Set course for the alternate trail to the coast, disembarking at Knottingley at 9.35am, and choosing my path eastwards carefully so as not to retrace steps through the town, as traced last year, so make for Headlands Lane, crossing the railway at the throat of Knottingley MPD, and turning onto Spawd Bone Lane, shadowing the line and still not giving me a handle on this puzzling of town. Over the level crossing at Womersley Lane, and follow the footpath across rough ground to the Springfields estate, meeting the A645 Weelands Road, to make my way out of this town of glassworks, council estates and hidden farmsteads, crossing the Goole line of the Aire & Calder navigation, and making for Dole Bank Junction, meeting the original alignment of the A&C and setting my sights to Selby. Canal shortly ends at Dole Bank Lock, where the lock-keepers house just call out to be loved, and whilst the rights of way along the flatlands of the Aire seem to suggest routes across the fields, the paths on the ground steer you carefully onto the flood embankment to give you the easiest possible going. Flat lands don't offer the best protection from the wind unfortunately, so pacing comes on to keep the warmth in as attention drifts towards Kellingley Colliery, one of the last pair of deep mines in the county, whilst more distantly eyes fix on Eggborough power station, whose changing perspective will keep us amused during all our time on the Aire banks. Also worthy of note is the flood management schemes, ideal to be inundated and contained when the Aire gets swollen, which it hasn't done in the last 7 years or so. Detour into Beal via the farm track when the path gets too busy with sheep, passing by the Jenny Wren and the Kings Arms pubs to get to see Beal bridge, a rare crossing point, and finding my way back to path by Beal Lock and weir, the lock house here is still occupied. Plough on along the bank, as it winds its way along, cutting one corner when to loops get silly, looking over to Birkin and Kellington churches on the horizon, whilst seeing Eggborough Power station gradually coming closer, and despite some welcome evidence of boating, I'm disappointed that there's none of the advertised water-skiing going on along the straights.
Meet the outlet of the Selby canal, opened in 1778 and enjoying its best years up to 1826, but it's on the opposite side of the river, and the pipe bridge doesn't offer a secure passage across, so a circuit of more than a mile is needed to meet the A19 bridge a Chapel Haddlesey, at the navigable downstream limit of the Aire, passing through the edge of the village and taking the path back to the riverside, not enjoying walking into the wind at all. Meet West Haddlesey flood lock and pace the right bank the short distance up to Tankard's Bridge, crossing to the left bank, and finding the ongoing path good, offering shelter from the breeze and rising and falling a lot in a landscape that offers less than 10m of elevation variety. Onwards to Paperhouse bridge where confusing signage dumps me on the wrong side of a mostly dead hedge, getting back on the right track for a section where the waterside is well hidden from view, meeting the dog walkers out on a circuit as I pass under the Selby Deviation of the East Coast Main line, hammering it on past Burton Hall bridge and start to feel like the canal's 6 mile length is very long indeed. Thankfully, past the A19 Burn bridge, points of interest start to emerge with regularity, the wooded hillside of Brayton Barff, the spire of Brayton parish church, an impromptu dust storm, and the remaining abutments of the spur of the NER's Selby and Goole line all show up before passing under the A63 Selby bypass. At Brayton Road bridge, we gain the Trans Pennine Trail on our path, giving a better surface on the home run, with suburbia and a variety of industrial concerns falling by the canal side as the Selby to Doncaster line and the A1041 are passed under. Sight of Selby Abbey is gained much later in the day this time around, only really appearing over the low factories lining Canal Road, and we pass a variety of mooring and the Denison Road swing bridge before arriving at Selby wharf and lock, which enjoyed a brief career as a sea port before Goole was developed in the 1820. Predictably, canal and riverside residential development has grown up at the junction with the Ouse, but along Ousegate there are still architectural suggestions of the brief maritime career that Selby enjoyed, as well as the best view of the Railway swing bridge, and a long trail of level tracks has me done in good time too, rolling up at the station at 3.05pm.
5,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 1567.1 miles
2015 Cumulative Total: 164.9 miles
Up Country Total: 1440.7 miles
Solo Total: 1340.1 miles
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| Knottingley Motive Power Depot, with live coal train action, from Headlands Lane bridge. |
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| Dole Bank Lock, the Aire & Calder's original junction with the river at the end of the Knottingley Cut. Someone please tag the lock house for habitation please, it's too nice to remain derelict. |
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| Kellingley Colliery, deep mining will soon be ending here so memorize this view, and as it will have passed into history, along with Coal mining in Britain, before many more months have passed. |
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| Flood management sluices near Beal. Not used since 2007, I'd guess, but primed and ready to inundate the fields in a controlled way the next time the weather causes Aire and the Calder to go crazy. |
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| Beal Lock. |
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| Eggborough Power Station, our constant companion for the middle section of the day. |
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| Despite the men with boats at the Aire-side, I'm disappointed by the lack of power boating and water-skiing on these waters. |
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| West Haddlesey Flood Lock, the start of the 1778 cut of the Selby Canal. ultimately doomed to be an historical side show after the construction of the Knottingley and Goole Cut. |
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| Tankards Bridge. |
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| Real life boating on the canal, a good trip for the casual boater, no locks of difficult bridges for most of its 6 mile length. |
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| Brayton Barff, this is what counts as a dramatic hill in these parts, a towering 55m high. |
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| Abutments of the NER Selby & Goole line, the railway remnants can be found in all parts of this county. |
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| Brayton Bridge. |
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| Selby Marina. |
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| Selby Wharf and Lock, which served as a sea port of a good 40 years, but is now an important junction for the pleasure boating trade. |
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| Selby Swing Bridge, once carrying the East Coast Mainline to Scotland, it now serves rail traffic to the East Riding only, where I will be headed, into the wildly unknown lands beyond the Ouse, next time I come this way. |
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