenario with a lot of traffic, after such time as we had out of it, and I'm sure my lungs were feeling happier in the preceding week than they are presently as we press down out of the town along Sheepwalk Lane, having not seen anything more than a century old once we're out into the fields again, with pylons and the remaining chimneys of Ferrybridge power station punctuating the local horizon beyond the trees as we skirt through the enduring greenbelt below Fryston Park, ahead of meeting the farm hamlet at Holmfield, and passage under the bridges and flyovers of the A1(M), just north of its entanglement with the M62.

Xscape and the Junction 32 retail park, Glasshoughton.

Park Road, and the missing Bingo Hall.

Holywell Woods.

The refitting pub at Toll Hill.

Urban Sheepwalk Lane, Townville.

Rural Sheepwalk Lane, near Holmfield.

The Ferrybridge Power station complex fills all of the sites beyond the motorway between the road and rive Aire, with the pair of multifuel plants at the western edge still in generating operation, superceding the Ferrybridge 'C' plant which filled most of the land beyond, now almost completely demolished after its rapid decline over the last decade, with only the sports and social club doing any business now, and its visual absence from the landscape is pretty hard to process, though it will linger on in the memories for a while, and is visually represented by the memorial beyond the railway bridge, and the old 'A' plant which will outlive everything. We take our dynamic turn on the path here, heading north over the John Carr bridge on the Aire, featuring in the actual middle of a trip rather than its beginning or end for a change, though we do immediately start to get tied up with our last path in this area as we enter North Yorkshire and trace the side of the A162 as we carry on up to the edge of Brotherton village, trying to mentally locate the missing cooling towers as we look across the ings and turn onto Low Street as it pushes into the village, taking us under the upper end of the Brotherton tubular bridge, on the Knottingley to Burton Salmon railway spur, which still sees a lot of heavy freight traffic. We rise up to the parish church of St Edward the Confessor, passing the graveyard and war memorial as Church Street leads up to High Street, landing us among the suburbia that is punctuated with stone built cottages in the local style, which almost looks like rubble construction, rendered desirable by location, and you can tell that this is a respectable community by how well dressed for the Platinum Jubilee celebrations it is, to be regarded with a sort of curiosity as we rise and come around to the old Great North Road and find the bench where we took our late break in mid-March to take lunch today.

Ferrybridge 1 Multifuel Plant.

The Ferrybridge Power Station memorial.

The absent Cooling Towers of Ferrybridge C.

The Brotherton Tubular Bridge.

St Edward the Confessor, Brotherton.

High Street, Brotherton. 

Keeping on a northbound track, we again to return to March's path alongside the A162, the former Great North Road, as it offers one of the better pavement options in these parts, giving the teased views over the Selby Levels again as we are passed over the A1(M) and the railway east of Castleford, before we get the look to the west across the flooded ponds of Fairburn Ings before touching the village by the roundabout by the care home at its east end, keeping to the North Road today as it skirts around the north edge of the village cricket field, passing just too early to get some free entertainment. Old Fairburn seems like it was reluctant to face the main road, preferring its south-facing perch, and only 20th century suburban growth seems to have pushed it over to the east side across the years, noting the North Road cottages, the village school and the Waggon & Horses inn as the only vintage parts, ahead of us taking he crossing by the war memorial to reach the far side of the A162 and our ongoing passage north along the Rawfield Road, past the suburban close in an old quarry and onto the slightly elevated lane beyond Bay Horse farm that gives us the downstream view to Drax power station, and the remains of Eggborough, before we are again taken over the A1(M). The apparently converging mass of pylons in this landscape are indeed coming together, as the Monk Fryston substation provides the next feature among the spreading fields of green, and I can field that tramping by here with camera in hand is probably not as innocuous a business now as it might have been a few months ago, tracking a way around under the crackling wires and its constant low hum as we are drawn on, to meet the A63 cutting across the landscape, almost arriving unannounced as a new horizon in the east is revealed past Monk Fryston Lodge.

The old Great North Road, again.

Fairburn cricket field.

The Waggon & Horses, North Road, Fairburn.

Converging Pylons beyond the A1(M).

Monk Fryston substation.

Crossing the A63 Selby Road.

The views improve from Butts Farm, with Milford Hall and Milford Junction railway yard in the foreground, while the tree-topped lumps of Bishop Wood, Hambleton Hough, and Brayton Barff rise beyond amidst the flatlands before we pass into Lumby village, immediately presenting a lot of rustic charm beyond Lumby Hall, with the rough stone construction still featuring here, along with the patriotic dressing around the village green, and the developments therein being mostly sympathetically done, ahead of the rise to the quarter still in rural business at the top of it. Past Orchard farm's high hedges, the view east is restored, giving us a distant Wolds horizon, with Gascoigne Wood pit and Selby Abbey visible below it, while looking west puts us not too far from the woods to the east of Micklefield, and not too distant from our 2015 trekking routes as Steeton Hall and its gatehouse are spotted across the fields from Westfield Lane, which is joined to take us into the suburban growth of South Milford, found beyond the most pleasant of wooded enclaves, with nothing along this lane being particularly old until we meet St Mary's church, the rectory and the old school in a single cluster. The old parts of South Milford are to be found down The Nook and along High Street, where our North Sea trek brought us seven years ago, and we cross today to head up Mill Lane, taking us over Mill Dike and into the fields around Muttley's Dog Park and the enduring Sherburn Mill with its farm and angling lakes, which we pass by as we join the footpath over to Sherburn in Elmet, which teases the northern horizon, but sits beyond our route as the Leeds & Selby railway line lies ahead, to be crossed via the foot-crossing just west of South Milford station, found beyond the footpath as the field's edge where we can land on the eastbound platform to theoretically wrap the day's excursion in 4 hours.

The eastern horizon from Butts Lane.

Lumby Village.

The road towards Steeton Hall.

Westfield Road, South Milford.

High Street, South Milford.

South Milford station from the Mill Lane path.

The barrow crossing to the Leeds-bound platform isn't there any more, thanks to the platforms having been extended several years ago, and thus we are compelled to walk all the way around to the south side, down the access road past the coal drops and under the Milford Road bridge, snagging our other previous path in this area as we go, before rising up the long path at the embankment's side to close the day out at 2.30pm, a slow rate for the day though well ahead of the train'a arrival, but nonetheless in good time as its stopping services are only two-hourly and, against all expectations, to soon be filled with many city-bound revellers.

South Milford station up close.

5,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 5550.1 miles
2022 Total: 265.4 miles
Up Country Total: 5,073.4 miles
Solo Total: 5218.5 miles
5,000 in my 40s Total: 4143.2 miles

Next Up: South to South, travelling South, on the long Jubilee bank holiday weekend.