Stanza Stones Trail Day 1

The sky was grey and it was just beginning to rain when Jill dropped me off at Marsden station.  Zipping up my waterproof jacket I said goodbye for the time being and set off through the village.  A minor road led up towards the hill and here I encountered my first obstacle: a works lorry blocking the entire road.  Luckily the wall alongside the road was low enough and sturdy enough for me to tip-toe along the top past the truck and find my way out onto the hillside.

The busy railway line drove into the earth below my feet, into Standedge tunnel, as I started the steep ascent of Pule Hill.  A ventilation shaft ahead showed which way the trains were going.  The higher I got the more the wind battered me but at least the rain started to ease and from the top of the hill there were good views to the Colne valley to the east and the wide open moors in every other direction.  In the immensity I felt like what I actually was: a small creature crawling across the face of the planet.

Insect-like I scuttled along the edge of the scarp, trying to take a shortcut back on myself after visiting the top of the hill, back towards the first Stanza Stone.  It was something of a mistake as the grass was wet and slippery, and the drop to my left was precipitous.  Needlessly tiring myself, I finally arrived at the quarry and looked down to see Jill making her own steep ascent from the main road.  The Stone itself, Snow, was tucked into a cul-de-sac at one end of the quarry, carved on a wide lintel in a sheltered spot, so the letters of the poem were starting to become encrusted with green lichen.  Out on the poetry bench – a seat in a curved dry-stone wall – was shelter from the wind while I waited for Jill to arrive.  We admired the work then I marched off again onto the moor.

Shortly along the path I reached the Pennine Way and with it came more rain.  The wind was coming from the north-west so it was driven into my face and my hood was torn at by the storm’s fingers.  Stomping along the flagged path, I passed a couple with their teenage daughter.  ‘Lovely summer’s day,’ I offered.  ‘Well, it is August,’ the lady replied.  The conditions weren’t favourable for any more of a chat.

The Pennine Way ducked and weaved over the high country with moors all around.  The wind nudged me around, though thankfully the high bridge over the M62 felt stable.  At the top of Blackstone Edge, I climbed up to the trig point, perched on a rock right on the crest, and had to grab hold of the pillar to stop myself being blown backwards.  I dropped down a bit to have a bite to eat.

Jill and I had arranged to meet for the next Stone but as I approached the White House pub, I wasn’t sure whether she meant in the pub or at the Stone.  I popped my head in just to check and fought to resist the urge to have a quick pint.  Instead I barrelled along the wide, level path by Blackstone Edge reservoir.  Coming round a corner I could see a pink dot in the far distance and guessed this would be Jill in her cagoule.  It was, and I joined her after crossing a cute, Andy-Goldsworthy-style arched bridge.  The poem, Rain, was carved on a sheer slab by another quarry.  This time the lettering was still crisp and shining, five years after its carving, the golden heart of the rock revealed from beneath the weathered surface.

Jill was off to check out our accommodation at Hebden Bridge while I carried on along the Pennine Way.  Except this was where I was going to take the first of my diversions, first taking a path away from the main one and then, at a collapsed wooden bridge, turning off into rough country.  It was hard going, steering between bogs, stepping onto bouncy heather, stumbling on grassy tussocks.  I could see the trig point, the goal of my diversion, ahead of me but it took for ever for it to arrive.  I cursed and I muttered as I staggered along, the wind playfully knocking me around and making my nose stream.  The rocky outcrop where the pillar was built couldn’t come soon enough.  The trig is on its own rock and I did a Tryfan-style leap onto it from another (not that I have done, nor ever will do, the leap across Adam and Eve on Tryfan).

Given there was no path, I was free to make my own way back to the real route.  I decided to cut a corner and was amazed to find a tiny track slicing its way through the heather.  It was going exactly the right way so I took up its offer.  The path was so faint that it was almost impossible to see it unless it was actually beneath your feet, but it took me reliably westwards to Stony Edge, where I could rejoin a more conventional path.  It had been a tiring diversion and, given the length of the day I was in for, probably a mistake.  Nevertheless, these are the things we have to do for trig points.

The wind continued to kick my head in as I traced the path along the edge above the Calder valley.  I reached Stoodley Pike and glanced inside for a moment, considering whether to climb up to the viewing platform.  And feel the wind even more strongly?  I didn’t think so.  I was on the home leg with the thought of a pint in a cosy pub foremost in my mind.  A sign for the ‘Hebden Bridge Loop’ informed me that my destination was ‘the sixth funkiest town in the world’.  Fair enough.  Funky or not, the paths I took to drop down into it were terrible – overgrown, over-steep and covered in loose rocks.  It took an age until I finally emerged at one of the bridges.  A text from Jill told me she was in the Shoulder of Mutton and I found her outside, nursing a bump on her head where the wind had just smashed her over the bonce with an umbrella from the next table.  I felt similarly beaten up, only all over.

Our pub, the Hare and Hounds, up the hill, didn’t open until 6pm, so we had a couple of drinks (woohoo, Saltaire Blonde!) then drove up.  The shower in the room was beautifully warm and soothing, but I didn’t stay too long as food and beer awaited downstairs.  The slightly mad landlord served everyone efficiently while making puns about my Elbow tee-shirt.  The beer went down well, though it didn’t do much to ease my aching limbs, and the chicken pie refuelled me nicely.  The landlord was replaced by the landlady who called out, to regulars and visitors alike, ‘Right you horrible lot, does anyone want another drink before I shut the bar?’  There was a brief rush before we all turned in for the night.

For more about the Stanza Stones Trail see Ilkley Literature Festival