Hebden Bridge...

[classic33]

At the top of the steep bottom section there is one very significant one so you'd not only have to have enough strength to get up that slope, you'd also have to be able to 'muscle' your way over the obstacle, which could otherwise easily bring you to a dead stop or knock your front wheel round and have you off the bike.

So most have now been removed, by the sound of things. Probably because its now a cycle path!

 

[hopless500]

I spent a day there last week and have fallen in love I was forewarned about the amount of quirky inhabitants and boy was that an understatement... but they, combined with the best ever chocolate caramel shortcake IN THE WORLD and a man in a green bodysuit talking to a tree have just about made my year!

That is one place I am definitely going back to

You met @ColinJ then?

 

[ColinJ]

So most have now been removed, by the sound of things. Probably because its now a cycle path!

They are probably still there, but the one that really stuck in my mind was at the transition between b**tard steep and just damn steep! I think on a good DRY day, I could cope with the rest of the climb. Those cobbles are pretty bad in the wet though, and especially on damp days like today when there are also lots of fallen leaves to contend with.

 

[ColinJ]

I spent a day there last week and have fallen in love I was forewarned about the amount of quirky inhabitants and boy was that an understatement... but they, combined with the best ever chocolate caramel shortcake IN THE WORLD and a man in a green bodysuit talking to a tree have just about made my year!

You met @ColinJ then?

Are you calling me a chocolate caramel shortcake?

 

[hopless500]

Are you calling me a chocolate caramel shortcake?

No, I was more thinking you might mooch around in green lycra bodysuit type clothing

 

[ColinJ]

No, I was more thinking you might mooch around in green lycra bodysuit type clothing

I was just speaking to someone who knows the woman with the orange and the knitting ... apparently, she sits there to give green bodysuit man 'moral support', presumably because he would otherwise feel really stupid dressed like that, talking nonsense to himself, and staring down at an empty hat!

(I've seen some odd buskers in Hebden Bridge ... We have a South American guy with dreadlocks who gets into the river and makes sculptures out of large pebbles and rocks. He is very impressive, and I often chuck a few coins into his hat, but I'm not sure that 'looking odd and talking weird sh*t to yourself' is a performance that I wish to show my appreciation of! )

 

[classic33]

Are you calling me a chocolate caramel shortcake?

At least she didn't call you a fruitcake!!

 

[ColinJ]

At least she didn't call you a fruitcake!!

Well, she didn't, but there are plenty of women who do!

 

[ColinJ]

Well, she didn't, but there are plenty of women who do!

And not because they think I am sweet ...

 

[Lisa21]

At least she didn't call you a fruitcake!!

Yet .............

 

[Lisa21]

The woman siting nearby knitting an orange or whatever was not there when I went. So I will HAVE to go back...

 

[Venod]

Just short of Hebden Bridge,there's the road from Luddenden Foot, that ascends (& hairpins) to join the road to Wainstlls, that's a bit of a bugger too!!!

When I was a member of Featherstone RC, that was a Sunday Club Run up the hill then across the rough road on Ovenden Moor and down into Oxenhope, can't remember if the Cafe was in Oxenhope or Howarth, but I do remember thinking about the climb before we got to it.

 

[classic33]

I know what you mean; it has a unique quaintness about it that I've never found anywhere else. Do you know that HB is on a major packhorse trunk route and that the bridge, first built out of wood then stone in 1510, was the first structure there? People don't realise that it was packhorses, charging around the hills like the equivalent of today's white vans, that shaped our landscape. Mytholmroyd was the original settlement and the packhorses needed to cross the river, hence the need for the bridge. Next time you go to HB, nip up the hill and have a look around Mytholmroyd, it's just as quaint but less popular.

As for the lesbia.... last year I took a business visitor from Ghana there and when I told him about HB's reputation he was aghast; Africans are resolutely heterosexual and in some African countries homosexuality is actually a crime. My visitor wandered around the town with his eyes bulging, staring at women and muttering in shock "why would a woman prefer another woman to a MAN like me.....?" We asked a passing Hebden woman to take a photo of us on the canal bridge and as soon as she had gone Kwame nudged me and asked: "Was she one? Was she one?"

Heptonstall is at the top of the hill. Mytholmroyd is further along the valley

I haven't been to Hebden Bridge for years, but we used to go regularly -Hebden Bridge, Todmorden and Mytholmroyd were all on the train route, or if we were feeling adventurous all the way to Halifax.
They used to sell the best chips in Hebden Bridge.

Whats adventurous about coming to Halifax?

 

[Richard A Thackeray]

When I was a member of Featherstone RC, that was a Sunday Club Run up the hill then across the rough road on Ovenden Moor and down into Oxenhope, can't remember if the Cafe was in Oxenhope or Howarth, but I do remember thinking about the climb before we got to it.

My Club!

Can remember driving/riding over the top road, before it was semi-surfaced, & stil gravel.
Not sure what year it was sorted out though.

Was up there early this year for a Fell-race, which started at Ogden Water, & circumnavigated the wind-farm, & we also came back on part of that road


http://fellrunner.org.uk/races.php?id=2529

 

[Richard A Thackeray]

What about Trooper Lane in Halifax, up to Beacon Hill??? (partially cobbled)

Stainland Lions claim it ascends 570feet in less than 1/2mile!!! (I ran.....struggled....up it in their 'Bluebell Trail Race' back in May)

Map of course at bottom of page;

http://www.stainlandlions.com/Club_Races/2013/BluebellTrail/index.htm