Wednesday 1st April 2026
Parking is marginally available opposite Hutton Roof church. I have mentioned before the war memorial stone in the churchyard for the local fallen of WW1. This is headed by:
Hardy was vicar at the church and although a pacifist and aged 51 he volunteered for the war in 1915 and was taken on as a chaplain and served as a non-combatant. Hardy's many deeds of courage and modesty and care for fellow comrades lead, it is believed, to him being the most decorated non-combatant ever.
I am not too given to recommending long Wiki entries from my posts but I think this one is not too long and is well worth a read.
"We shall remember them."
This four and a half mile walk was pleasant enough and notable for:
The worst overall collection of decrepit stiles I have encountered for a while.
An error taking the wrong path from Spital bridge - the correct one was almost parallel and to assuage my self deperecation was an understandable error, rather than a gross mistake. See the red dots on the map below.
The two paths merged to follow an unusual deeply sunken lane extending for half a mile.
Near here I heard loud voices, shouting, but distant.
Turned out to be a group of hi-viz clad weorkers gathered under an electricity pylon apperently shouting at each other, their voices easily carrying the quarter mile or so back to me.
As I plodded back up the road to Hutton Roof the sun burst through contrasting sharply with the earlier murkiness and opening up grand views to Ingleborough and the always inviting Dales landscape.
As I huffed snd puffed up a steep little hill I came across an elderly local lady tyding up the debris from a recently felled roadside tree. We had excellent conversastion. she had a sonorous Lanacashire country accent, a good sesnse or humour, and was full of information. She told me she acted as a local guide and informant on the lifetime of the above mentioned Chaplain Theodore Hardy VC and amongst much about Hardy's relations and the like, she told me Hardy, before his church position in Hutton Roof he had been a teacher at various schools including D H Lawarence as a pupil at one time.
That meeting certainly trasnsformed what I would classify as an everyday kind of walk into something more memorable.
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| Hutton Roof church, and below... |
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| In the churchyard. Hutton Roof WW1 memorial including Hardy VC |
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| Just to give a sample of the countryside - limestone country |
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| Badger Gate - now posh hoiday units I think |
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| Lupton Beck |
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| Stocky I would say. Night club bouncer type? |
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| Lunch break |
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| Zoom to shouting hi-vizzers |
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| The deeply sunken lane |
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| Looking back at my route - cropped sheep pasture dotted with small limestone outcrops, delightful |
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| Start/finish, Hutton Roof church (furthest west) clockwise. Note red dots showing correct route I missed |
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