Hebden Bridge is at it's most luscious and green right now. The leaves are fresh and young, the bluebells are blooming and the meadows have their first dusting of buttercups.
This is the time we conveniently forget about the long harsh winter we just had and remember what we love the most about living here.
This morning I had a 'before work' walk up to the fields above Nutclough woods to see how the meadows were doing. There are many ways to get to these woods but this time I took the snicket called Bankside to the left of Stubbings School (you can see the school above St George's Square in the centre of town).
Bankside is steep and cobbled and it is a quick way of getting up to Birchcliffe Road.
I love it because it cuts up between a terrace of Hebden houses and their gardens and these gardens are particularly beautiful. I didn't take photo's but I loved having an appreciative peep. Hebden Bridge hasn't got many gardens as there are so many houses stacked on top of each other so it's lovely to see the lucky ones take good care of them.
The path brings you out at the post box on Birchcliffe road. Turn right and walk a little way up the steep road and take the first left up Sandy Gate.
Sandy Gate was lined with Welsh Poppies.
These ones gifted me their poppy seed heads. I featured these in my Tiny Treasure's book so they are close to my heart.
I was very excited to see some of my window film on my friends beautiful yellow door. It's lovely to find it here because this is the way to the meadows that inspired the design!
Sandy Gate is also good for allotment inspiration.
They are looking full of promise.
You can get into Nutclough woods by following a little path just at the end of the beautiful terrace after the allotments. It will take you into the woods and over a bridge. The clough is so beautiful with it's deep gorge and flowing stream. It looks here like its covered in Autumn leaves but it is actually lots of sticky brown beech blossom!
We stopped to listen to the sound of the waterfall and the birds singing heartily.
Just after the bridge on the right hand side look out for a yellow arrow marker post near the graffiti'd shed. This is the path that will take you up to to the meadows. It's hot work getting up this steep path on a summers day but it's worth it for the views!
At the top of the path is a stile over to the meadows. Hooray! We made it!
They were looking good today with a mixture of grasses, bistort, plantain, pignuts, sorrel, clover, dandelion clocks and LOTS of buttercups.
They are going to get much taller in the coming weeks.
This cow still managed to hide in the grass.
We followed the path to the left of the stile and then walked through three fields with Old Town Mill up on the right and then took the first footpath on the left, down past the lovely garage with a grass roof and onto Hurst Road.
We turned right down this road for a little bit and then took the little path on the left which goes down the side of the terrace with the red roofs and drops into the woods.
This is a steep path down and can be a bit slippy but its really nice in these little woods.
I loved the mix of yellow poppy and the blue of the bluebells.
Follow the path back down to Keighley road and then you can wander back down the hill into town.
This is the beauty of living around here. The centre of town is so close an abundance of nature. It doesn't matter that we haven't all got garden of our own because we have all of this on our doorstep
