Slaithwaite to Hebden Bridge 29/08/20

17.9 miles, via Crimble, Wellhouse, Bolster Moor, Clough Head, Quebec, Croft House Moor, 
 Camp Hill, Scammonden Dam, Meg Dike, Krumlin, Slack, Ripponden, Royd Lane, 
  Cross Wells, Blackshaw Clough, Lighthazles, Cross Dikes, Flints (moor & reservoir), 
   Slate Delfs, Sykes Gate, Turvin Clough, Cove Hill, Hove Yards Wood, Turley Holes Edge, 
    Withens Clough Reservoir, Higher Moor, Sunderland Pasture, Higham, Erringden Moor, 
     Cock Hill Moor, Wood Top, and Crow Nest Wood. 

When I initially planned for a long August Bank Holiday weekend, between my usual breaks in July and September, it was in the hope that I might be able to travel away for my own solo holiday and burn a few trails that bit further from home than usual, but pandemic circumstances have transpired to render it as my first and only opportunity to get together with my family this summer, and thus the walking options have to be reduced to fit that in, as well as clearing away a lot of necessary housework that has lain fallow since my walking year resumed, on the early days. So as Mum is travelling up on the Saturday evening, it again pays to ride out early to do yet another trail from Colne to Calder, which should be the last of them, alighting in the sunshine at Slaithwaite station at 8.35am, and setting course for possibly the easiest of all the route out of the valley to the north, favouring the long and slow ascent that can be found by heading east, following Station Road as it passes below the high stone retaining walls that contain the remnants of the original station buildings and foot tunnel, heading down to pass below Crimble viaduct. This leads us to the Swan inn, and the heart of the sub-village of Crimble, where our lane ascends up the valley side on as shallow and angle as is plausible, with Radcliffe Road raising itself beyond the terraces, through the wooded bank and on upwards through the suburban outliers that have chosen their perch over the Colne valley very carefully, ahead of the hidden hamlet of hilltop and up to the emerging view downstream towards Titanic Mill at Linthwaite and back to Deer Hill and Pule Hill at the valley head. It might be the long way round, but its worth it to emphasise the scenic potential of the valley, one that's a bit too easy to disregard, and you do wonder if Westwood House and the nearby rural terraces arrived here to absorb the views deliberately, beyond which we locate the village of Wellhouse, where the village school possibly has one of the best views of any educational establishment, and the rural weavers cottages of the upper village pile up haphazardly, beyond which we start our rise out of the valley after a good mile in the 'wrong' direction by hitting Copley Bank Road. This rises us above the wooded side valley that cleaves this side of the Colne, beyond which Golcar can be seen, scattered down its own hillside, looking like a model village with its cottages and terraces best arranged to exploit the sunlight needed for domestic weaving, with our route finally tending northwest as we rise above to an expanding downstream view, while we are directed steeply uphill towards Heath House Mill and the Bank End terraces, later arrivals on the woollen industry scene in this valley.

Sowerby Bridge to Walsden 22/08/20

15.1 miles, via Scar Head, Wood Nock, Triangle, Mill Bank, Lumb, Cotton Stones, 
 Lighthazles, Blackshaw Clough, Syke Hill, Soyland Moor, Manshead End, Collin Hill, 
  Cold Laughton Drain, Byron Edge Drain, Whiteholme Reservoir, White Holme Drain, 
   Turley Holes & Higher House Moor, Withins Moor, Warland Drain, Langfield Common, 
    Gaddings Dam, Basin Stone, Rake End, Salter Rake Gate, and Birks Clough. 

Our morning ride out for today's excursion, breaking the theme of the revive season by staying wholly in the Calder catchment, show us the we can have no clear expectations of what the weather is going to bring, as we board our early train from Morley in bright late Summer sunshine, which gets replaced by a fierce rainstorm as we pass through Brighouse, which has passed as we land in Sowerby Bridge, under skies so dark and overcast that all the street lights have come on, making 8.05am feel a lot earlier than it is in reality, and gets you wondering what the day might bring before any footfalls are made. We have the 69th and final unseen railway station in West Yorkshire as our destination, with a lot of Calderdale to cross to get there, so haste needs to be made, away from this one and it curious mix of vintages, hitting the rise of Norland Road as swiftly as possible and getting the pulse going as we head up the double-arrowed lane, before rising with the footpath alternative to Boggart Lane as it heads up to Sowerby Croft Lane, immediately regretting the choice as the steep setts and steps are as slick as after the recently passed downpour, but at least the views reward as we ascend to the high east side of the Ryburn valley. We'll hang on this edge as we go on for the initail stages, passing through the elevated hamlet of Scar Head before joining the high track of Long Lane, a road that really looks like it ought to go somewhere but is only used for remote farm access as it settles in among the angled fields, not too far away from the Rishworth branch line, which hides under the tree cover below as we pass the path tops that we had intended to use to access it, coming around to the high reveal of the valley ahead, looking up to the field we walked above a few weekends back, and down to Bank House farm, somehow crammed into the angled fields below. Rise as the lane chooses to crest high, before our gradual descent starts, beginning as we drop down to the junction at Lane Bottom, where all of the ongoing routes are not recommended to motorists, take the lower road, which takes us past the pair of Wood Nock farmsteads, again clinging to the valley side, looking like desirable country retreats these days, with the road ceasing to be driveable beyond, and pretty much unwalkable too as the steep run of uphill cobbles looks unappealing and slick, but an alternative is presented that features no ascent at all. So footpath it instead, guided through to the top edge of Dodge Royd wood, through which the railway cutting gouges, following the contour around as it passes through the open fields and meets the descending track from Oaken Royd farm, a wise corner to cut off as we are quickly led to the bridge over the throat of Triangle station, and a route is retraced as Stansfield Mill Lane drops us down past the cricket club and over the Ryburn, past the eponymous mill and up to meet the A58.

Mytholmroyd Bubble Walks 4 & 5 15/08/20 & 16/08/20

1.2 miles, from Cragg Road, via St Michael's, Mytholmroyd Bridge and Caldene Bridge, 

 & 1.8 miles, from Cragg Road, via Hawksclough Bridge, the Rochdale Canal, 

  Mytholmroyd bridge and Cragg Brook.

It hadn't been my intention to drop out from my walking schedule this weekend, but when a call came inviting me out for another return to my Support Bubble in Calderdale, taking the opportunity seemed too good to miss, as the local lockdown restrictions don't apply to our particular type of socialising, and Barbecue is offered as a clincher by My Good Friends, and that seems like a most appealing prospect when the weather projection isn't great, far cooler and greyer than last weekend turned out, demonstrating further that this Summer has no idea at all what it's trying to do. Sadly, opportunities for major exercise aren't really forthcoming as my invitation only gets a late response due to me not seeing it until Friday evening, curtailing the chance of a two night stay, and also precluding an early start on Saturday as supplies need to be gotten in ahead of my visit, as they haven't been obtained preemptively, and so we don't land at Chez IH&AK until after Saturday lunchtime, meaning there isn't enough afternoon to head out for an uphill blast after brews and a conflab, meaning that none of us will have the chance to hit the 383m summit of Crow Hill for the first time. So we only stroll in the village instead, and I really mean stroll, as the walks we do would barely feel worthy of recording at all if it wasn't for all the potential miles lost during 2020, heading out from base on Cragg Road at 2.35pm, walking into the village , beyond the station and viaduct to see how more of the flood defence works have progressed, noting that while so much has been built anew along the sides of Cragg Brook over the last couple of years, some of the older walls retaining the gardens of Streamside Fold have started to suffer from cracking. A detour off New Road takes us through the churchyard of St Michael's, which gives us a dramatic foreground for the fine view up to the woodlands and rocks of Scout Scar above the valley, a grand backdrop to take in as we visit the public gardens around the bowling green, recently replanted after the civil engineering depot that had spent many months on the tennis courts site finally moved out, having completed most of the work deepening and widening the channel of the Calder, downstream from Mytholmroyd Bridge. The major local interest point remains the relocation of Caldene Bridge upstream, with the original span now completely removed as a pool is created upstream from the Calder-Cragg confluence, hopefully to allow water to back up safely in times of spate, and the increased width of the river is obvious as the south bank is completely rebuilt, with the piles now driven in and the construction of new retaining walls having started, allowing my friends to feel like this project is coming to a conclusion after nearly 4 years of work, as the village centre seeks its own new normal again.

Berry Brow to Sowerby Bridge 08/08/20

15.5 miles, via Armitage Bridge, Armitage Fold, Big Valley, Nether Moor, Crosland Moor Stone
 Circle, Crosland Hill, Milnsbridge, Scarbottom, Golcar, Scapegoat Hill, Longwood Common, 
  Round Ings, Slack, Outlane, Sowood, Sowood Green, Stainland, Dog Lane Mills, Bottomley, 
   Barkisland, Greetland Wall Nook, Norland, Norland Town, Spark House and Scar Head.

We've had a few days of high temperatures since my walking year formally revived this Summer, but this turns out to be the first to land on a Saturday, which allows us to head out with the anticipated worriies of how to keep cool and watered, rather than dry and warm as it has mostly turned out so far, and thus the sunshine blazes down as we take an early morning rid on three trains to get to our start line in the Holme valley, a bit remote from the usual lines of Colne and Calder, but making a whole lot more sense when it is recalled that this year was intended to have trails blazed westwards towards the Tame valley before the pandemic came a-calling. So to Berry Brow we head, where 2019's season ended, another world ago, alighting just ahead of 8.20 and rising to the suburban front of the district on the high east side of the valley, pacing along Birch Road before we set our course away down Station Lane, past the old station site and The Railway inn before descending down to the A616 Woodhead Road, which we join and then cross to head down among the tree cover around Carriage Drive to soon meet the valley bottom, crossing the River Holme via Armitage Bridge. The local landscape of Armitage Bridge house's parkland, the mass of Brooke's Mills office park and the parish church of St Peter's have all been noted on our last August passage down here, but the terraced blocks of Armitage Fold were not, built to serve the mill complex and located a ways down Armitage Road at the valley floor, now forming a pleasing little suburban enclave below the woods that crowd the west side of the Holme valley, through which we ascend again on the way up to meet Meltham Road, to enhance the feelings of 2019's travel experience. Progress with the shade coating the B6108 for a stretch, because I still haven't been able to suss if the route from Butternab Road to Delves farm is publicly accessible or not, and erring on the side of caution has us getting a s close to Nether ton as we can before returning down Nether Moor Road to make our passage across the Big Valley, through the tree cover of Dean Clough and under the former Meltham branch line before rising up towards the farmsteads, where the lane is gated off and the view to their personal overbridge is best viewed, ahead of the next climb. The steep cobbled lane leads us uphill, alongside the edge of Dean Clough woods and away from the farmsteads that have clustered here, giving us a really good turn of early exercising, barely half an hour into the trip, as we come up to the open fields of Nether Moor, which we eventually strike across with the lane, just downwind of the Crosland Moor airfield, with enough altitude having been gained to have us higher than our start point and rewarded with a view across the Holme Valley to Castle Hill and far beyond.

Huddersfield to Todmorden 01/08/20

19.8 miles, via Fartown, Norman Park, Cowcliffe Side, Reap Hirst, Burn, Stone, Ainley Top,   Blackley, Hullen Edge, West Vale, Greetland, Greetland Moor, Norland, Longley, Triangle, 
  Field House, Hubberton Green, Long Edge Moor, Cragg Bottom, Lumb Stone, Knowl Hill, 
   Blaith Royd, Sunderland Pasture, Stoodley Pike, Harvelin Park, Mankinholes, Lumbutts, 
    Causeway Wood, Oldroyd, Kilnhurst, and Stansfield Bridge.

The end of July may have seen Kirklees and Calderdale districts put back into a local lockdown after spikes in Covid infections, but the restrictions seem to apply to private gatherings only, still allowing for free movement and travel, which means I won't be deterred from heading out onto a frankly bonkers distance to be attempting, and the fact that my headline says what it does immediately tells you that walking fortitude came my way despite the distance and the terrain, so let's get right into it here, as this is gonna be a long one. So to Huddersfield in the sunshine we ride, as early as is possible to depart the station at a whisker ahead of 8.10am, aiming ourselves onto the trajectory that opened this 2020 walking season as we head from the square past the George hotel, onto John William Street and past the old Empire cinema before passing under the end of the railway viaduct and on to meet the crossing of the inner ring road, picking the Unna Way side and finding that I've chosen the spot that doesn't have a crossing. Around the commercial estate on the old Newtown goods site we pass, to tangle up with the A641 again, because Bradford Road offers us the way through to the bottom of Halifax Old Road, which splits off to the northwest by the Slubbers Arms, a pub name that I'd hope was unique, as it then leads us on among the residences and terraces of Fartown, taking us over the old MR lines and greenway, and on past the Grimescar club and the mosque in an old chapel before we are soon upon Birkby Hall Road, the route of urban circular route from last year. The housing quality to the east of the lane improves as we rise on, above the edge of Norman Park, which is quiet at this hour and has a war memorial separate from the main one in the town, beyond which we start to find ourselves among the elevating wrinkles that rise over suburban Huddersfield, with the terraces of Cowcliffe side piling up above the road, with the cleft of the Grimescar beck valley cleaving its way through the spread below us, where suburban arrivals cling to the steep side of the lane to ensure feature views from their rears. The single depth of terraces fills the roadside right up to the woods above the town, and the suspicion that the old road has been much more under-used than usual with surpassed route is revealed as we come upon the bottom of Grimescar woods, with the road closed off for ongoing and extensive repairs beyond, and while my instinct says to carry on, the sound of tree surgery uphill suggest that such a move wouldn't be wise and our route will need a revision, heading down the drop of Slant Gate to reacquaint ourselves with the Kirklees Way.

Deighton to Mytholmroyd 25/07/20

15.7 miles, via Bradley Gate, Lower Fell Greave, Sheperd's Thorn, Booth Wood, Toothill, 
 Rastrick (Carr Green), Elland Lower Edge, Old Earth, Elland, Hullenedge Rec, Broad Carr, 
  Holywell Green, Stainland, Scar Hill, Bankhouse Mill, Barkisland Mill, Barkisland, 
   Bank Top, Ripponden, Soyland Town, Mill Bank, Field House, Sowerby, Dob, Higham, 
    Steep Lane, Long Causeway, Stake Lane, and Hall Bank.

I need a decent Summer to get my walking plans completed, and now I'm certain that the season is trolling me after giving us a warm spike on Friday which it promises won't persist into the weekend, and thus we set out on our early ride expecting the worst for yet another outdoor day, only to land ourselves in the Colne valley with the day bringing on sunshine that hadn't been projected at any point, with me dressed in waterproofs and having not applied sunblock despite us being at the start of the heights of Summer. So we alight at Deighton, on the eastern side of suburban Huddersfield, at 8.20am, ahead of most of the locals being roused for their weekend, and after the briefest of showers as we meet Whitacre Street and it's ascent over the current and former railways in the area, up to the Deighton Road corner where we meet the WMC and War Memorial, it's rapidly getting bright and too warm for extra layers and waterproofs need to be shed before we ascend the lane onwards, up past the Deighton Centre, the local multi-use sports arena. Our early route over the Colne-Calder watershed takes us onto a path that leads around the grounds of the Christ Church CofE academy, which feels like it hasn't seen much recent traffic as it skirts the car parks and boundary fence to lead into the woodlands that separates it from the suburban close beyond at the bottom end of Wiggan Lane, which will carry us north as it drops in quality, leading as a farm track up to the old Bradley Gate farm before becoming a rough path as to shadows the eastern edge of Lower Fell Greave wood. The covering of Beech trees snags us onto the route of the Kirklees Way as it leads uphill on Old Lane, passing a gatepost with a benchmark on it before landing among the expanding Bradley Business Park, which mostly hides from view behind foliage, but does reveal that it might have a traveler problem before we are propelled out onto the A6107 Bradley Road, which we cross to join Shepherd's Thorn Lane as it shadows the edge of Bradley Park golf course, and while the sunshine still holds sway here, we get rainclouds over Calderdale ahead. This does give us a rainbow hanging to our west as we progress beyond the fields at the hill crest and away from the Kirklees Way route, declining with a rougher track to meet the footbridge over the M62 on its long straight run down from Ainley Top, and join the improved track beyond as we enjoy our last footfalls in the district, passing the Booth Wood Scouts encampment and what looks like a roadside ice house that might double as portal to an alternate dimension for local teens to explore, in a Spielberg-esque fashion.

Slaithwaite to Sowerby Bridge 18/07/20

15.6 miles, via Hill Top, Wilberlee, Pole Moor, Scammonden Dam, Withens End, 
 Rishworth Mills, Godley, Rishworth, Dyson Lane, Farrar Height, Manshead Moor, 
  Baitings Reservoir, Ryburn Reservoir, Stones Mills, Rishworth, Ripponden, 
   Hanging Stones, Triangle (station), and Watson Mill. 

I'm now pretty certain that the Summer of 2020 is openly mocking me, not just by preventing a first family get-together of the year to celebrate Dad's birthday by locking down My Mum in Leicester for another few weeks, but also by seeming to know that I want to get my walking impetus on again, and thus dropping deeply unseasonable weather onto the days that I have selected to walk, whilst giving us three days of the conditions that you'd like to out in when I'm busy doing something else entirely with my time NIW, making the Summer feel far too much like the relentlessly damp one of 2007. So we travel out early on Saturday morning, with a plotted route in mind, but not certain if it will achievable due to the fact that we are projected to have rain in the air until 1pm and no significant improvement dus after that, riding out to alight in the Colne Valley at Slaithwaite station for the first time at 8.40am, with waterproofs already donned and a climb coming right after we've headed out from the platform by the old goods yard, not opposite the other, down to Crimble Bank and then uphill under the railway and hair-pinning left to join Hill Top Road and Royd Street through the terraced district that clings to this high side of the valley. I'd have hoped to get a view of Slaithwaite reservoir in its side valley cleft as we carry on up Longlands Road, but only its dam and heel are faintly visible beyond the run of suburban houses that run up the hillside, petering out as we rise higher, into open fields on the steeply rising road, with Merry Dale Clough opening out to the west of us as we see the first of many drizzles coming on as the road shifts us uphill to the hamlet of Wilberlee, where the Colne Valley Circular brought us last year, reeling rather remote for a suburb, despite being barely a hard mile out from the start line, and only part way up the climb out of the valley. Tiding Field Lane leads us on uphill sharply, before we reach a welcome level section below Moorside Edge and among the high farmsteads on the edge of moorland altitude, which we crash as we head above the gash of Barrett Clough, taking us over Crimea Lane and the route of the Kirklees Way, onto the high plateau and among the high points of the Colne Valley's north side, with Worts Hill to the west of us and the bulk of Wholestone Moor further off to the east, having gained over 200m of altitude as we pass behind the microwave masts on Pole Moor, the slender sentinels that can be seen from far and wide, which scrape the low clouds as they pass overhead.