Dog-friendly walks in Silkstone

Silkstone's village park off Manor Road, a small green with a refurbished play area, a path round the edge and open views west up the Silkstone valley. It takes ten minutes to walk round, so it is the local dog walk rather than a destination, but it sits a few hundred yards from the start of the Silkstone Waggonway and works as the parking end of that route when the Cross is full. Barnsley Council refurbished the play equipment here under its Love Where You Live programme.

The line of a horse-drawn waggonway begun in 1809 by the Barnsley Canal Navigation Company to carry Silkstone coal down to Barnby Basin at Cawthorne, now a walking and cycling route of about two and a half miles. Many of the original stone block sleepers are still in the ground along it. The route passes Nabs Wood and the Huskar memorial to the twenty-six children drowned in the pit there in 1838, crosses the A628 and runs on through Silkstone Fall woodland past the scout camp. It starts at Silkstone Cross in the village and finishes at Pot House Hamlet on the Cawthorne road, which has a cafe.