Building Bridges

In a Venn diagram that shows the intersection between farming, country walking and tourism I find myself firmly at the centre, a foot in every circle. Walking gives me access to the fells of my Yorkshire Dales upbringing, my farming family provides an understanding of rural communities and the need for walkers to respect farm life, and producing guide books allows me to encourage walkers into the Dales, bringing in much needed income.

For many years this has been a joyful place to be. Until Coronavirus when tensions erupted.

Farmers were desperate for people to stay away, terrified of being struck down with Covid-19, especially at lambing time when they were working 20 hour days, often alone with no-one to take over in a crisis. Frightened village communities with their elderly populations and lack of medical facilities tried to ban visitors. Walkers resented footpaths being blocked and gates tied up when they were legitimately walking from home. People who’d never visited the Dales before descended on beauty spots in huge numbers, parking in gateways, lighting fires, leaving litter and worse. And in the middle of all this the government were encouraging businesses to continue to trade if possible.

How could I with a small business promote guidebooks that encourage people to walk in the Dales knowing the dangers to a way of life I love so much? How could I, a passionate champion of Rights of Way, condone a chained gate or ‘Keep Out’ sign however much I understood the fear? It was a difficult and uncomfortable place to be.

As lockdown lifts I hope very much that bridges can be built and good relations restored between town and country.  As more leisure facilities open up the pressure on rural beauty spots will ease. An afternoon in a beer garden will become more attractive to some than a drive to Ribblesdale. Holidays abroad will be possible by late summer. Holiday cottages, camp sites and caravan parks are opening as I write and will bring in much needed tourism £££s. Walkers will return, many of us avoiding farmyards and fields of stock if possible and heading for the fells.

And I will start promoting routes again – especially A Dales High Way.

Happy Birthday Lady Anne's Way

It's 25 years since Sheila Gordon created Lady Anne's Way, a 100 mile long distance trail from Skipton through the Yorkshire Dales and Eden Valley to Penrith in Cumbria. The route follows the route that Lady Anne Clifford might have taken as she travelled across the north of England restoring castles and building almshouses in the second half of the C17.

The route of Lady Anne's Way

Pendragon Castle

In 1605 Anne's father George Clifford, the Earl of Cumberland, died and left his vast estate to his brother. Lady Anne and her mother spent the next 38 years trying to get it back. Finally in 1643 she succeeded and at the age of nearly 60 she set about restoring the properties which had suffered years of neglect. She travelled between them in a litter accompanied by a huge entourage. 

Lady Anne in her horse drawn litter

Today thousands of walkers follow in her footsteps, enjoying both the history and lanscape of the wild open country of Yorkshire and Cumbria.

Sheila Gordon's guidebook

On Saturday 16th May Sheila Gordon along with Friends of Lady Anne's Way will lead a walkalong the Highway starting at Garsdale station at 11am and climbing up to the Highway, an ancient track used by travellers through the ages including Lady Anne.

Details of the walk and the route can be found at https://www.ladyannesway.co.uk/about

This Time Next Year

As publishers of walk guide books, Skyware Press, we've always had a love/hate relationship with Amazon. As a retailer they squeeze profit margins till the pips squeak making it almost impossible to make a living unless you are selling to them in pallet loads. On the other hand our customers, the walkers we want to reach with our books, expect to find what they want online and if it's not there they will buy something else. After all, guide book A looks much the same as guide book B until you're lost on the moors and by then it's too late. 

 

As well as producing guide books I also write short stories and last year I decided to bring out a collection. Our traditional route to publishing means that we have a couple of thousand copies of a title printed at once at a substantial cost. A couple of thousand books that require storage, marketing and distribution. I did not want to go down the same route with a slim volume of stories so turned to Amazon to investigate self publishing. We were able to follow the online instructions, upload my documents and produce a book for sale both as a Kindle e-book and a hard copy print-on-demand. I was able to design the cover myself using one of my paintings and order author's copies to give to family and friends. It wasn't just a single click but it wasn't difficult either and best of all it was completely free. There was no huge financial outlay, there are no boxes of books under my bed but I do have to do some publiciy to encourage sales.

So to anyone who would like to see their work in print it is an option worth considering and if you'd like to see the results click here 

Dare to be Different

In the summer of 1999 Bradford Congress, a group consisting of Bradford Council and others, asked for ideas for 20/20 Vision, a document they were putting together to set out the strategy for the next 20 years. It would be a blueprint for the future of the city and the towns and villages that make up the Bradford District, a long term visionary plan that would all come to fruition by 2020.
A small group of us from the 1 in 12 Club's Publications Collective submitted our vision which is printed below. As 2020 approaches I'll leave it to you to decide how much has been achieved and by whom.

Dare to be Different

Imagine a small, stone built city centre surrounded by the most beautiful countryside in England.
Ugly 1960's concrete buildings have been re-faced in local stone, the city centre is car free. There are regular bus and train links with the surrounding towns and villages. Bus services within the city are free and are based on small vehicles operating on routes that follow a spiders web pattern, both radiating out of the centre and surrounding the centre in concentric circles. It is simple to move around the city by hopping from one bus to another.

The Bradford Canal has been re-opened linking the centre to Shipley and Saltaire. The canal is regularly used for transport and leisure by local people and by visitors. Shops, cafes and houses overlook the canal as they do in Shipley and Saltaire. There are well used cycle and walking paths along the canal.

Trams run along Manningham Lane between Saltaire and the city centre and between the centre and the Industrial Museum. There is a link to Manningham Mills. The trams are used for transport by local people and also provide an attraction for tourists.


There is a thriving tourist industry, which celebrates Bradford's industrial heritage. Attractions include guided heritage walks in Saltaire and the city centre, the tram and canal rides between sites and links with surrounding towns and villages. Other attractions such as the Photographic and Colour Museums are popular and well known.


Bradford is known nationally and internationally for its thriving food economy.
The city centre is dominated by Britain's largest local food market housed in a beautifully renovated Market Hall.

Ingredients and specialities are available for the wide range of cultures which make up Bradford. There is a special emphasis on local produce and a thriving organic sector.
Around this has grown up a wealth of successful cafes and restaurants celebrating every type of food and drink. There are specialist food shops, cookery book shops, kitchen equipment shops and producers of raw materials and ingredients. Manufacturing has regenerated with the demand for catering and food production equipment.
Farmers and growers from the surrounding areas supply both the public (directly through the market) and the shops, cafes, restaurants and food processors. The availability of fresh, locally produced food and the awareness of its importance has had enormous benefits in the health of Bradfordians.

The business community is independent and self sustaining. Jobs have been created and business opportunities opened up by the exciting and unique eating and shopping experiences.
The city celebrates creative "do-it-yourself" cultures, enterprises and voluntary activities. Independent film, television, music and internet companies all contribute to the reputation Bradford has for being a place where people make things happen for themselves.
The local economy creates local wealth for local people and communities are supported as they create their own opportunities. There is a thriving Arts scene. Bradford Festival continues to flourish. Manningham Mills has been renovated and now houses a theatre, cafe, music and art studios, a range of arts and crafts businesses as well as flats and houses. Green spaces flourish and are protected. There is a moratorium on building on green field sites.
The city is clean and litter free. Public safety is managed by making the city well lit, easily served by public transport and essentially busy. Every available space above shops and offices in the city centre has been turned into apartments so that Bradford is truly a place to live, work and play. Surrounding the centre housing is of good quality, built in small groups not sprawling estates. Old housing stock has been replaced by attractive energy efficient homes with gardens, all with safe play spaces, shops, medical centres, schools and community centres all close by.
Local government is decentralised with the towns and villages surrounding the city being run independently.


All of this is possible. Every idea suggested here builds on a strength our city has already - its cultural diversity, its industrial heritage, the reputation of the Curry Capital, Saltaire's regeneration, the oldest Organic Show in the country, the great achievement of the Local Produce Markets, etc. etc. We are unique - geographically, culturally, historically and we should value our uniqueness not try to ape other cities. Congratulate Leeds on its successes but let it keep them. We don't need to open shopping centres, hotels or conference centres - they are all a short train journey away. Instead we should be celebrating our differences and creating our own identity.

DON'T IMAGINE - DO!

 

Art Attack

I've recently had an inner ear infection that left me dizzy and struggling to focus. Reading, typing and scrolling down screens just made it worse. I couldn't do much outside for fear of falling arse over elbow and anyway it rained most of August. I was beginning to crawl the walls with frustration when I spotted an online art course. It was a free taster to promote the artist's more expensive content and involved daily prompts to encourage you to have a go. So I did. I've always made birthday and Christmas cards so I had some paper and I found a box of acrylic paints that I'd bought for visiting children. 

I'd never painted before. I'd tried setting up a rose or a trio of pears on the kitchen table and making a wonky pencil sketch then sloshing watercolour at it until I chucked the whole muddy mess in the bin, admitting that my art teacher was right all along and I really couldn't draw.

This was different. We were told to put paint straight onto the paper, to whoosh it about with a credit card or a spatula from the kitchen drawer, encouraged to let it dribble or run and to make marks with a twig from the garden. It was like being 4 years old again before the pressures of 'what is it' and 'is it any good.' set in.

Soon every surface was covered in paintings - some drying, some waiting to have layers added or be painted over or be rubbed with sandpaper to reveal the colours underneath.

I tried quick sketches

and impressionist-y poppy fields

and light abstract skylines

and discovered a love of dystopian landscapes. 

But best of all I realised that just because you can't produce an accurate charcoal drawing of a sheep's skull it doesn't mean you can't have fun.