Towneley Hall
This walk starts in the grounds of magnificent Towneley Hall. For first time visitors it will be difficult not to wander into the museum and art gallery. This writer will not deter you. Particular highlights of the house itself are the Long Gallery and the Towneley family chapel. Aside from this the museum presents a view of Burnley's past, industrial and rural, in its various exhibitions. Run by the Borough Council since 1902 it has been said that Towneley Hall is the jewel in its crown. This can be disputed – surely it is a jewel in Lancashire's crown!
Time: 3˝ hours
Character: A walk that makes moderate demands, with some steady ascents. Mainly field and pasture on the edge of wild moors.
Start: Riverside Car park, Towneley Hall. From M65 motorway junction 9 follow A679 towards Burnley and Halifax. At first set of traffic lights turn right onto A646. (From this point onwards Towneley Hall is signed) Keep on this crossing Manchester Road, A682, until you reach the junction of A671 Todmorden Road. Turn sharp left to descend into Burnley. The entrance is on the right at the bottom of the hill a mile further on. Fork left for Riverside car park once inside grounds.
Map
1. Towneley Hall to Hurstwood (3 Km or 2 miles: 1 hour)
Walk past the distinctive roundhouse information point (and toilets) admiring the hall from afar along an impressive drive.
With the river (Calder) on your left keep to the edge of playing fields until a footbridge is reached. At this point you are on the Burnley Way a 64 Km/40 mile footpath that circles Burnley passing through a surprising variety of countryside.
After crossing the footbridge the route begins to climb and reaches open pasture with wide views across to Pendle. At Cliviger Laithe, a cluster of neat properties, follow the drive for a short distance and then bear right to a metal gate and stile.
Keep ahead on a broad, green track across pasture.
At the next wall look for a stile on the left.
Cross it and with a gritstone wall on your right, continue your climb.
By a stone stile cross the next wall and soon after arrive at a 5 bar gate that gives out onto Red Lees Road.
Cross the road to take another footpath which will put you on Foxstones Lane. On reaching it, turn right. After 400m turn left past a farm house with a dove cote and drop to Foxstones Bridge.
Follow the track as it bends to the right to reach Hurstwood directly in front of Spencer’s House.
2. Hurstwood to Swinden (3 Km or 2 miles: 1 hour)
Edmund Spenser, the hugely influential Elizabethan poet whose remains lie in Westminster Abbey, had links with Hurstwood and stayed at the hall at sometime during his action packed and relatively short life.
In his footsteps follow the Burnley Way through the village, past the chapel and to a gate and stile.
Beyond this bear left as the Way begins to skirt a conifer plantation on the west side of Hurstwood Reservoir. At a point where the wall on the left ends, and beyond a stile, you will arrive at a waymark post indicating a footpath to the left.
Take it keeping a wall on the left. Pylons to the right will serve as a good reference point on this next part, since your way across to the Gorple Road will run roughly parallel to them.
Cross into the next field and keep ahead until you reach the Gorple Road. (Not a road at all but a fabled moorland track leading into the wilds of the South Pennines) Cross the road and the stile opposite, and with a wall on your right keep ahead.
After a stile, cross open pasture to reach a track as it descends towards a service road by Swinden reservoir. (Your route will have almost converged with the pylons.)
On reaching the service road turn left and follow it to Exwistle Road. Keep ahead and before you begin to climb up the hill, turn left onto a footpath.
3. Swinden to Worsthorne (2 Km or 1˝ miles: 40 mins)
If it is open the Roggerham Gate Inn is recommended as a good place for refreshment. It is a short way beyond the footpath leading left.
Back on the path, which in fact is another part of the Burnley Way, follow it as it dog legs right at the end of Lee Green Reservoir.
After a stone stepped stile, turn left to enter a wooded valley. After 250m look for an unusual stone bridge crossing Swinden Water on the left.
Take it and after a conventional footbridge climb steeply up the valley side. Pass by a distinctive stone enclosure with a utility building at its centre, to a (broken) stile on the skyline of the next rise.
At the next (well maintained) stile turn right and follow the fence/wall to arrive at a stile before the mesh fencing of a property.
Follow the footpath to the left and when it reaches the farm lane turn left on a track that will bring you into the neat terraces of Worsthorne Village
4.Worsthorne to Towneley Hall (3 Km or 2 miles: 1 hour)
At the end of Lennox Street turn left and walk into the centre of Worsthorne. With the church on your left walk to the end of the cul-de-sac and turn right onto a footpath that quickly leads across pastureland with wide views across Burnley.
From this viewpoint it is easy to see why it has been dubbed as “A town amidst the Pennines” by one local writer (Frank Ashworth). The way is clear, at first along a flagged section, through metal kissing gates to Hurstwood Lane. By turning left readers can make their way into Hurstwood and then retrace their earlier outward steps. Alternatively, with a bit of road walking, they can turn right, then left at the next junction onto Salterford Lane.The lane dips down to a bridge.
A short way beyond it, on the right, take a footpath that leads up to and crosses Red Lees Road. On the far side it drops to the track leading down to Cliviger Laithe, and once more on the Burnley Way it will be a straight forward affair to find your way back to Towneley Hall.