![]() ![]() As soon as you leave Haworth, you’re on heather-clad moorland, which makes for a startling contrast with the sheep-shorn fields across the valley to the south. ![]() It’s four miles each way, and a popular outing for those parking and lunching in Haworth. I took in the sturdy facade of the house through the lovely graveyard – it’s an evocative setting – before setting off through Penistone Hill country park.Įven without the waymarkers in English and Japanese, the path to Top Withens is easy to find. It was early Sunday morning and there were already people milling around the Brontë Parsonage Museum – a secular church of sorts. I went on up the hill, taking the path behind the church – not any church, of course, but the one where Reverend Patrick Brontë preached. Skylarks cascaded, a couple of red grouse skimmed low and the wind blew heartily, if not quite wutheringly Second-homers haven’t spoiled things – not yet, anyway. “The curtains may have changed, but not the furniture,” he said. I asked Nick if the town was very smart these days. I’d packed a ham sandwich, but couldn’t resist stashing one of his towering veggie pies in my backpack. I needed a coffee so popped in to Fairtrade cafe-bakery Hunters of Haworth, where chef-patron Nick made me a perfect brew. It always was too pretty to be gritty and, for sure, steep, Hovis-ad-picturesque Main Street is lined with cafes, delis, bookshops, craft outlets, galleries (“Wuthering Arts”) and gift shops. I hadn’t been to Haworth in years – decades, in fact. ![]() Much of the path is flagged or consolidated to protect the surrounding peat bogs. Anyone reasonably fit can undertake it – I met lots of retirement-age ramblers en route – and there’s little navigating involved. It’s 13 miles long, but involves mainly gentle inclines and lots of high, level, moorland walking. This walk, from Haworth to Hebden Bridge, is an absolute cracker. Despite the justified controversy around rail prices, there’s still no better way to plan a hike: you can see two places, perhaps overnighting in them you don’t need to retrace your steps to collect a vehicle and there’s something satisfying in walking freely from station to station. Pilgrim haven park series#I can’t think of a more fitting ride to begin this new series of car-free walks. The line closed in 1961, just before Beeching slashed hundreds of local services, but thanks to the efforts of an army of volunteers, the Keighley & Worth Valley line still operates every weekend and on some weekdays in summer, connecting six rural stations in a little under five miles. ![]()
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