Blawha one

Slow Way not verified yet. Verify Blawha here.

I’m sorry to be blunt but this route is an absolute fail due to non-existent access to the canal towpath at three places – Side Beet Bridge, the industrial zone near Daisyfield/Green Bank, and Cicely Road near the cathedral and station. In addition, there is no access between the “footpath” within the northern Whitebirk industrial area and the busy A6119 dual carriageway with no pavement. I suspect other parts of the footpath through this industrial area are inaccessible or non-existent. And if that weren’t enough, the route goes through a supermarket underground car park, which doesn’t exit where the plot says.
For the section of the route from Whalley as far as the canal, see my review of BlaWha Three.

Update Dec 2025. The start of this walk as depicted by the mapping software can be confusing/incorrect as per the recent reiew comments by Mary. Please use Mary's route BlaWha 3, which has a much better start and also uses the towpath until out of Blackburn, again a much better route than BlaWha 1 (see my last paragraph below).

March 2024 - This is what Slow Ways is all about - a route between two towns, in a reasonably well populated area, which hardly uses roads. Where it does, they are quiet and the route quickly reverts to paths away from the roads. I walked this at the end of Feb, after a particularly wet winter, so some of the field paths were quite wet in places. Away from this sort of weather pattern, I would expect the field paths to be ok underfoot (walking boots would be fine). That said, some of the paths appear to be only lightly used and were ill-defined in places. An ability to use a map (and orient it North) would be very helpful.

Three or four of the stiles were in poor condition and required a modest amount of agility (hence the four star review) and so this path would not suit anybody who struggles on anything other than good, flat paths. It's completely unsuitable as mapped for any form of wheeled transport.

The only amendment I would suggest is to ignore the part where the path leaves the canal towpath and tracks through the streets of Little Harwood and the Philips Road Industrial Estate. These roads can be busy, with numerous cars parked across pavements - staying on the canal path, whilst possibly marginally longer, is a far better and much more enjoyable option. Specifically, the path leaves and/or rejoins the canal towpath at SD 69539 28673 (What 3 Words ///wiring.dates.dices) and SD 70654 30152 (W3W ///tells.motion.trying).

Otherwise this is a walk with some good views and delightful sections of path.

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