Rochdale Canal 30/8/2009 Sowerby Bridge to Todmorden

For my next bit of walking I had settled on the Rochdale Canal, which I had crossed over on one of my Pennine Way legs. This time I had my good friend Lee for company and it was nice to have some conversation en route instead of the radio/tapes. The canal is 33 miles in total, running from Sowerby Bridge to Castlefield in Manchester, for today we had settled on a 10 mile leg. One of the handy things about this canal is the Caldervale rail line which runs close to the canal for most of the route with stations at Sowerby Bridge, Mytholmroyd, Hebden Bridge, Todmorden, Walsden, Littleborough, Smithy Bridge & Rochdale. Therefore its a great route to take if you're not too sure how far you want to walk in a day as you're never too far from a station and a return from Manchester Victoria to Sowerby Bridge will cost you about £8.

So it was it was an early start for the train from Victoria, which had one of those old-fashioned type charter trains departing to goodness knows where.

Arriving in Sowerby Bridge, the station is hidden away from the town centre in an industrial area but it wasn't too hard to find our way to the centre and bridge number one of the canal.

With my previous walk having been down the Huddersfield Canal, it was easy to draw comparisons between the two and they were actually in direct competition for traffic. The Rochdale Canal was completed in 1776 and was ultimately the more successful one as it was built as a broad canal allowing for wider boats and had far more space for boats to pass each other.

One of the features of the canal, as it lies in a steep-sided valley, is that there a several streams flowing down the hillsides ending in small waterfalls as they feed into the canal.

For most of the route, the canal is lined with trees which I would imagine provides shelter from the winds on stormy days.

I was certainly impressed with the efforts of the ivy I saw at this point.

Having left Sowerby Bridge a couple of miles behind, we passed the first of many properties that line the side of the canal, most are stone-built and many are three stories. I could quite go for the idea of being able to fish from my back garden.

The canal shares the valley with River Calder and at this point it crosses over the river.



The locks on the canal seem to much less frequent than on the Huddersfield canal, as far as I can remember this was the first encounter of the day.


Further along the trees thinned out, revealing a large meadow to the left and some chickens getting some football practice to the right.




Before long we were approaching the outskirts of Hebden Bridge, and like many others like it, the canal has attracted new property development - nice to see the builder has worked to blend it in with the general feel of the valley.



Another advantage of the nearby River Calder is as a run-off for excess water from the canal.


A fair few of the boats encountered seemed to be full-time homes for the owners, some of them having vegetable plots and even garden sheds. Unfortunately being afloat does not exempt you from council tax, although you can claim a rebate for each day of the year you spend cruising.





Passing through Hebden Bridge, the canal gradually moves from the north side of the valley to the south.



I'm unsure as the correct name for these but this was the first of several, again for the purpose of draining excess water, with the small wooden bridge on the side to keep your feet dry when the water flowing out is deep.



There were plenty of interesting distractions here, with waterfalls joining the canal, geese and fantastically old-looking stone bench.







There were many eye catching properties on the opposite bank with large gardens rolling down to the water edge, this was my favourite.


We were getting into last few miles of the day and as you can see from this lock, the going was downhill now.


Here we met one of the friendliest horses I have ever seen, the one in foreground was straight over to say hello as soon as stopped to take his photo.



One final lock to negotiate and we were in Todmorden done for the day in just about 3 hours. A good mornings work.

A stroll to Huddersfied 9/8/08

I did this walk just over two years ago and when it came my attention Huddersfield were playing Stockport, it seemed like the prefect opportunity to do it again.

Setting off at 8am, I was aiming to be in Huddersfield for 2pm at the latest, the canal is literally at the bottom of my street and I had soon passed under the first of the days 97 bridges.
The first barge of the day was out bright and early too.
And I spotted what I think is a Wood Pigeon, which hung around long enough for to take its photo.


Further along is a stretch of the canal which was buried after its closure in 1944, and when restored had to run directly under the electricity pylon - as far as I am aware this is the only canal in the world straddled in the manner.


Further along were two Canadian Geese and their chick, these geese are non-migratory and were almost unheard of in the area before the canal re-opened but easily outnumber the duck population.



At the junction with Printworks Road, there is a service stop for boats with shower, toilet and drinking water services.

This structure is what remains of the old Hartshead Power Station, which was a conveyor belt used to carry crushed coal from the railway sidings at Millbrook, not the prettiest structure but its height gives it an impressively imposing look and it serves as reminder of this particular areas industrial past.


After passing a few locks it was through Scout Tunnel which is 200 yards long and used to scare the shit out of me as a youngster. There's a footpath over the top for those who don't fancy it.





At the next lock along, I decided to get a few shots from a different and closer perspective.



This is my one of my favourite photos of the day, I'm really pleased with the reflection the water has captured for me.

This is a Dutch Barge under construction in Mossley, ironically it looks like it would be too wide for this canal as it is designed for narrowboats.

Another common feature of the canal-side skyline are the remaining chimneys of the mills that provided the canal with much of its revenue in its heyday.

Then the rain began, but nothing serious at this point.



A little further along, the towpath ends briefly and you are treated to a nice stroll through the woods.
Out of the woods the route takes you along what is known as the Yellow Path, site of the form Stalybridge Branch Railway which was finally closed in 1964 and scene of plenty of my teenage misdemeanors. About 100 yards later a path leads back to the canal and on to the excellent Roaches Lock pub and an opportunity to get a good shot of the River Tame.
At this point, I found the towpath blocked by a landslip and had to take to the roads to safely continue, thankfully there are plenty of access points to the canal and my detour was a short one.

Some ravens were keeping watch over this fine building, sadly their colleagues sat on the weathervane took flight before I could get their photo.

This the part when an aqueduct carries the canal across the River Tame.


Five miles gone so far and 3 miles remaining of the west side of the canal.
This is Frenches Wharf Marina, near Greenfield, with construction well under way.


I knew that the heavy rain was not far away but the silver lining was the fantastic texture of this cloud formation.Crossing the A62, the canal widens for the classy village of Uppermill.


Here, the River Tame runs close to the canal at a much more sedate pace than earlier, downstream.

I'm a big fan of canals as well as railway viaducts, so when the two collaborate it is worthy of a few photos.



Uppermill is certainly a rich are for the angler.




Fuerther along lies the the warehouse which was used to transfer goods from barge to horsecart for transport over Stanedge whilst the tunnel was still under construction. Nowadays its in good hands as the headquarters of the Huddersfield Canal Society, who worked towards the restoration of the canal for over 25 years. http://www.huddersfieldcanal.com

The Diggle Flight of locks then riases the canal up to its peak of 645 feet above sea level, alongside and in full view of the Leeds-Manchester railway line.


uThe emergence of the railways was untimately a death sentence for the canal as a viable business, ironically Huddersfield and Manchster Railway bought the canal in 1846 to utilise the Stanegde Tunnel to build their own parallel tunnel and transported the earth extracted on barges using a series of cross passages.

At this point the only way onwards is over the top as the tunnel has no footpath and it was seriously lashing it down. I had three options, go over the top on foot and get seriously soaked, wait and see if the rain passes (not looking very likely) or get a bus to Marsden on the other side.

I decided to go for option 3 and walked into Diggle village and there was a bus waiting at the stop 50 yards down the road. I started to sprint to the bus waving my arms to delcare my intentions and when I got within about 20 yards it pulled out and drove right past. Cursing loudly, I contemplated my next move when a passing motorist pulled up - he'd seen me running thought the bus driver was a dickhead and offered to chase, overtake the bus and drop me at the next stop. I gratefully accepted and 5 minutes later I was sat on the bus, pleased for a break from the rain and my faith in human nature restored. Thank you random stanger



Setting off from Marsden, it was still raining but nowhere near as hard as earlier, so on with the final 12 miles to Huddersfield.






This is the Sparth Reservior which lies on both sides of the canal, a sign of times the notices advising it is illeagal to fish without a licence are in English and Polish.


These horses were well into their grass and far too busy to pay any attention to me.


I was soon nearing Slaithwaite which as well as being one the most mis-pronounced towns in Britain, can boast a guillotine lock, floating tearoom & micro-brewery.




Moving on towards Linthwaite, the scenary is dominated by the wonderfully-named Titanic Mill, which has now been converted into apartments - not sure how well they've sold in this out-of-the-way spot of West Yorkshire at £269000 a pop - nice building though.

Whilst contmeplating the mill, I met this charming family who swam across to say hello, sadly I had no bread to reward them with.



I was getting close to my objective now, just Milnsbridge between me and my objective with a cracking waterfall on the nearby River Colne to take in en route.


At his point I need to have a quick 5 minute sit-down under a dry bridge as I had been walking non-stop apart from 10 minutes on the bus earlier, I then spotted this little chap out of the corner of my eye - those of my fingers next to him for the benefit of scale.

One mile to go as the crow flies, or the slug crawls, and I was off the canal and into Huddersfield. I rewarded myself with a bumber KFC, had time for a welcome pint in The Gas Club. Of all the football grounds I've visited (100+), this is one of the best pre-match boozers around and the local fans are as friendly as any you'll find. The game itself was not the most exciting but 1-1 was a fair result, most were happy and new season is very much underway.