CROWS (Community Rights Of Way Service): Ryburn - Rough Hey wood

Following an extremely wet and blustery Thursday, Linda, Jak, Jerry and Angus were greeted by a fantastic rainbow spanning the valley at the start of today's work.

A glorious start to the day!

The task was to finish off the first section of the path (that leads off the Calderdale Way) between the 2nd and 3rd stiles:

Job 1. This is where we started to build stone steps on a particularly slippery section. Now we need to put in more stepping stones and infill the steps.

Job 2. Is to fit a section of revetment along the upper path where previous rabbit damage (strategically created, ankle-twisting holes!) had narrowed the path.

Once again this work has been funded by a generous donation from the Russell family. A big 'thankyou' to them . . . we'll soon be finished!

The location of today's worksites circled in blue.

Given the amount of recent rain, we had expected the first section to be very muddy and slippery. However, it wasn't as bad as we'd feared and it looks as if the stone steps have helped to alleviate the problem by slowing the run-off down the path.

We set-to locating suitable flat stones from a ruined, long-buried wall now overgrown by holly trees. Some of the 'flats' were put in as stepping stones and others used to create further steps. Four bags of MOT gravel were spread on the original steps to help fill the gaps and bind the stones together.

Jak, Linda and Jerry backfilling the gaps with MOT gravel.

Jerry positioning a suitable stepping stone.

The lower section where we needed to make things a bit easier.

A new step fashioned out of re-cycled walling stone.

After a couple of hours we had managed to make the remaining length of the path a lot safer and much easier to negotiate. Several regular walkers (being led by their four-legged companions) passed and were extremely grateful for all the improvements CROWS had made through the length of Rough Hey Wood.

We will need to revisit this section to cut-back more of the overhanging holly. This will let in more light and hopefully keep the path a bit drier.

On to Job 2 further along the path, where previous rabbit damage meant that care had to be taken not to twist an ankle, the revetment was soon in place and, with a bit of cut & fill, we now had a much safer section of path. A similar job further along required widening but didn't need revetment.