Leeds does not want for urban parks, but it does lack a good country park. I've already said that Golden Acre is under-sized and lacks wildness, and the likes of Temple Newsam and Roundhay have scale but seem too well tamed. My hometown, Leicester, has Bradgate Park, a former country estate in the heart of Charnwood Forest's Granite Country, that has hills and rocks and miles of trails amongst the bracken, and is also one of the most popular free outdoor attractions in the whole country, and yet Leeds, a city of many hills, really wants for something similar. So for today, we'll be heading for probably the wildest place in the entirety of Leeds District, Otley Chevin and its Forest Park, as it's a place that can't really be ignored in this young walking career.
Active May: Day Four
Menston to Harewood via Otley Chevin 11.7 miles
Leave Menston railway station at 9.20am under a pall of low cloud and under a hiss of drizzle, and to think that two month ago I was walking in my shirt sleeve and getting heatstroke. This looks like the sort of weather that we're going to be enduring all day, crappy but without proper rain, and it's eastwards we go to find that there is slightly more to Menston than just a railway station, it's dormitory town placed in the gap of the southern ridge between Rombalds Moor and Otley Chevin. The former of those destinations is for another day, and beyond the A65 we're soon out into the country, first alongside the railway, and for soft going once into the fields. Quite unintentionally, I've chosen to walk a piece of the Ebor Way, one of those trails that no one seems to know about and seems to exist solely to link the Dales Way and Cleveland Way, and to provide a trail through York. I'm sure it has its good points, but lacks for transport links, and the nearest sections also follow the Dale Way Link, which I'll be doing once the Dales Way comes calling (probably next Spring if the walking continues).
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| Chevin Nature Reserve |
Just as I hit the first uphill section, a dog walker coming down the hill asks 'Have you seen the deer?' and I say no and she says 'You ought to have, they're right behind you!' Turnabout and sure enough, not 50 metres away are a trio of Red Deer, didn't think that they lived wild so close to civilisation, but sure enough there they are. Escapees from Harewood Estate, perhaps? Uphill, and way to The Chevin pub and guest house, and the for a log section of road walking that really isn't all that much fun, all up hill in straight lines along Windmill Lane and York Gate, with cars tearing past you at speed unsuited to country lanes. At least the views improve as you go up, and they'd be inspiring if it wasn't for all the cloud and greyness. Having ascended 100 metre in half a mile, we leave the road and go north into the woods, at the start of Chevin Nature reserve, and it's quite an odd wood, as the trees seem unusually far part and there's very little growth on the ground, very little detritus too, damp with atmosphere though. Don't venture down the slope but stay up near the top edge, winding between tree roots and Gritstone, and wondering where the disembodied voices are coming from, all very strange and eerie. The path opens out by Yorkgate Quarry and peer down into Wharfedale, and 200 metres below us by the riverside, the source of the voices can be located, it's the Otley Country Show and the tannoy seem to be announcing the cancellation of event because of the weather, it doesn't look undersubsrcibed though.
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| Otley Chevin |
Carry on along the top of the ridge of Otley Chevin, watching the clouds scud across the top, grazing the Gritstone outcrop at surprise view, and an hour into the day's walk I've already hit the most interesting point! Views in all directions, Wharfedale to east and west, the Washburn valley and Almscliffe Crag peeking out to the north and Guiseley, Yeadon and Leeds & Bradford Airport to the south. The cloud prevent views as for as the high moors near Huddersfield and the sights around Leeds, but the Tinshill microwave tower and Hunger Hill stand prominent to show I'm not far from home. I must ask AK to dig out the pic of a bunch of us, from a decade or so ago, stood by the viewpoint rose, all pointing in different directions. Note that The Royalty public house seem to have become vacant, and the start the descent from the top of Otley Chevin, down to East Chevin Road, a prime route for mountain bikers it seems and from here I can start my quest to photograph Wharfedale viaduct, distant in the Landscape.
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| Chevin Forest Park |
Cross the road to enter Chevin Forest Park, and the first stretch here, up to the car park, is the best section, as the tree seem to be at their most unmanaged on uneven and there's a carpet of bluebells everywhere. Beyond the ground is somewhat flatter and the masses of conifers make it seem much more like a plantation than a forest. The decision to make is to follow the Ebor Way path or the Dales Way link, and choose the former which cuts a boringly straight forward path until it takes a dive downhill as a beck cuts acroos the park. Rise again on the other side, finding the park rather disappointing, even though it seems nicely popular with exercisers of all ages; managed plantations, with their own little name boards just doesn't really do it for me. The east end of the park finds a view though as Caley Crags pops up, just above the A660 to inject a bit of Gritstone excitement into the landscape. Ascend away from the edge, through some boggier wetland and up through the last plantation of Fells wood, which is nicely untamed and deciduous, to leave the Forest park and go back into the fields.
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| Bramhope |
Cross Pool Bank New Road, where someone seem to have Turkeys in their front garden, and the houses seem to be too new to belong to a settlement called Old Bramhope. Through more fields for an unnecessarily muddy trudge to meet Old Lane, where the house are all south-facing and very expensive looking. It seems Bramhope is dressing up for the imminent Diamond Jubilee celebration and would look decoratively patriotic on a nicer day than this one, don't think we didn't notice you re-using the Royal wedding bunting from last year though. Needing a toilet break I find myself wondering why, even in a place as leafy and Tory as Bramhope, the conveniences are scrawled extensively with men's advertisements for swinging and gay sex. Most puzzling, they weren't like that when I was a boy! Stop for lunch at the War Memorial, which seems well-dressed when we're about as far from Remembrance Day as you can get, and then it's onward down Breary Lane, and its eastern portion beyond the A660 to wonder if Bramhope has any housing that doesn't appear to be fearsomely expensive.
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| Rawden Hill |
Suddenly fields, as Bramhope ends and first sight is a field entirely made up of black sheep, and I didn't know there were breeds that came in all-black so that confounds most of what I understood about genetics. The path feels like it should be obvious, but is actually rather vague all the way to Black Hill Road, but the sight worth seeing is the cloud of birds circling above Arthington Quarry, they looked like birds of prey to my untrained eye, and if they were Red Kites from Harewood estate, there was one heck of a lot of then up there. Bank Top Lane gives us a better walking surface and we descend a long way as the highest part of the ridge comes to an end, and beyond the Dales Way Link heads off south (see you again next year!) and we go on east and the best view of Wharfedale viaduct finally appears. More Kite action suggest we're close to Harewood, and that's both the Red and the 'Let's go fly a...' variety, and as country lanes are again joined to dodge traffic, the modestly-sized Rawden Hill makes a bid to dominate the local views.
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| Home Farm, Harewood |
On arriving on the edge of Stub House Plantation, I call my pal and colleague NW to warn her that I'm going to drop in on her at the end of the day's walk as it's been to long since I dropped in on her and her family, and she promises me tea and biscuits to conclude the day. That's enough impetus to get me to hit the hurry up, and head into the Harewood House estate to say massively out-sized conifers is the way to do a plantation. Come within yards of the Leeds Country Way route before my path takes me north by Carr wood and the triangular walled garden, to more Red Kite spotting, kids on their first outward bound course and architectural joy at the Home Farm and other associated estate buildings, probably the work of John Carr in the late 18th Century. Onward up Sandy Gate to see what a real herd of Red Deer looks like, thriving on the estate because Health & Safety laws prevented them from being hunted, and hit the last uphill drag which I remember pushing a buggy up when visiting NW and her small ones quite a few years ago. At the top is the last view back into Wharfedale, and I've enjoyed plenty of those today, and I'll have to come back when it isn't quite so grey. Then a detour to All Saints Church for a photograph, and then it's on down Church Lane to John Carr's model village of Harewood (one of the earliest in the country!), and stop outside The Harewood Arms for a time check; 2.45pm and no time for booze, unfortunately, as I've got a friend to visit. When I explain my route, she tells me that it would have been quicker to have walked from Leeds, which is true, but where would the fun have been in that? She thinks I'm mad to have walked so far, and I don't
really think she's wrong in that analysis.
Next Up: Spring Holidays!
1,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 138.5 miles
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