March 25, 2019
Day Three
Towards Swaledale
It was a cold night and a freezing morning, but the stiff climb on rough tracks over to Scar House Reservoir soon warmed me up.
There were several phases of reservoir building in the Pennines. This one was built in the 1920s and 30s to provide Bradford with drinking water. It was a vast project, the dam constructed using stone from the hilltop quarry you can see in the photo. A temporary village of over 1300 inhabitants sprang up to house the workers and their families, and there was even a light railway running along the SW side of the reservoir - yet, within a couple of years of the dam being finished, the people left and the village was taken apart. Now it's a lonely, windswept place and, at 09:00 on a March weekday morning, it was just me and the curlews.
My onward route continued over the dam and along what had been an important drovers' path, used by Scottish traders to herd sheep and cattle to market in Leeds and points east. The valley's original settlement lies beneath the waters of Scar House, but I passed through the remains of the medieval hamlet of Lodge, higher up-slope and abandoned once construction of the dam began.
Another tough, loose climb took me over into Coverdale, one of the Dales' undiscovered gems. It's an uphill grunt to the pass above Kettlewell, but if you do have to ride tarmac this is about as good as it gets. Shortly before cresting the summit, I peeled off right for the old road to Starbottom (no sniggering at the back, please).
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There's a tendency to think of the modern road network as being an inevitability; something that's always been the way it is now. That there is a road, while that, over there, is a track or path. And of course, it never used to be that way. Prior to the motor car, all these unmetalled tracks had pretty much equal status, branching off across the landscape and taking you where you wanted to go. It was only when certain routes were arbitrarily covered in tarmac, and the traffic started confining itself to them, that the remaining rights of way became the preserve of farmers, walkers, horse riders...and, latterly, mountain bikers. Carving effortlessly round the contours in sudden warm sunshine, I picked up the Starbottom Cam Road for the fast, stony descent to a refreshing beverage at the Fox and Hounds.
A quick tarmac blast to Buckden then I was back on the good stuff for the steady climb up onto Stake Allotments. This section of track does briefly intersect with the road and, as I climbed towards the steep tarmac leading over to Wensleydale, I was watching a car in obvious trouble slowly reversing its way downhill into a small gravel bay. By the time I reached them, a flustered middle aged couple (i.e. about my age...), it was clear they needed help. Lacking enough momentum to back into the gravel parking bay, the front end of their car was sticking out into the road, but the guy couldn't push it back out for a neutral spin down to Buckden. I stopped to offer my help, agreeing to push them out - on condition they helped me pick up some plastic bottles discarded there by litter dropping assholes, then take them away for recycling. A bit nonplussed, they went for it and I was soon on my way, climbing onto the Green Desert...
Fast gravel tracks take you across Stake Allotments, the wide upland plateau between Buckden and Bainbridge. It's inspirational cycling, but I'm conflicted over these landscapes now. While I love them, I'm under no illusions that they're natural, or even healthy. They're an entirely artificial construct - a combination of sheep cropped monoculture, and moorland with a poor biodiversity. It's just a happy coincidence that the latter provides a habitat for curlews, lapwings and skylarks; in reality, they're maintained by rich estates for the sole purpose of rearing enough grouse to provide prey for urban 'sportsmen' to shoot at. George Monbiot, in his book 'Feral,' is clearly working through some issues with his own inner demons, but he makes a few interesting points if you're interested in this kind of stuff.
A fast descent through Bainbridge, across the river to Askrigg, then the long climb out of Wensleydale and over into Swaledale. There are several routes between these two valleys and, in 2014, the Tour de France sent its riders over the Buttertubs Pass between Muker and Hawes. That's a pretty nice road, right enough – but on this occasion I was riding over The Fleak, which is an altogether steeper, tougher proposition...with the initial 25% kick in the teeth out of the way, I settled in for the long grind over the top. Dropping through the switchbacks on the far side, I hung a right onto Whitaside Moor and started looking for a place to pitch the tent...
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Height gain: 1353m/4439ft
Today's ride: 53 km (33 miles)
Total: 159 km (99 miles)
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Enjoying this journal immensely. Thanks for putting it up here.
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4 years ago