HIGHEST, LONGEST, DEEPEST. (12/09/09)

  MAPS ARE CREDITED TO THE AA AND BRITISH WATERWAYS.......The latter is a minor masterpiece. There are ten of these small reservoirs all built to provide water to service the Huddersfield Narrow Canal. This is the longest deepest and highest canal in the UK. The Standedge Tunnel lies just north of me and over five hundred feet beneath me. At it's deepest it must be almost a thousand feet beneath the earth's crust. Parallel to the canal tunnel is a railway tunnel, this no doubt causing the demise of the former. The canal was begun in1794 but the three mile long tunnel wasn't completed until 1811. It was finally closed in 1944. A twenty year renovation project costing five million pounds resulted in it's reopening in 2001. For the full words and music look HERE 
I am parked at an old roadhouse, now a pub, previously a filling station and transport cafe on the Trans-Pennine route now serviced by the M62.  The fascinations of this area almost defy explanation. Victorian engineering, totally wild, nature reclaiming what man claimed. Something I find hard to resist. Now to the pictures and a confession, I usually shoot landscapes in aperture priority mode. Was taking some snaps of the Manchester Chapter of the Hells Angels, well their Harleys and had both flash and camera on manual. Forgot didn't I, IQ of a slug! Took a circular walk in almost perfect weather and have had to salvage these. Thanks Photoshop and thanks that the originals are in RAW.
      SPOIL HEAPS......I am assuming that the rectangular building to the right of the heaps once housed a winding engine. This is taken from Pule Hill, not misspelled but a derivation of Pool. Not that I saw any evidence of one. The camp site is in the foreground.
     CULVERT......The moors are awash with these and all sorts of water management systems.
 
CULVERT AND A GREAT WELCOME
        REDBROOK RESERVOIR........There are a further eight or nine of these serving the canal beneath.
       ENGINE HOUSE?
        VENTILLATION SHAFT OR THE CHIMNEY FOR THE ENGINE......Whatever it has been demolished and capped so I suspect the former.
        STANDEDGE.........The path running top right to bottom left is not. It is an incline built to get stone from the quarry down to the road. These are interesting as they required no power. Two parallel ways were laid and the truck carrying the stone was counterbalanced by another, the two connected with a hawser. When the truck was loaded with stone it being heavier than it's partner descended pulling the counter balance to the top. When it was unloaded the counter balance being heavier rolled down pulling the empty truck back up the hill. Neat. The two small structures are ventilation shafts.
        PULE HILL, CAMP SITE AND STANDEDGE EDGE.
I will have to revisit this place, get some pictures of the tunnel itself.
Am busy for a week and then will resume my travels starting in North Wales on Saturday. So posts will be a little hit and miss.