0:00:34 > 0:00:37This is Calderdale in West Yorkshire,
0:00:37 > 0:00:40a mix of Pennine moor and mill towns,
0:00:40 > 0:00:42craggy hills and wooded vales.
0:00:42 > 0:00:44It's beautiful.
0:00:49 > 0:00:52Calderdale sits a few miles west of Halifax.
0:00:52 > 0:00:56The bit I'm exploring is round and about the village of Luddenden...
0:00:58 > 0:01:01..a little-known area that features prominently in this book,
0:01:01 > 0:01:05the rather marvellously titled A Spring-time Saunter.
0:01:12 > 0:01:13Published 100 years ago,
0:01:13 > 0:01:16it was written by a local chap called Whiteley Turner
0:01:16 > 0:01:20and though winter still lingers in this landscape,
0:01:20 > 0:01:23I'll be making my own springtime saunter regardless.
0:01:24 > 0:01:26So, David, who was this Whiteley Turner?
0:01:26 > 0:01:27Well, Whiteley Turner,
0:01:27 > 0:01:31he's an ordinary guy who works in a textile mill down in Luddenden
0:01:31 > 0:01:33and when he was 12,
0:01:33 > 0:01:35he has an accident in the mill
0:01:35 > 0:01:37and his arm gets caught in a carding machine
0:01:37 > 0:01:39and it rips off the arm, basically. Oh, gosh.
0:01:39 > 0:01:42He has to have the rest of it amputated.
0:01:42 > 0:01:44He can no longer work in the mill because of that
0:01:44 > 0:01:46and it means that he has to do something else.
0:01:46 > 0:01:50He goes back to school and then he gets a job taking tea and coffee
0:01:50 > 0:01:53round to these isolated farms.
0:01:53 > 0:01:56It was on these rounds that the remarkable Turner
0:01:56 > 0:02:00started writing newspaper articles about what he saw.
0:02:00 > 0:02:01From them came the book.
0:02:07 > 0:02:08When Turner made this journey,
0:02:08 > 0:02:11there would have been mills all along this valley.
0:02:11 > 0:02:14They've long gone, but the power behind them remains...
0:02:17 > 0:02:19WIND WHISTLES
0:02:19 > 0:02:22..not the howling wind,
0:02:22 > 0:02:24but water.
0:02:24 > 0:02:28"Now we command a goodly view of Fly Flatt Reservoir.
0:02:28 > 0:02:30"How shallow the water looks.
0:02:30 > 0:02:35"So low that little islands of black heath protrude above its surface,
0:02:35 > 0:02:38"seemingly making it possible to hop from one another
0:02:38 > 0:02:40"to the embankment on the far side." And here it is.
0:02:40 > 0:02:43There's not a lot of hopping across it today, though, David.
0:02:43 > 0:02:46No, you certainly couldn't hop across it today, could you?
0:02:46 > 0:02:48There's far more water in it than when he saw it.
0:02:48 > 0:02:50This is Warley Moor Reservoir.
0:02:50 > 0:02:52Fly Flatt is the other name for it.
0:02:52 > 0:02:53The community of Fly Flatt is behind us
0:02:53 > 0:02:55and you can see that in the picture,
0:02:55 > 0:02:59all the various farms are on the picture and they've all gone now.
0:02:59 > 0:03:00Nothing but heaps of stone.
0:03:04 > 0:03:07The coming of the reservoirs changed the landscape
0:03:07 > 0:03:10and made the mill owners rich.
0:03:10 > 0:03:13They built huge stately piles with this new-found wealth
0:03:13 > 0:03:17and there was none grander than Castle Carr,
0:03:17 > 0:03:19in its day the finest building in the area,
0:03:19 > 0:03:22now no more than a pile of ruins.
0:03:22 > 0:03:25David, this place is extraordinary, isn't it?
0:03:25 > 0:03:27It's amazing, isn't it? Yes.
0:03:27 > 0:03:30It's weird seeing something in such a state of disrepair
0:03:30 > 0:03:32compared to its picture in the book, which is, well,
0:03:32 > 0:03:35it's indistinguishable, isn't it? Yes.
0:03:35 > 0:03:37And all that's left is just the entrance
0:03:37 > 0:03:39and the portcullis is still there
0:03:39 > 0:03:41and this is their main gateway into a big courtyard.
0:03:41 > 0:03:43The carriages would have come in here
0:03:43 > 0:03:45and the fountain that was actually in the courtyard,
0:03:45 > 0:03:50in the centre, has ended up in Leeds, near the railway station.
0:03:50 > 0:03:55Castle Carr fell into disrepair and in 1960, was finally broken up.
0:03:55 > 0:03:58The lead from its roof and most of its stone was sold off.
0:04:06 > 0:04:09Whiteley Turner passed into obscurity.
0:04:09 > 0:04:12The cost of publishing his book left him penniless
0:04:12 > 0:04:14and he died aged just 54,
0:04:14 > 0:04:17but Spring-time Saunter remains a fitting testament
0:04:17 > 0:04:20to one of Yorkshire's most beautiful landscapes.
0:04:30 > 0:04:32Some of the country's best home cooks