Name: THE STANZA STONES TRAIL, 3RD SECTION, BINGLEY TO ILKLEY, 14.5 MILES.
Start: 2025-11-22T09:16:00Z
End: 2025-11-22T16:30:00Z

**FOR THIS HIKE YOU NEED THE WEST YORKSHIRE DAY SAVER, TRAIN ONLY, PAPER TICKET.**
**At Leeds Train Station you need to catch the 8:56 Skipton train on platform est. 0A. It will arrive at Bingley at 09:14 The walk will start from Bingley train station at 9:16. The return journey will be from Ilkley. Make sure you have the correct clothing and sturdy footwear for all the weather conditions you might expect plus sufficient food and water in your rucksack. Do not go in front of the leader unless you have informed him of your intention to do this.**

**THE STANZA STONES TRAIL.**
**FOREWARD BY SIMON ARMITAGE THE POET LAURATE.**
For many thousands of years people have been coming to moors around West Yorkshire to offer their prayers and express their desires in the form of carved stones. The Stanza Stones poems are my contribution to that unbroken and ongoing dialogue, and consist of six carved poems sited across the South Pennine Watershed, all celebrating or paying their respects to the element which gave shape and form to this region, namely water. The water that sculpted the valleys, the water that powered the industries, the water we take for granted but which is our most precious life-giving substance.
Each carved poem describes water in one of its many forms, hence a Beck Stone, a Puddle Stone, a Mist Stone, a Rain Stone and a Dew Stone. The Snow Stone, the first to be carved, is situated in an old quarry on Pule Hill above the village of Marsden where I was born and grew up.
In my experience the moors are both brutal and blissful, an essential part of our ecology, economy, our vocabulary and our subconscious. So as well as being landmarks in their own right, I hope the Stanza Stones act as beacons of inspiration, encouraging people to engage with West Yorkshire and Lancashire’s great outdoors in thought, word and deed. And those looking hard enough might stumble across a seventh Stanza Stone, a secret stone left in an unnamed location within the Watershed area, waiting to be discovered and read.

mick

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THE STANZA STONES TRAIL, 3RD SECTION, BINGLEY TO ILKLEY, 14.5 MILES. 

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THE STANZA STONES TRAIL, 3RD SECTION, BINGLEY TO ILKLEY, 14.5 MILES.

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