Dog-friendly Elsecar

A Green Flag park on Armroyd Lane with terraced ornamental gardens dropping to the old canal-feeder reservoir, which is a local nature reserve with a bird hide on its bank. Barnsley Council sets no lead rule here, so the borough dog control PSPO is the whole of the law: clear up at once, carry bags, keep out of the fenced play area. The circuit round the water is level and the climb back through the terraces is the only gradient. Elsecar Heritage Centre and the heritage railway are five minutes away at the bottom of Wentworth Road, so the park and the yard make one outing.

Three miles of the Trans Pennine Trail running alongside the line of the disused Elsecar branch canal from Elsecar Heritage Centre down the Dearne valley to RSPB Old Moor. It passes the site of Hemingfield Colliery, whose engine house is still standing and occasionally open, and comes out at the edge of the Dearne Valley wetlands. The surface is hard and level the whole way, which makes it one of the few genuinely all-weather walks in the borough, and it is shared with cyclists and horses. Walk it one way and come back on the 226 bus, or turn round at Old Moor for a six mile round trip.

The former ironworks and colliery workshops of the Fitzwilliam estate on Wath Road, now a run of stone buildings round a yard holding antiques units, craft workshops, a heritage railway and the only Newcomen-type engine still in its original place. Admission and parking are both free, so it works as a stop rather than a day out, and the yard is flat setts and tarmac. Dogs are welcome outside and at the outdoor seating of both cafes, The Pantry and Brambles Tea Rooms, and the centre asks that they are kept on a lead. Assistance dogs are welcome in all areas of the buildings; other dogs are not taken inside.