Castle Hill

on Aug 16 in General by

I’ve lived in Huddersfield for 33 years, on and off. Yet in all that time I’ve never been to the top of it’s most famous landmark – Victoria Tower up on Castle Hill.

The Tower is pretty insignificant historically, being built as recently as 1899 as a monument to Queen Victoria. But the hill itself is far more interesting, and remains of fortifications have been found there from the Iron Age, the time of the Roamn occupation, and also the Middle Ages.

There are also legends that the hill was the site of ancient Camelot – but to be fair there are similar legends attached to every single prominent spot in the UK, and all of them are complete rubbish. If you looked hard enough you would probably find rumors that Robin Hood was buried up there too, as well as Boudicca, the Scarlet Pimpernel, and possibly even Biggles.

Still, Castle Hill is a pretty cool place and we’re lucky to have it.

We were driving past this afternoon and decided on a whim to go and see if there was any kite flying going on as it’s definitely the place to be for stuff like that. We’ve even got a fair few photos of us flying kites up there ourselves. Here’s one from back when Kerry was pregnant with Evan, just so you can get an idea what the tower looks like:

Lets go fly a kite

There weren’t that many kite flyers up there today, probably because it was a bit too windy. But what we did find was that the doors to Victoria Tower were open and visitors were being allowed to climb to the top.

I’m sure the council must have some sort of schedule for opening the tower, but in 30 odd years of living in the area I’ve never been there when people were allowed in. So it was pretty much a given that we’d be paying our £3 for our family ticket and trudging our way up the stairs. After all, I might be 60 the next time it opens.

Unfortunately we didn’t have either of our decent cameras with us, and so had to resort to taking photos on the crappy ones in our phones. I did manage to get a nice one of Amy sulking about being asked to pose on a window ledge though, and an arty but not very illustrative one of the view from the top:

IMG_0177

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So that’s another thing ticked off my “things to do before I die” list.

Of course that list doesn’t actually exist, I just add things to it retrospectively as I’ve done them. It’s a fine strategy and I’d recommend it to everyone. I avoid a lot of disappointment that way, and don’t end up backing myself into convert an old bus into a campervan or writing a manual on industrial energy efficiency before I’m forty like some certain brothers I could mention.

Related posts:

  1. Up to the highest hight
  2. Is it me, or is that a 16 mile long hill?
  3. Snowy School Run, part 2
  4. Looking at dead animals for fun
  5. In which I have a burning desire and prostrate myself at your feet

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