25-28/10/25 Hanging Out In Huddersfield.

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We came to Huddersfield not because of any particularly outstanding tourist sites but to visit family members who moved there in April and who were thus locals from our point of view.

Huddersfield's history dated back a respectable 4000 years or so and included a Roman fort, a long-deserted medieval village, and a Norman Castle, none of which were evident other than in barely perceptible patterns on Castle Hill, just outside of town. Back in 1899 (recent times!) a stone tower was built on top to celebrate Queen Victoria's jubilee, and this was still the dominant feature of the landscape.

The moors lie just out of town.

We visited the Victoria Tower on a clear day with a bitterly cold wind that soon saw us all huddling in the lee of the Tower before we gave up and went home for a nice cup of tea without doing any exploring at all.



Huddersfield had a long history of textile production in cottage industries capitalising on abundant supplies of wool and soft water. Huge textile mills replaced the cottage industries in the industrial revolution and now these were gone too, the buildings repurposed into accommodation and office blocks. We went for lunch at the Old Mill in Brighouse, all diligently choosing suitably English menu items.


I'm not sure why the 19-12 was there. A mill had existed on the site since at least the 12th century and the present Mill was built in 1808 with the current operation opening in 2003.

Toad In The Hole,  bubble and squeaky, and a pot of tea. As English as I could get.

The Old Mill was close to the alleged site of Robin Hood's grave, so after lunch we left Roger doing laps of the car park with Steve and made an attempt to visit the grave. That didn't work out, stymied by a busy road and the lack of a discernible track into the Nun Bank Woods where the grave allegedly lay.

Determined to explore something, we headed off to the Calder river with its parallel Calder & Hebble Navigational Canal. As luck would have it the canal path was under renovation so Roger and Steve had a brand-spanking new asphalt pathway along which to walk.

Perfect.

I don't think they locks on the Calder Hebble Navigation get a lot of work.


Warning for unwary boats.

Back at home the first shots were fired in an epic Scrabble battle, fuelled by cups of tea and Jammy Dodgers, with much lamenting about too many vowels, the vileness of the letter 'V',  and the cruelty of random letter selection. The contestants were, so far, equally matched with the score at 2-all and more rounds to come.

Huddersfield streets.



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