Slow Bus to Where?

I'm a Tourist Board's worst nightmare. They attract me to a locale with hard fought-over advertising money, I show up, fling myself at the local hills, bring my own tent, own foodstuffs and provisions, and camp on some remote hillside without paying a penny for the privilege. I then leave; with the Board getting little to no return on their investment. In short, I'm a backpacker. 

And for the past few days, that's what I've been doing over the Yorkshire Dales, the plan being that I'd climb mountains, wander hidden valleys, and generally forget work and responsibility for a while. 

But the plan didn't quite work, because high on a limestone pavement above Kingsdale (which incidentally, is now a close second to Upper Eskdale in the stakes to be my favourite place in the world), my stove decided the scenery was just too good for it, and stopped working. Half an hour of deconstruction, reconstruction, flushing, and many Bad Words later, I admitted defeat, and resigned myself to a diet of marmalade sandwiches, and the fact that I'd have to go home the next day. 

In the morning, The Weather Gods decided that Mike hadn't quite had enough urine extracted from him, so supplied the most astonishing dawn weather (pale clamminess quickly followed by a gorgeously warm sunrise), and after another half hour of stove based aerobic exercise, I headed for the village of Ingleton in the hope of either someone who could help me with the stove, or transport home.

The former came in the guise of the man who runs the outdoor shop in the village, and even he couldn't persuade the thing to light, the latter was a little more exciting. My initial plan had involved more days walking, and a train home from a completely different village, and with the first one ruled out, and the second possible only via a full day's walk, I was forced to indulge in one of my personal delights - slow rural buses.

One of my heroes, A. Wainright, shared this love with me (for the uninitiated, to his fans, A. Wainright is not just a walking writer, he is the walking writer), both of us appreciating the relaxation possible on them, and the fabulous cross-section of humanity on display. On the bus I boarded, I was the only one not to know everyone else, including the driver, who took us on a tour of not only his family, his pets, and his financial situation, but the surrounding countryside as well. I think Britain must be fairly unique in having an under-resourced, and under-appreciated bus system, that has access to an extensive and exciting road network. Occasionally I get the feeling that bus companies set up some bus routes because the roads they take in might be fun to drive over. My bus, which contained six people, cannot have been profitable. 

By long ways, we arrived in Settle. Which is a town that attracts the young and trendy like a magnet does, but entices in the elderly and bikers (of the motorised and un-motorised variety) faster than an unguarded piece of flapjack. From there, things got less exciting in a direct-bus-to-Skipton kind of way. Pausing only briefly to be fleeced out of 20p by a malfunctioning automatic public toilet, which decided that opening and closing the door was so much fun, it would continue to do it, regardless of whether I wanted privacy or not, and on discovery that there were only two buses a year to Bradford, I gave up and opted for a train home.