STAGE ONE – ILKLEY TO APPLETREEWICK – 12 MILES

Hello Dear Reader,

So here we are ready for the off at last. Breakfast eaten (bloody awful) but at least Rufus got a fatty treat to line his stomach before the off. The problem is that we have the tail end of hurricane Katrina to contend with and I am walking West, so into the teeth of the wind.

Here is Rufus ready for the off.

I set off and all seems calm, then outside Ilkley, the wind picks up and I battle to stay upright. This is like adding double the miles to my journey!

I soon skirt around a caravan park and come across this sign. “Private Beach, Caravanners Only”

 I know West Yorkshire is missing a natural coastline, but I think it is a stretch to refer to this muddy embankment as a “Private Beach”! Maybe I can invite these happy campers to Blackpool to see a real beach.

I drag myself away from the deck chairs and sand castles and carry on my way. I soon come across an old Quaker meeting house. For those who don’t know, I am a Quaker, and this brings back weird memories of my schooling in a quaker boarding school in North Yorkshire. If you see the interior, it is like a smaller version of what I had to endure for 5 years, 7 days per week and twice on Sunday’s. Now if you read the sign, you can have a succinct answer to the question I always get asked. “what is a quaker?” “What do they believe in? “”Do you eat Porridge?” etc.

Well, you will all be amazed to hear we eat, breath and procreate just like normal people!

 

 

 

The next landmark we came to was Bolton Priory on the banks of the River Wharfe. This is a 12^th Century Augustinian Abbey that escaped the full ravages of Henry VIII.

I had memories as a child of hopping across the river on the famous stepping stones. See below:

The only thing is, like an idiot, I didn’t think twice about Rufus, assuming he could also skip across the stones, so off I went. I got halfway across only to see Rufus drifting downstream with a look of panic on his poor little face! I managed to coax him across to the side we started on, and he sheepishly escorted me over the bridge like a civilized person.

It was just on the other side, I saw a tradition I have come across before in Yorkshire that amazes me. They create money trees by hammering coppers into felled tree trunks.

It’s not the act of adorning a tree in money that is so amazing, as the concept of a Yorkshireman squandering good money! Any Yorkshireman I have come across would say, “why forego tuppence when you can put it towards your funeral expenses”.

Time for tea. A nice treat at my halfway point of the day.

River Wharfe in full flow. My beautiful companion for the day.

How about this for a foot bridge? A bit grand. The reason for this rather over the top design was because it was in the sight line of Barden Tower, just down the river.

I arrived at our Inn for the night in good time. It was an amazing room, which Rufus seemed to appreciate. However, no en-suite, so off I went for a long hot bath, with Rufus lying on the bath mat. He is such a sissy, he can’t bear to be apart for a minute!