Studley Royal Park including the Ruins of and Jodrell Bank Observatory

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Studley Royal Park including the Ruins of

   Fountains Abbey is the largest monastic ruin in Britain, and it stands in a valley so green and quiet that it hardly seems real. In 1132, a group of Benedictine monks, dissatisfied with the lax life at York, left their abbey and sought a stricter rule, and with the help of the archbishop, they settled in this remote valley beside the river Skell. They became Cistercians, and over the next four centuries the abbey grew rich on sheep and wool, building a huge church, a vaulted cellarium, and a tower that still rises above the ruins. Henry VIII dissolved the abbey in 1539, and the roofs were stripped for lead.

   Read the complete Studley Royal Park including the Ruins of write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Studley Royal Park including the Ruins of is where the day begins. Next is Saltaire.

2. 2. Saltaire

   Titus Salt was a Bradford wool magnate who got tired of the smoke, the sickness and the squalor of the city, and in 1851 he began building a new mill and a new town beside the river Aire, a few miles north. Saltaire, his name joined to the river's, was a model community: tidy stone terraces of different sizes for different grades of worker, a hospital, a school, almshouses, a church, a park, and a huge Italianate mill with a campanile chimney. The mill opened in 1853 and was among the largest in the world. UNESCO listed the village in 2001 as an outstanding example of Victorian industrial planning.

   Read the complete Saltaire write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Saltaire comes up about 49 km into the recorded legs. Next is Jodrell Bank Observatory.

3. 3. Jodrell Bank Observatory

   You see the dish long before you arrive. The Lovell Telescope at Jodrell Bank rises out of the flat Cheshire farmland like something from a science fiction film, a white steel bowl seventy six metres across, tilting slowly to follow its targets across the sky. When it was completed in 1957 it was the largest steerable radio telescope in the world, and one of its first tasks was tracking the rocket that carried Sputnik into orbit. The observatory, founded by Bernard Lovell after the Second World War, has been at the forefront of radio astronomy ever since, and it was listed by UNESCO in 2019 for its role in the development of the science.

   Read the complete Jodrell Bank Observatory write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 152 km into the recorded legs you reach Jodrell Bank Observatory. Next is back through Saltaire.

4. 4. back through Saltaire

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Saltaire write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   back through Saltaire, late in the day. Next is Studley Royal Park including the Ruins of.

5. 5. Studley Royal Park including the Ruins of

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Studley Royal Park including the Ruins of write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Back at Studley Royal Park including the Ruins of. That is the ride.