Caught the 6am bus to Preston then walked to the Railway Station to catch the 06:54am York train to Halifax. I bought a £10.55 return train ticket as I’m hoping to use it on the way back. The train was quite full when I arrived at 08:05 and I followed the rushing commuters up the steps to the cobbled Horton St. It was dull, cold and overcast. My plan was to catch the 522 bus from King Edward St to Illingworth to the north. I walked up Horton Street and was immediately struck by the dismal frontages and some empty and partially derelict buildings. Some of the pavements hadn’t been cleared of snow and it had now turned to glass ice and I had to either cross the road or walk in the road. I found an information board which showed me where the public toilets were. When I reached them they were pay for entry (20p) but that didn’t matter as they were out of action and closed.

Halifax Railway station.

My plan was to wander round for a while and have a look at the town but there didn’t seem to be much to see so I wandered in to the indoor market where stalls were setting up. It was also warmer than outside. I ate my sandwiches and hung around for a while before catching the bus just after 9:30. By 10 o’clock I was at the Natty Ln turn off the main Keighley Road. This was the start of my walk. I headed north to where the Calderdale Way path route crosses the A629. I turned left and followed the road past the Zion Church and down to the next road junction. I turned right down the lane which was covered in frozen snow and quite difficult to negotiate on foot so I don’t know how motorists would cope. The lane reduced to a minor private track by the time it had reached Stod Fold.

Derelict car near Hunter Hill.

The way on wasn’t obvious but one of the locals was there and he pointed me in the right direction. The next two fields had a covering of snow but the path was well trampled and the ground frozen hard. Ahead was Hunter Hill and a steep slippery path took me up to a walled track near the summit. The path split and footprints went both ways. I couldn’t see any way markers so turned left, which was the wrong way. I soon found myself on a long straight track between stone walls. It didn’t match with the map. Before long I realised my mistake but didn’t need to retrace my steps as I could still reach today’s objective by another route.

The track split and I took the steep descent down to the road. Continuing downhill for a while I turned right towards Stone Farm to try and find one of the two paths shown on the map. Neither was marked on the ground and I found the second but it seemed to have been blocked off lower down. I reached the road above Wainstalls and turned right to follow the road for a while till my route left it for a minor track leading down to Upper Saltonstall. The icy track made the descent difficult in places. I reached the road and crossed over to continue the descent along an old path taking a less steep diagonal route down the hillside to the woods. Then I dropped directly down to Luddenden Brook and crossed at the large Wade Bridge.

Interesting Sky above Mixenden.

Crow Hill Nook with Stoodley Pike in the distance.

I turned right to follow a minor path up through the woods to reach Jerusalem Lane. I turned right for a while then sharp left to reach Clough Cottage. I was now on the edge of Midgley Moor and wanted to reach the moor top at the first suitable path. I continued along the track until a gated track turned upwards to the semi derelict ruin of Pasture which was partly renovated but it didn’t look like any work had been done on it in a long time. I trudged upwards through the snow and crossed a collapsed wall and wire fence to join a reasonable path up on to the moor. I followed it to a tall stone post which marked the meeting of four paths.

The only mark in the stone was an Ordnance Survey bench mark. The map calls it Crow Hill Nook. In the distance ahead was Stoodley Pike. I turned right and followed the path roughly NW in to Midgley Moor. My objective was to investigate the mound called Millers Grave that is shown on the map. I saw it in the distance and had to leave the path to reach it. The circular mound had a lot of large stones in its centre but the snow covering made it difficult to see much detail.

Not much to see of Miller's Grave.

The water supply was melted snow.

Because of the snow I didn’t need to find water for my camp so I headed for a large boulder called Robin Hood's Penny Stone a short distance to the NW and pitched my tent on a flat piece of ground close by. A bin liner filled with snow was my water supply.

The wind was getting up but not too bad for the tent. It did mean that I had to zip up the tent inner as the snow was blowing under the tent in to the inner area.

Camp at Robin Hood's Penny Stone.