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| The Halo | |
The third in the Panopticon walks attracted ten members of Hyndburn Ramblers to venture out on a sunny, if slightly chilly, June morning. Leaving the car park to proceed the full length of Plantation Street, we then made our way up the cobbles past Arden Hall on our left and Owl Hall on our right. Following the right hand fork we arrived at New High Riley with its battlement tower (an Victorian Folly) before emerging onto the lane near the 16thC High Riley farmhouse. Following the track that would take us under the A56, and up to go past West’s Farm, we eventually joined what is known as The King’s Highway, an ancient route said to stretch from Manchester to Clitheroe. We remained on the line of this track for about 2km until we turned eastward just before reaching Stonefold. After reaching a junction of tracks and paths our leader called a brief stop to take on some liquid as the day had quietly been getting slightly warmer.
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left:
The cobbled roadway |
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right: The first view of the Halo |
From this point we resumed in a southerly direction, passing through several fields and by several horses, to go through a small woodland. After crossing a rather dilapidated bridge the route took us past Cribden Side on the fringe of Cribden Moor. After a pleasant footpath through a small plantation we got our first view of our objective - The Halo. It was just a couple of fields distant and our leader hailed it as the forthcoming lunch stop before immediately adding that it would be in about an hour. So it was we turned our backs on the Halo and headed past the model aeroplane club and up to join the track around Cribden Hill. Upon reaching the farm at Cribden Fold we proceeded through the farmyard, with it’s incumbent farmer, to take an enclosed path down into a field. A herd of cows were gathered at this point and as we tried to edge past them the farmer bellowed down at us to get on the path - we were about 5 foot off line in order to circumnavigate his cows!! We duly obliged as the cows had subsequently stampeded because of the yelling and so we continued on our, now unequivocal, way.
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left:
Greenery |
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right: After Cribden Fold |
We emerged onto a good track and this was to be our route until lunch. We passed the Rossendale Dry Ski Slope where a moment or two was spent watching people of all ages skiing and/or falling down. As we continued we noticed some new additions to the dry stone walls along our route, namely clay shoes, which turned out to be markers for a newly formed local walk called the Shoe Trail. Talking about this trail ensured that a good pace was kept and before long we arrived at our lunchtime destination of the Halo. Built on a promontory at a former slate quarry this work of modern art is quite astounding and when lit up in blue at night apparently gives it the look of a flying saucer!
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Two views of the Halo
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After everyone had eaten our leader announced the way back was all downhill and very straightforward. We left the Halo behind us as we followed the track on past Slate Farm and round to join the lane past Sherfin. This lane continued on to Stonefold where a right turn down the road took us back under the A56 bypass and after passing through a play park to a small road called Back Lane. This runs parallel with the existing A680 and was probably the original line of the road before the advent of motorised vehicles. The sun was shining and everyone was ready for a drink when, lo and behold, a place of refreshment appeared - namely the Dog and Partridge. This ancient establishment had obviously been an inn on the original road line. A nice 30 minutes or so were passed in the beer garden and everybody was suitably refreshed.
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left:
Past Sherfin |
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right: Sunlight through trees |
We continued on down Back Lane and emerged onto a typically seventies housing estate whereby we wove through the small streets before we quite suddenly entered a small wooded area. You could make out the estate houses through the trees at either side of this peaceful haven but this was nothing as to what was to come. We emerged onto another estate road between two houses but almost immediately turned off to go behind one of them. The path through the trees was astounding. A small brook carved it’s way through the landscape and you felt you could be anywhere in the countryside. Here was a veritable oasis of calm in the middle of housing estate and it’s name was Laund Clough.
We emerged onto a road through an industrial estate and followed it down and round to take a track up past Accrington & Rossendale College. We crossed a road and after a couple of streets we were back where we’d started some five or so hours earlier. It had been a glorious day and everyone thanked the leader for a tremendous walk once again.
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| Laund Clough | |
