Haw Park

Monday, 4th February 2002, West Yorkshire

AFTER the heavy rain, the old disused Barnsley Canal at Walton Park, near Wakefield, has more water in it than I've seen for a long time.

We follow the towpath, which has recently been restored as spur of the Trans-Pennine Trail. As we follow it on through Haw Park the path ahead is framed by slender Hazel branches, dripping with greeny gold catkins.

We follow the path along under a small stone-arch bridge dated 1828. There are rope marks on the corner stones from the days of horse-drawn barges.

Another relic of those days is a stone plinth with a horizontally-mounted iron wheel on top of it. It appears that this was used, at the end of this branch of the canal to allow the horses to pull the barges along the last stretch. There's a similar wheel by a bend on the canal on the other side of Haw Park.

Cold Heindley reservoir was built to supply the canal with water.

Richard Bell,
wildlife illustrator
E-mail; 'richard@willowisland.co.uk'

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