Huddersfield A - Z - Beaumont Park

Beaumont Park was officially opened in 1883 by one of Queen Victoria's children, after the rocky and precipitous site had been donated to The Huddersfield Corporation by the wealthy landowner Henry Frederick Beaumont. He wanted to create Huddersfield's first public park "to increase the happiness, promote the good health and elevate the minds of the people of Huddersfield'.

The park took 5 years to complete and proved very expensive due to the nature of the site. At one point, rates were raised by one sixth of a penny to pay for a new access road.

In the shot you can see the Lower Gate, which cost £275 to build and was the grand entrance to the park from the newly built steam tram line from Lockwood. It has recently been renovated, but when I first discovered it with the kids 15 years or so ago, it was wildly overgrown and looked like something from a Scooby Doo adventure!

The whole park is quite wonderful, completely wild in places and you can go for ages without seeing a soul, wandering round winding paths, steep slippery steps, and suddenly finding yourself under a huge cliff-face with a random arch carved into it. Yet at the other end of the park this morning there was a brass band playing Glenn Miller tunes, and a bear hunt organised for children. Lizzie dog had her first ice-cream whilst listening to the band.

About 6 or 7 years ago I took the kids to the park 3 days after Easter. We were walking around one of the wilder sections, when we started to see Easter eggs hidden in the trees, in bushes and behind rocks. I assumed that had been left over from an Easter Egg hunt, so I told them they could pick them up but not eat them as they must have been outside for a few days. Great fun ensued, and they assembled a great big pile of eggs from the ingenious hiding places. We left them in the middle of a clearing, and as we walked back up the sloping path to civilization, a group of 4 or 5 excited young children ran past us wearing bunny ears, wellington boots and clutching baskets. They were followed by their pleased looking parents. We just kept on walking!

There's only really one song to go with Park!

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