HARROGATE PARISH #36: ROECLIFFE
Roecliffe – “Red Cliff”
This week in Harrogate we continue to make our way along the River Ure. Welcome to the gorgeous village of Roecliffe – literally Red Cliff – which located on the edge of Boroughbridge. It lies close to the A1, and is centred on a village green which doubles up as a school playing field. Although tiny, Roecliffe parish extends for quite a distance in all directions – but most notably towards the A1, where a massive industrial estate provided logistics company Reed Boardall with their HQ.
There are some awesome landmarks in this one. St Mary’s Church is its main attraction. Its believed to be the only church in the country with an entirely vaulted roof. Then there’s the school which dominates the village centre – and you can’t really miss it. It has a spire that’s taller than the church! Roecliffe often attracts tourists. You can stay here thanks to a couple of caravan parks around its edge, but you may also be tempted by the pub. Named The Crown Inn, it has a 16th-century theme, and offers 5 star accommodation.
And lots of people do stay here because close to Roecliffe are the Yorkshire Dales, known for their spectacular scenery. Others prefer to take on the Roecliffe Ramble, a short circular walk that incorporates Westwick Lock.
In all, its not a bad place to come and explore, so lets do just that.
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#Roecliffe, #York, #Yorkshire, #Harrogate, #NorthYorkshire, #Boroughbridge, #Churches, #Chapels, #Schools, #Pubs, #Caravans, #ReedBoardall, #Logistics, #Transport, #Brickworks, #A1, #GreatNorthRoad, #Romans,
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Roecliffe Park:
The Crown Inn:
https://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/18697534.16th-century-inn-went-liquidation-reopens/
Vicarage:
https://www.vrbo.com/en-gb/p8247588
Church:
https://www.roecliffewestwickvillage.co.uk/st-marys-church-history.html
Chapel:
General info:
https://www.roecliffewestwickvillage.co.uk/
Reed Boardall:
Demographics:
https://www.citypopulation.de/en/uk/yorkshireandthehumber/admin/harrogate/E04007410__roecliffe/
Rightmove:
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices/roecliffe.html?page=1
Some of the following music tracks may appear in this video:
Brendan Perkins – “Foxsnow” (B. Perkins)
Brendan Perkins – “Mickey’s House” (B. Perkins)
The Keyhouse – “Voices” (H. Flunder)
The Keyhouse – “Circles” (H. Flunder)
Helen Flunder – “Sun” (H. Flunder)
Helen Flunder – “Angels” (H. Flunder)
Helen Flunder – “C Song” (H. Flunder)
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hello my name is Andy and I Am The Village Idiot I’m armed with a car and a GoPro and an unhealthy amount of time on my hands I’m using that time to attempt to visit every civil Parish in England you’re watching the Harriet series Harriet is a large burough one of the 11 districts of North Yorkshire it’s got 139 civil parishes which one are we in in this episode welcome back to Harriet once again people today we are 2 miles away from the town of burough bridge and I’ve been excited to put this one on the map for you this is a lovely Village and even just looking at it on Google Maps I just knew it was going to be one of the best I’ve ever covered so far here in this part of Yorkshire this one is also where you’ll find the home of Reed ble the uh logistics company who we’ve mentioned before in the cop Grove episode a few months ago now this is RO Cliffe [Music] here’s my disclaimer for people who may be watching me for the first time I say things as I would in my native accent and dialect as a result I may not pronounce things in the same way as the locals do remember I’m a visitor it’s impossible to know everything leave me a comment spin me a like and Bash that subscribe button let’s get to today’s Parish video Ro Cliffe Red Cliff this week in Harriet we continue to make our way along the river Ure welcome to the gorgeous Village of rowcliffe literally Red Cliff which is located on the edge of burough Bridge it lies close to the A1 and it’s centered on a Village Green which doubles up as a playing field although tiny Ro Cliff Parish extends for quite a distance in all directions but most notably towards the A1 where a massive industrial estate provides logistics company Reed bortle with their HQ there are some awesome landmarks in this one St Mary’s Church is its main attraction it’s believed to be the only church in the country with an entirely vaulted Roof then there’s the school which dominates The Village Center and you can’t really miss it it’s got a Spire that’s taller than the church Ro Cliff often attracts tourists you can stay here thanks to a couple of Caravan parks around its Edge but you may also be tempted by the pub named The Crown Inn it has a 16th century theme and offers five-star accommodation and lots of people do stay here because close to riff are the Yorkshire Dales known for their spectacular scenery others prefer to take on the Radcliff ramble a short circular walk that incorporates Westwick lock in all it’s not a bad place to come and explore so let’s go and do just that [Music] welcome to rowcliffe this is effectively a linear settlement but it has a wide Central span defined by The Village Green we start our walk on a narrow street that runs around the southern edge of the green you’re not allowed to park on the road here or the grass but there are designated parking spaces this is the green the focal point of this stunningly beautiful Village and it’s one of the most unique we’ve ever come across we’ll discuss why in a moment and the reason you can’t park on it or near it is simple this is a bus route served by the number 21 to nbra we’re making our way around the Green in an anticlockwise fashion all the landmarks here are based around it with the exception of the school which is on it this house is up first it’s an old primitive Methodist Chapel which was built in 1835 interestingly its Upper Floor is lit entirely by roof Windows only next we have the school Ro Cliff CV which regularly gets outstanding offstein doubles as the school sports field dogs are banned from it for health and safety reasons but it’s still a great place for children of the village to play outside the church is a board which tells you about the Radcliff ramble a circular walk that starts at the church and follows the river year just walking around the village is a good ramble in itself it’s even one Awards this sign tells us it once won the title of Best Kept Village in the lower Dales let’s get the parish marked off by the way we can do that here too by leaving a card on the notice board I’m hoping the 10 people who live in Westwick see this too because that of course was too small to have one for us now are the gates of St Mary’s Church so let’s go in for a nosy the church was built in 1843 for Andrew Lawson of old Roma and was designed by the York architect RH sharp it’s built of stone which came from quaries at cop grve Burton Leonard and old bmana the latter of which was used by the Romans the most notable feature here is the roof the rare semicircular shape is known by Architects as a wagon head Vault and it’s believed to be the only church roof in the country country of its type although there is a regular service here St Mary’s was declared redundant in 1983 and is now in the hands of the church’s conservation trust next to the church is the old vicarage which was built in 1854 attached to it is the vest purpose built in 2005 as a holiday home outside on the road is a phone box now A Book Exchange and a wall mounted post box rocliffe has no post office but that’s not surpris surprising in times past not much work was available for such a small undeveloped area males tended to work in agriculture whilst females worked in domestic service the situation hasn’t really changed over the last 150 years and so roiff remained short of basic services such as a shop burough Bridge provides access to those The Village does have a pub though this is the crown a 16th century coaching in which offers five-star accommodation it’s had some rough times of late it went into voluntary liquid a in 2019 but it’s now been refurbished by the coastal and Country in group if staying in the pub accommodation isn’t for you you could always buy one of the park homes that’s behind it owned by Turner Parks Radcliff park has 22 plots designed with those aged 50 or over in mind and all of this can be easily reached by bicycle Ro Cliff lies on sustrans Route 688 and the national byway awesome okay so that’s R Cliff Village it’s all around that Central Village Green and it is beautiful however we are not done with this episode yet by a long chalk you see roiff parish is much bigger than the village itself and out to the east there’s a big industrial estate and that is where Reed bortle are based now we’re going to go for a long walk down a foot path which will take us towards it well at least that was the plan you can see here this uh this house here has got a public foot path way marker just there so I went through through the gate past that car you can see there to another gate through that and then it just comes to an end the uh the foot path just stops and there’s a fence there and a and a hedge so that foot path obviously doesn’t exist anymore or at least if it does it’s not clearly way marked this is a bit of a problem because that path would have taken me to read border there’s only one other way to do it and that’s in the car um but I’m not sure how much of this I’m going to be able to get now because from the road you can’t really see anything we’ll see what happens it wasn’t just Reed bortle that the foot path would have led to you see the industrial estate also has a few other hidden secrets which I was hoping to uncover one of them lies close to this road this is Brickyard Road and just to the West is a second street named claypit Lane by now the longtime viewers should all be able to work out what was once here yep this was a brick works the only remaining evidence of the Brick Works comes in the form of a disused Clay Pit which has now been filled with water and turned into a private Nature Reserve had the foot path been accessible this is what it would have passed first running around the edge of the lake Behind these buildings before passing along the edge of Reed Bortles warehouses it’s clearly marked on many Maps so there must be another way to get to it I though have no idea how to do it in any event the fact I had to drive this meant I could show you a bit more of the Industrial Area this is barane which runs to a roundabout near the A1 before entering burough Bridge whilst it’s greatly industrial on its southern side to the north there’s actually another campsite burough Bridge camping and caravanning the next street up is called Bean’s close and again it’s full of small businesses I’d like to draw your attention though to the large white warehouses that Tower over this dead end they all belong to Reed bortle the company specialized in temperature controled distribution their site here in riff is the second largest cold storage facility in the UK they began life in 1977 as alaton cold storage limited co-founded by Mike Stewart Keith Reed and Guy Reed the latter of whom lived at copgrove Hall the company was originally based in North Allon they went on to buy General Hall firm Wilson’s transport who already had a site in bough bridge and land for expansion subsequently the two businesses emerged in 1992 the business became Reed bortle and Keith Reed helped design their first cold store now it’s one of the leading names in Frozen Logistics services and being so close to the A1 is a major advantage to finish with we need to talk about the A1 actually after passing under a bridge Beyond Reed bortle and turning left at a roundabout you find yourself on the a168 which runs for a while parallel to the A1 both roads cross the river y just nor nor of Radcliffe where the A1 crosses the year there’s a bit of Roman history excavations in 1993 uncovered two first century Roman fors at that crossing point they were never major settlements though and it’s believed they were shortlived and abandoned in favor of alra one mile to the east how could the Romans abandon such a lovely bit of Yorkshire how very dare they I can only assume alra must be much better but we’ll see when we get there we’re staying with the river Ure for the time being though come back next week when we’ll be seeing another Village that sits on its banks see you [Music] later thanks thanks for watching this video folks don’t forget to like this episode if you haven’t already it really makes a difference with YouTube if you’re new here subscribe to the channel for more videos like this and give us a share too if you’ve got friends who’d like it you can find all the links to my social media accounts below as well as my buy me a coffee page where you can donate to the channel also if you’ve enjoyed this episode have a look at some more videos in this series until next time I’ve been Andy also known as The Village Idiot and I’m out
1 Comment
Another very pretty village and interesting history. Many thanks.