Walking The Kirklees Way – part of the NSPCC HACK training

Kirklees Way Huddersfield Hike

I walked a big chunk of the Kirklees Way on Sunday with friends Taru and Jenny. We’re jointly doing the NSPCC ‘HACK’ challenge in June and this was one of several training walks we’re doing.  And this time we had Karl, an Iron Man participant, along with us. So no pressure then 😉

I was going to call this post ‘Five go mad on the moors’ or similar; as we had the destination (Taru’s old family house – an ancient hall) and the home-cooked tea we knew was waiting for us, fixed in our minds. And the 2 boy, 2 girl and a dog combo lent the day an Enid Blyton feel.

Can’t remember who came up with the theme but it kept us amused, chatting across the misty moors up to Cupwith Reservoir and then on to Scammonden.

We started at Marsden and walked 16 or so miles at an average of 2 miles an hour. So not a heads-down rush but with occasional steep inclines and a bit of mud and slurry to navigate, it was a sociable but purposed pace.

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Wayfaring the Colne Valley Circular Walk..

Colne Valley Circular Walk hike Crimble Clough

I say’ wayfaring’ in the post title, rather than plain old walking, as it’s mentioned on the back of the Colne Valley Circular Walk booklet which Jenny (fellow walker and also stargazer) had lent me:

“Thirteen miles of fascinating wayfaring in the beautiful South Pennine countryside of Kirklees, West Yorkshire.  A walk full of history by moor and mill, clough and canal, weaver’s cottage and ancient hamlet.”

That saved me a job explaining the landscape we traversed through on Sunday. Except to say there’s no mention of the word ‘mud’ or horse / cow ‘slurry’ – and we splodged through a fair amount of both on the day.

We (Jenny, Taru and myself)  were getting in some miles as part of a training schedule (which is also an excuse to meet in the pub and plan some nice walks) for the 22 miles of  NSPCC North HACK challenge in June (that’s a link to our team Justgiving page).

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Legging it along the canal – a towpath Hike

Mikron Theatre narrowboat Tyseley in Stourport
Tyseley in Stourport Basins

Okay, the title is a bit of a pun in that there wasn’t any actual legging involved on a recent trip along part of Staffordshire and Worcestershire and Shropshire canals. But I did do a lot (really, a lot) of walking over the 3 days we spent moving the Mikron Theatre narrowboat Tyselsey, from Stourport Basins up to Gnosall. I’m on the council of management for the theatre company and mostly I offer woolly advice about marketing but sometimes I’m actually useful and help move the boat when the touring actors (who are also the crew) have to use the van to get to some venues.

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A couple of walks courtesy of Brecon Carreg

I’ve been contacted by the guys at Brecon Carreg water as they’ve created a series of walks around the south of Wales (naturally) and they wanted to get the word out about them.
I’m not reviewing a product as such here and I haven’t been offered any incentive, I’m just posting two particular walks I was sent details of.
Why share these? Well, it was a friendly approach and they’ve gone to the trouble of compiling some walks. And I liked the fact they are near to conurbations, so reachable by lots of folk who maybe won’t / can’t do big hikes in more remote places. Or maybe who can but like to fit in some shorter (but still leg-stretching) explores of interesting areas.

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#Iamwithsimon – A guided walk around Rough Sleeper Leeds

This wasn’t a hike as such but I wanted to post about it here , because it was actually one of the most enriching walks I’ve done. I joined a group of about 100 others last night for a sponsored sleep out behind the Leeds Parish Church, raising funds for homeless and rough sleeper outreach charity, Simon on the Streets. … read more >