The Angry Bird of Elland and ‘Hell, Hull and Halifax’

The usual morning ritual applied. I fed and watered them and they glared at me.

It was just past 8.30 on a cool, crisp and sunny Wednesday morning as I opened up the shed where our ducks reside.

Six angry birds!

For the 3rd day in a row our Lockdown ducks (incubated by my daughter during Lockdown 1) were stuck in their own Lockdown and they were not impressed. New Government rules mean that all poultry has to stay safely enclosed for an indefinite future, following a bird flu outbreak in Northallerton at the beginning of December.

As I closed the pen I could feel their seething resentment. Those birds were not happy with me. ‘Soon girls; soon” I muttered as usual. They were hollow words in truth.

I felt incredible guilt as I once again curtailed their freedom to roam.

I swung my rucksack onto my back and with camera draped over my shoulder and slightly softened banana in my left hand I closed the garden gate and turned …….right.

Today there was no ‘make it up as you go’ plan. I had a 26 km walk already in mind.

Last week I had walked as I willed. Today I had clear intentions: to complete a circuit of Halifax, doorstep visit 5 households to hand over my Christmas card and a weird desire to check out the current welfare of ………. another bird.

I got my usual galloping greeting from Georgia’s horses as I headed for the link path to the Calderdale Way that lies directly outside our garden gate. Those horses weren’t happy with me either. I usually have an apple, carrot or vegetable peelings to give them. Today I had none. My stock with the livestock of Greetland was at an all time low.

The weather on this particular Wednesday was a photographers dream. Even for this amateur!

In the distance I could see the familiar figure of Howard our longstanding (and long suffering) neighbour from next door on his usual morning walk with his dog Olly. I snapped away before he even saw me and then we chatted before moving off in our different directions.

I was feeling nostalgic today.

Seeing Howard I was reminded of his late dad Selwyn. The physical resemblance was uncanny. I smiled to myself as I recalled Selwyn’s oft repeated greeting: “Walking is an over rated commodity”: always delivered in the style of one of Compo, Clegg or Foggy of ‘Last of the Summer Wine’ fame. Which one though? I can never remember.

I dropped down through the steep woods above Copley village.

Until I retired in September this had been my daily route to and from my school in Skircoat Green. I know these woods like the back of my hand and I love walking in them.

Nostalgia kicked back in as I once again jumped the wall of St Stephen’s churchyard. I had broken so many journeys to and from work in this beautiful spot. It always gives me a sense of wonderment: creation at its best. I paused yet again by the three graves of soldiers from Copley who had died in World War 1. Cut down in the flower of their youth. I reminded myself that I had no just cause to really complain, despite the 9 months and counting of limitations to my desired 2020 lifestyle.

I thought again of Graham Wilson who had lived for many years in the old Toll House by the bridge.

The Boxing Day floods of 2015 had washed away the historic bridge that crossed the river Calder by the church.

I’ll never know the full impact that this disaster had on the last 2 years of Graham’s life but I suspect it was significant. His access across the river was lost for several years meaning a 5 mile detour whenever he needed shopping. My own daily walk to work was also disrupted for 2 long years meaning I had been forced to walk to work along the traffic frenzied route of Stainland Road for most of 2016 and 2017: dodging a regular drenching from a passing lorry and unavoidably breathing in noxious car fumes.

Wilson Bridge was opened in memory of Graham in October 2017. It stands as a sign of hope in these troubled times. We can and we will overcome.

Copley village always interests me. The model industrial settlement built in a ‘Picturesque Pennine Vernacular’ style by Edward Akroyd in 1849, glimmered in the dew of the morning.

As I picked up the towpath to Elland I was reminded of the scene on this walking route in the earlier Lockdown of Spring 2020. Some residents of Calderdale had seemingly lost their senses as Boris placed us all in isolation. I remembered the piles of litter and rubbish along that same path. Every bin was overflowing and the nation itself had seemed to lose its senses. How many beauty spots were trashed in April, May and June by day trippers who seemed unable to take their litter home?

Today thankfully, the banks of the canal were pristine. There was simply no litter.

As I crossed at Salterhebble Lock keepers cottage I realised part of the reason.

Approaching me, gloved up, wielding litter pickers and bin bags were 2 men wearing ‘Canal and Rivers Trust’ branded fleeced jackets. I recognised Julia’s dad straightaway. Julia teaches at Ravenscliffe and is an exceptionally gifted educator. Her dad Keith and mum Cathy had spent many hours volunteering in school. Sadly Cathy died 2 years ago and yet here was Keith still doing his bit for the common good. I was grateful for him and his unknown companion. There are many people who moan. Many more talk about doing something. Fewer are the actual ‘deed doers’. Keith is an example of the best volunteers: super humble, he just quietly and effectively does his bit for the common good.

The world needs lots more Keiths.

Happily they reported that the litter dropping habits of the people of Calderdale had improved. their bin bags were almost empty and it meant that the beauty of the canal side scenery had no unwanted distractions!

The low winter sun created the most incredible light. As the traffic hummed on the Elland by pass above me, the peace and tranquillity of the towpath was sublime. I thought of my old friend Dennis Collins who walks this stretch of the Calderdale and Hebble canal every day. Dennis loyally drove a school service Yellow Bus to Ravenscliffe every day for 12 years. He was a ‘salt of the earth’ character just like Keith and I was reminded that many Yorkshire folk are really the best type of folk! Happy Christmas Dennis and Pam.

I met 3 walkers out for their twice weekly walk. I had never met Judith, Janet or Keith before, but we chatted like long last friends. Another reminder of the North/South divide I blogged about last week. They were lovely people.

I walked past the tumbling ruins of the old mill with a mental note to check its story via Google when I got home. (Note: it was called Woodside Mill, an old flour mill apparently.)

So it was that I arrived at the principle point of focus for my walk. The stretch of canal just beyond Elland Bridge.

For the last few years a pair of swans have lived on this stretch of the canal. One of them is the most malevolent bird I have ever seen.

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This swan is seriously territorial and every time I have walked or cycled along that stretch of canal we have had a ‘face off.’

Our last encounter had been in June whilst on an afternoon run with my oldest son Harry, ‘coached’ by my youngest son Jake, riding along on his bike. Our Strava entry that day was one of the worst of all time as the ‘Angry Bird of Elland’ stopped our run in its tracks. Every time we tried to run under Elland Bridge that bird had squared up to us and we backed off.

I vividly remembered my childhood in Norfolk and a particular fishing trip with my stepfather. A fisherman had stumbled past us on the river bank, clearly in agony. It turned out that a swan had attacked him with a resulting broken arm. Since then, I have always been a distanced respecter of swans. This vicious beggar deserves the utmost respect.

So whilst I snapped away with my camera at this magnificent bird, (from a safely respectable distance of course) I was very pleased to have noted an escape route directly behind me onto the Brighouse road.

As much as my ducks had clearly resented me earlier that morning, this bird displayed hatred and hostility of the higher order. Sauron the Swan: Lord of the Calder’, in tribute to JRR Tolkien’s ‘Lord of the Rings’, seemed an apt comparison.

Sauron, my Angry Bird, did not disappoint.

His feathers were puffed up and he came as close as he could to my elevated position above the water. He didn’t like me I could tell. His eyes glimmered cold, black and menacing!

This time though I held all the aces as he couldn’t get that close to me. I grudgingly accepted that despite his noxious character, this swan and its family were truly majestic creatures.

Protected by royal decree since 1482, these are THE birds of royalty. Swans have featured for centuries in British History, the Queen even has a lesser known official title of “The Seigneur of Swans’.

In that beautiful morning light I could see why. ‘Sauron’ and his family were resplendent: ‘Bold 3’ in their brilliant whiteness.

As I walked up past the sadly silent and empty shell of the Barge and Barrel pub, I reflected that ‘The Angry Bird’ would be a great new name and rebrand for this particular hostelry. Sadly in an area where Covid 19 and its Tier 3 restrictions have been in place for months, opening or rebranding a pub in West Yorkshire is probably ‘a bridge too far’ for anyone just now. I quietly wished the landlord and/or landlady well. These are very tough times in the hospitality trade.

My walk became more elevated as I climbed the red brick path that rises up above Siddal and leads ultimately to Beacon Hill, high above Halifax town centre.

Red brick is definitely the poorer relation in the construction industry of these parts. Black faced stone predominates as the common building currency of Calderdale. That red brick track is a marvel though. Constructed from locally produced bricks, (from the now redundant Elland brick works perhaps?) it is an aged tribute to man’s ability to construct something that will last.

A brilliant rainbow bridged this track and framed my ascent to beacon Hill perfectly. Wow!

The walking was glorious up to Beacon Hill. The ‘sneak’ in that cold wind meant that even stopping for a photograph had significant windchill implications.

The Calderdale Royal Hospital stood dominant in the foreground. I wondered, as I wondered, just how tough were the medical implications of Covid 19 in that building? Even as I looked, I tried to guess just how many poor souls were inside, gasping for breath under the cruel influence of Coronavirus whilst I contentedly breathed in that brilliantly fresh air.

I counted my blessings yet again and resolved to stick with the rules however irritating and unfair for the last few months yet.

A single tree, bare in its winter shell, graced the hill top, framed perfectly by the blue sky. Such beauty on the hills and yet such suffering on the hillside. No one ever said that life would be fair.

Nostalgia returned again as I looked down on the SpringHall building (shadowed by the familiarly distant Wainhouse tower), that now belongs to the sixth formers of Ravenscliffe High School.

Ravenscliffe@SpringHall shone in the wintery sun and again gave testimony to the remarkable efforts of so many in that community to effect a change for the better for some of Calderdale’s most deserving young people. This facility was built on the back of over £2 million of donated money.

I FaceTimed the ever efficient Nicola on Reception to ask if Julie was being given a fitting penultimate day in work.

Julie is retiring as Deputy Headteacher at Ravenscliffe at Christmas after an amazing 42 years of dedicated service to the families of young people with learning difficulties in Calderdale. Her commitment deserves acknowledgement: ‘Salt of the earth’ springs to mid once again.

As I reached the beacon towering above Halifax I looked down on the Grade 1 listed ‘Jewel in the crown’ of Calderdale that is ‘The Piece Hall’.

The supreme irony of the “Hell, Hull and Halifax’ wording was revealed in the bright morning sun. This is worthy of no hell like comparison. The Piece Hall is spectacular.

It would easily grace cities like Paris, Venice, Barcelona and yet it lies in a ‘grittily’ determined, yet small, northern town.

The sight of it gave me hope for a better time: it reminded me, just like the gravestone of Corporal Edwards in St Stephens churchyard that I had squatted by some 2 hours previously, that there is always HOPE and that this terrible pandemic just like the Spanish flu of the 1920’s and the inhuman gibbeting of petty thieves in the 17th and 18th century by that beacon, will soon be history.

I’ve no great local knowledge of Hull.

It strikes me as a fairly non descript northern city where I’ve only visited for 2 things: to catch a ferry to Rotterdam and to see Bristol City FC exact justifiable revenge last season for a play off final defeat by Hull City in 2008.

I respectfully suggest that any comparison with Hell seems far more deserving for that East Riding sprawl than Halifax: a true gem in the kingdom of West Yorkshire.

I slipped and slithered down the ridiculously steep and slippery stone setts of Trooper Lane and entered the Piece Hall, which as usual, never seems to disappoint.

My walk was nearing its end, but I remembered the other purpose of my stroll.

The 5 cards in my rucksack were needing of a hand delivery and so I had my doorstep chats with Ian, Chris and Stuart and my best friend Carl, all bravely facing difficult personal challenges this year but courageously battling on.

I caught up with Lorraine and Andy, 10 months on they are still shielding their precious daughter; yet they never complain.

I caught up with Jill, unyieldingly fronting the war on Covid through her role as a partner in a local general practice and my spirits soared.

I passed the new bookshop in Skircoat Green run by Gabrielle and Kevin: a real example of a new beacon of hope in our community.

As I chatted to Gabrielle on the pavement outside ‘The Thoughtful Spot’ I subconsciously cheered that unbeatable human spirit of determination so evident in this little corner of ‘God’s own Country’.

Victory against the odds so engendered by all these people, was my abiding memory as I toiled back up the hill to Greetland though the dark and muddy woods above St Stephen’s church. So many ‘doers of deeds’.

Our local scenery is undeniably spectacular, but even more remarkable is the resilience and determination that I saw in every person that I met yesterday.

Some 7 hours and 26 kilometres after setting out for my ‘Halifax Loop’ I marvelled that I still had energy and that I could easily have kept on walking: just like that Angry Bird that keeps on swimming next to Elland Bridge.

The reason? An inspirational group of individuals showing simple defiance and pragmatism in their currently more restricted lives. It was very uplifting to see!

Thanks for the read. I hope you enjoyed it.

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Have a great weekend

Martin x