Calderdale

 

Heptonstall is an interesting village with a fascinating history - but to me it always seems very dark and almost spooky, even though it is high up, which you'd think would make it feel light and airy.  The surrounding countryside has steep, wooded valleys cutting down into the Pennine rock.  To take this photo I was standing at the edge of the village, enjoying the wonderful views up and down the Calder valley.  The buildings you see in the valley are part of Hebden Bridge (which we visited briefly last year on this blog).  Heptonstall was by far the bigger and more important settlement at one time, thriving on the handloom weaving trade, but with the coming of industry in the latter part of the 18th century the valleys became the focus. Water-powered mills grew up along the rivers and the construction of the canal and railway led to even more industrial growth.  Thus Hebden Bridge became the main town and Heptonstall got left behind, a well-preserved example of a Pennine hilltop settlement.

PS: To answer Malyss's question, the tower in the distance is Stoodley Pike, a monument financed by public subscription in 1856 to replace an earlier one that was to 'remind the present Age of the transcendant bravery of the Duke of Wellington' - commemorating the defeat of Napoleon and the surrender of Paris, after the complicated Napoleonic Wars 1803-1815 and the Battle of Waterloo.  (I'm glad we all get on better these days!)