Day 41: Devonshire country house at Bolton Abbey

Distance: 15.5 miles
Ducklings: 13

It was another grey, drizzly day today. The walk was ok, but a little nondescript. So since there is not much to say about our walk, I'll back up and talk about our hotel last night. Or rather, the shower in our room - and other rooms the past few days. I don't know if it's just bad luck, or if the English are not good with these things, but it seems very rare to find a shower in this country that delivers hot water - but not too hot - with enough pressure so Dawn can wash her hair. We've had many with almost no pressure at all. A few days ago we had no hot water. Incomprehensible controls are common. The day before yesterday was a weird English thing where you get a bath, no shower curtain, and a hand held shower. Naturally, people hold the shower thing over their heads, and get water all over the place. The place smelled so strongly of mildew and rot that it was hard to be in the bathroom at all. This, at a one hundred pound per night hotel. Yesterday, the shower was very impressive looking, with jets that shoot out of the wall, and dual shower heads, and a slick control panel. But the key control, the dial that changed temperature, was a placebo - it did nothing. So the shower was stuck at a temperature just a little too hot for comfort. The hotel manager checked it out, and agreed that, yep, it's broken. Eventually, they upgraded us to a room with a fancier bathroom that included a giant tub, in addition to a shower. We didn't dare try the shower, but we did take a bath, under the watchful eye of the hotel's demonic duck.


A good chunk of the walk today was taken up getting through the rather uninteresting city of Keighley. We walked through some industrial sorts of neighborhoods, then along the rather sad looking high street, with most every shop closed for easter, and finally down a footpath along a rubbish filled stream and through some fairly sketchy back yards. I didn't feel particularly inspired to take any photos of Keighley, so here's one of some mud we encountered on the way in to the city (it's been raining!). Fortunately, we found a side trail around the worst of this.


We exited the city along the Leeds to Liverpool canal. Here we saw a new kind of baby animal: ducklings! Cuter than calves but not as cute (or tasty) as lambs.


Just before lunch, we were on a path through some woods, heading for a footbridge over a stream, and were confronted with this.


It looked like this was our footbridge: a two foot wide moss covered wet stone viaduct 70 feet up. Fortunately, the real footbridge was further down the path, a nice sane bridge with handrails and a wooden deck. This rather impressive piece of Victorian engineering is not a bridge at all; it's a viaduct, built in 1858 to carry water to Bradford from Barden moor.


It's amazing to come across things like this, quietly hidden in the countryside. Every time we hit one, we feel like hobbits seeing something new in Middle Earth.


The last mile or two was a slog along a busy B-road. We were happy to see the Devonshire Arms! The hotel is nice, but the star of the show is their super fancy acclaimed restaurant. It's one of those places where you eat about a dozen courses, where each course has a little nibble of main ingredient, surrounded by foams and dollops of stuff and bits of fancy vegetables. Their wine list is a huge binder, which includes some Oregon wines, and, for a special occasion, an 1870 Chateau Lafite for twelve thousand pounds. I wonder if you get your money back if it's corked.


That's a big mean looking fish in their lobby. Their drawing room has a cool dog theme, including great dog wallpaper.


Tomorrow, we'll be on the Dales Way all day, following the river Wharfe through Wharfedale. The weather is likely to be the same dreary drizzle we had today, but you never know, maybe the sun will make an appearance.