Morley to Leeds (x4) 27/07/14

Back at the top of the year, I had high hopes for the second half of my walking season, feeling like I could safely aim for 500 miles on the year and also manage to fit in all my major targets and have some weeks to spare as my 40th approached, but a month on and I'm feeling like the wheels have been spinning for the last few weeks with little progress being made. July isn't quite the time to declare the season beyond redemption, but it's looking unlikely that I will be able to fit in both of the Kirklees Way and Wakefield Way before November as it will take a total of 12 trips to complete them, and that would be three whole months of my schedule. I had really been hopeful to be half way around the Kirklees Way by now, but tiredness at the end of June and wanting to fit the the Tour de France at the start of the month lost me two weekends, with my weekend after my trip down country being a non-starter as the heatwave had had me turning into Freddie Flakeout and rain coming down on the Saturday was not the inspiring change I'd hoped for. Then my trip for yesterday failed as I made out early to catch the train to Marsden only for my plan to be scuppered by its non-appearance due to a lack of available train crew, the first time I've heard that be announced by the tannoy, by the way, and missing my connection up the line would mean a trip of over two hours before I could get going and a longer stretch of walking in the hottest part of the day, so I am shortly heading home to sulk. Still, heatwave feels over by Sunday morning, and July needs a conclusion, before moving on to hopefully make August count, and the reserve list has another route to the city on it...

Morley to Leeds, via Beeston Royds and Whitehall Road  6.9 miles

Morley to Leeds (version 3.0) 01/06/14

Every walking season so far seems to hit a point in the Spring where my early season enthusiasm drops off and the need to take some time out from the trail comes down, mid-May last year and mid-June in 2012, and sure enough, at the end of May this year, my enthusiasm falls off once again. It's mostly the need to have a Saturday morning lie in this time around , and not having much desire for the planned trail along the Barnsley canal, thus ending the month with only 7 days walked when I had hoped for 9, but the need this time is more the need for a rest, and knowing that June is going to be a much quieter month, some time out feels earned. However, the change of months has some excellent weather upon it, and that means the weekend can't go to waste, and with a trio of walking targets still outstanding from my last walk, it takes only the slightest amount of shuffling to find a fresh route to take in a Sunday morning stroll through the industrial heritage of Leeds once again.

Morley to Leeds, via Middleton Park & Hunslet  7.6 miles

Morley to Leeds (again) 26/05/14

Bank Holiday Monday rolls around and I'm back home again, eager for a stretch whilst the sun is out and the skies clear, a surprisingly good day after a sequence of four grotty ones, and yet I'm not feeling that well-disposed towards the world, no a particularly happy camper at all. There has been a shift in this nation that I do not approve of at all, one which marks a particularly unpleasant change that this country has happily avoided for several decades, and I get the feeling that the discourse is going to get rather more poisonous in the coming years, not a good places to be for sure. Not that this has anything to do with walking of course, but right now I'd really like to disappear far away from the world as it is to gather my thoughts and harden my resolve, but there's no option for a distant retreat as I need to work on Tuesday, instead taking a walk into the town again, happy that my city has retained a small amount of sanity in these testing times.

Morley to Leeds, via Middleton Park & Hunslet Dewsbury Road  6.3 miles

Morley to Halifax 03/05/14

The month of May is finally here, my favourite month of the year, and even though I am not currently in the best of conditions right now (feeling far too many niggles and non-walking related pains), I'm hopeful for a good month and if all goes to plan I could get 9 (count 'em) walking excursions down over the coming 4 weeks. Long weekends and jollies will give me plenty of time to get busy with what I enjoy going most, and let's burn a day of annual leave to give me a 4 day break for May Day weekend, allowing me to have a couple of decently long excursions plus necessary rest and relaxation times between. My progress for the year is also going well, at a similar mileage rate to last year and also making good progress down my list of walking targets too, so I'm pleased that I'm on the edge of completing the first of major plans of the year, namely blazing a trail to the administrative centres of West Yorkshire, and I'd saved Halifax for last on the assumption that this trail would probably require a decently long day, as well as good weather if this is to be my only visit to Calderdale for the entire year.

Morley to Halifax, via Birstall, Gomersall, Cleckheaton & Brighouse  15.3 miles

Tingley Viaduct & Ardsley Reservoir 27/04/14

Taking the whole department out for drinks could have been an expensive business if all 26 staff had turned out, but thanks to shifts patterns, absences and unavailability, a wholly more manageable 8 folk turned out which ensured that a drinks order could be made without recourse to writing things down, but I'm still baffled as to how many people thought they were celebrating my 40th birthday already. Maybe my choice of words on the e-mail invite, notably 'in a spirit of egalitarianism in my 40th year', was a bit confusing, but no matter because a seven pint session went on with a whole lot of nonsense talked and laughter echoed around, plus a couple of old faces rejoining the crew and everyone getting off for their last ride home. So predictably, Saturday is scrubbed with a hangover and no real awareness of what the day is doing until late afternoon, but even with it being a notional weekend off, I could use the stretch to work off the beer, and to make some space for the epic post-hangover bacon sandwich, so Sunday morning demands a supposedly short stroll to find a couple of the hidden highlights of the borough.

Tingley Viaduct & Ardsley Reservoir  8.6 miles

Morley to Huddersfield 19/04/14

The walking year so far has not really had me exerting myself in my choice of trails, starting off at a steady pace of short walks for the colder part of the season and having largely avoided treks that would be all-day ventures. Nearly 100 miles into the 2014 season and I still haven't topped 12 miles in a single day, so it's time to make a break from such modest excursions, and as we've a long weekend of Easter break afoot, I can allow myself an extra day of relaxation before hitting the trail on Saturday. So, to the heart of Kirklees we look, finally cutting a path from home to the Calder valley and the south west (having failed to do so in my first 1,000 miles), to see if Huddersfield is a long way away or not, for I dwell under the idea that it isn't that far away at all, only 30 minutes distant by train, but we all know that travel time is deceptive as almost everywhere else in West Yorkshire is around an hour distant, and that line on the map is what tells the true story.

Morley to Huddersfield, via Batley, Dewsbury, Thornhill Lees, Whitley & Kirkheaton 
   16.1 miles

The 1,000th Mile: Morley to Leeds 05/04/14

The final straight awaits, and I feel like it was only a few weeks ago that I embarked on this walking scheme, and I can't believe the target is within sight at the end of only the shortest of ambles, and I've already stated my case for avoiding a dynamic finish, as I feel that my achievement needs to be engaged socially, but I also think that there is a good case for doing something really mundane. That thought needs some explanation, as travelling from home in Morley to Leeds City Centre is a route that has been engaged thousands of times but has only been walked twice, and I have never walked Chrurwell Hill in either direction, so going along the main road, shadowing the route of the #51 bus, will give me an opportunity to pay close attention to a landscape that I have passed so many times. There's a fascination in the everyday surroundings that many people will never notice, but it is something to get me excited and intrigued, a journey through the present to the past and to a goal that I would never have thought was so easily attainable, so it might not be the nicest day of the Spring, but it is the first weekend of the season when glumness does not bring the feeling that winter is still lingering.

The 1,000 Mile: Morley to Leeds, via Churwell and Holbeck  5.8 miles

Morley to Wakefield 06/02/14

The odd caprices of February weather continue as Wednesday brings heavy cloud and lots of rain, an ideal day for a ride up country to Carlisle on a bargain ticket and to return having spent the difference on books and CDs at my favourite secondhand outlet. Then we get more clear skies and much milder temperature for the Thursday, so quickly get myself set for another stretch, filling in another blank spot on the map by heading south to Wakefield, but I'm a bit of a dawdler when all is done and I don't get set quite as fast as I'd have liked. Still that's not the worst thing in the world as the low sun of late winter may illuminate the world in an attractive fashion, but walking with it sitting squarely in your eye line through the middle of the day would not be the most comfortable, so greet the milky skies with relief, as I will not be blinding myself on today's amble.

Morley to Wakefield, via Tingley, West Ardsley & Alverthorpe. 9.2 miles

Morley to Bradford 04/02/14

So a week of being NIW, and having started it with a colleague's birthday bash, featuring me getting blasted and dominating the karaoke (not that I can actually sing, but can give an impression of knowing what I'm meant to be doing), and following that by staying up to watch the worst Superbowl in at least a dozen seasons, the need for some walking is in order once the hangovers have dissipated. Of course, this is already turning into one of the most inconsistently weathered Februarys in recent times after the consistently grey January, so the weather eye has to be keen to spot the open windows, and time shouldn't be wasted with excess travelling, so let's start out from home. The Dales Way and the High Moors absorbed so much of last year, and after the first pair of trips in February, no more trips were made in the locality of Morley, so I may have made the North Country feel small, but I should now start making the less remote parts of West Yorkshire seem a bit closer together. So onward to spend more time on the local paths, starting by walking to the one notable place in West Yorkshire that I have avoided on all my trails so far...

Morley to Bradford, via Gildersome, Drighlington, Birkenshaw and East Bierley. 9.4 miles

Morley to Leeds 16/02/13

Self at Morley Town Hall

It may be early in my second season of walking, but it's now time to start out on a proper linear walk, not all done in a single expedition, of course, as that sort of thing is still beyond me, but it's time to stop walking in circles and to travel in a distinctive straight line. The Dales Way is the obvious choice, as it's straightforwardly accessible along most of its length and its start point in Ilkley is only 21 miles distant from home in Morley, factor in the Link to Leeds and it's only 7 miles away to a path that leads me all the way to the shores of Windermere. There's still plenty of Winter to traverse before we get to the joy of Spring, and there's no great hurry to get this done in short order, the season can afford me a few short ambles before we get to the real meat of the trail, so my walk to Windermere can start with the walk from home to the Dales Way Link in Woodhouse, getting in the remnants of three lost railways along the way. Weather projections for Saturday had stated the high probability of mist all through the preceding week so it's a surprise to find a bright day opening up when I rise, so I have to get on at the hurry up to make a detour to collect more books to add to the 2013 pile from Morley parcel office before heading to my start point.

Walking to Windermere: Morley to Leeds. 7 miles

The Morley Circular 02/02/13

The 2013 walking season was due to kick off on 9th February with me meeting up with the FOSCL group for a walk over Ingleborough, but as some unseasonally sunny weather greeted the first Saturday of my week of being NIW, I made the decision to get out one week early. Not that there was huge pressure to make an excursion of it, indeed in all of 2012's ambling, I never really did anything close to home other than joining to Leeds Country Way as it made its way past Morley. So this was a good time to rectify that, and to wrap up in my underused winter coat, down fleece and thermals and head out to the end of Station Road because most of my walking excursions had started out from Morley railway station to various parts of the West Riding, so today I will very literally start my walk from there.

The Morley Circular.  10.3 miles