Monday April 24th
Carriage House Hotel, Standedge to Air BnB stop, Hebden Bridge
Distance: 16.44 ml
Elevation: 1364′
Overnight:
Hebble End,
Ap1 Canal Works,
HX7 6HHB&B: £35.00
Expected walking time: 5h 58min
After another great breakfast, I specially liked the fresh fruit – strawbs, kiwi, melon etc, and scrabbled egg, bacon, mushrooms and tomato, it was nearly 9am when I left.
A cold front was passing over bringing colder weather and brisk NNW winds. Three sharp showers experienced during the walk and all in the morning. The first 2 were dealt with just the brolly – I was walking in my Craghoppers fleece. The last, just after the burger van before the M62, was much heavier. Sack cover on, fleece exchanged for waterproof jacket and poncho. All that effort but 5 mins after the M62 the poncho was off and no more rain. The front had gone through, very stiff wind continued and the day was bright sunshine but with a sky filled with lots of separate clouds.
This day isn’t the best of walks. I left Carriage House and picked up the Standedge Way next to the Great Western Inn to rejoin the PW just after Brun Clough reservoir.
8:58 left the Carriage House
09:24 trig point at Millstone Edge
09:38 PW splits from Oldham Way
09:52 A640
10:13 White Hill trig point
10:38 M62
11:16 trig point built on a rock
11:27 Aiggin stone
11:54 White House pub
13:04 far end of Warland reservoir
13:57 Stoodley Pike
14:30 Hebden Bridge loop turn off
14:54 Hebden Bridge
I made one route mistake, I didn’t drop down to the pub, instead contoured around before climbing a fence to join the A58 and walk back to the dam.
Contractors had drained Warland reservoir and the PW was routed to using the footpath on the eastern side rather than using the dam wall.
The walk from Stoodley Pike and into Hebden Bridge was the best section today. At last out of the wind the waterproof came off. The sun was shining and the drop through the woods onto the tow path and into HB was lovely. My Air B&B was next to the canal. In fact my ground floor window was passed directly by the HB loop – the closest I stayed to the route so far and probably not going to be beaten all trip.
39,487 steps
6 hours taken
Shotley Walker 