Otley

Well I have canceled New Zealand and will "instead" stay for some days for a short holiday at friends in Otley.

Below info from Wikipedia:

Otley is a town within the metropolitan borough of the City of Leeds, in West Yorkshire, England, by the River Wharfe. Historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, the town has a total resident population of 14,348.

The town lies in Wharfedale, and is divided in two by the River Wharfe. It is surrounded mostly by arable farmland.

The south side of the valley is dominated by a large gritstone escarpment overlooking Otley called The Chevin. In 1944, Major Le G.G.W. Horton Fawkes of Farnley Hall
donated 263 acres (1.1 km²) of land on the Chevin to the people of
Otley. This has now been expanded to 700 acres (2.8 km²) and is known
as Chevin Forest Park. It was from the quarry on The Chevin that the foundation stones for the Houses of Parliament were hewn.

To the east and west of Otley there are flooded gravel pits, where
sand and gravel have been extracted in the 20th century. The gravel
pits to the east are known as Knotford Nook, and are a noted birdwatching site. Those to the west are devoted to angling and sailing.

To the West are the nearby villages of Burley-in-Wharfedale and Menston. To the East is the smaller village of Pool-in-Wharfedale.

Otley lies in the Leeds North West constituency of the UK Parliament and is represented by MP Greg Mulholland (Liberal Democrats). It is part of the Otley & Yeadon ward on Leeds City Council and is represented by three Liberal Democrat Councillors Ryk Downes, Colin Campbell & Graham Kirkland. It is twinned with the French town of Montereau, south of Paris.

Otley and Wharfedale ward has a population of 24,000, and Otley itself has a population of 14,348, according to Census 2001.

The town hosts Wharfedale General Hospital which serves the surrounding area, and also Prince Henry's Grammar School, which holds Language college status.

The town dates from before Roman times, and belonged to the Archbishopric of York. Otley is close to Leeds and thus may have formed part of the kingdom of Elmet. The southern flank of the Wharfe valley which lies above Otley is known as The Chevin a term that has close parallels to the welsh term "Cefn", meaning ridge and may be a survival of the ancient cumbric
language. Remains of the old Archbishop's Manor House were found during
the construction of St Joseph's RC Primary School near to the River Wharfe. The town formed an important crossing point of the River Wharfe and was an administrative centre in the wapentake
of Skyrack in the early medieval period, and this importance continued
with its being the seat of the Mid-Wharfedale Urban District council up
until the local council reorganisation of 1974.

The first church was built there in the early 7th century. In All Saints Parish Church there are the remains of two Early Anglo-Saxon
crosses, one of which has been reproduced for the town's war memorial.
Buried there is an ancestor of the 19th century American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and the grandparents of Thomas Fairfax who commanded Parliament's forces at the Battle of Marston Moor
in 1644. In the graveyard of the parish church stands a replica of an
entrance to the Bramhope Railway Tunnel, a monument to those killed
during its construction.

Otley is a market town
and has held a regular market for over a thousand years. Market days
are Tuesday, Friday and Saturday, and there is also a Farmers' Market
on the last Sunday of every month. Documented history for the market
begins in 1222 when King Henry III granted the first Royal Charter.
Cattle markets are still held at the Wharfedale Farmers' Auction Mart
on East Chevin Road although the Bridge End Auction Mart closed a
number of years ago and has now been demolished.

Thomas Chippendale, the famous furniture maker, was born at Farnley near Otley, and his statue stands in the town next to the old Prince Henry's Grammar School in Manor Square that he once attended. The current site of Prince Henry's Grammar School is in Farnley Lane.

J.M.W. Turner, the famed painter, visited Otley in 1797,
aged 22, when commissioned to paint watercolours of the area. He was so
attracted to Otley and the surrounding area that he returned time and
time again. His friendship with Walter Ramsden Fawkes made him a
regular visitor to Farnley Hall, two miles from Otley. The stormy
backdrop of Hannibal Crossing The Alps is reputed to have been inspired
by a storm over Otley's Chevin while Turner was staying at Farnley Hall.

The Wharfedale Printing Machine was developed in Otley by William Dawson and William Payne. An early example can be seen in Otley Museum.

Famous Methodist preacher John Wesley
was a frequent visitor to the town in the 18th century. Famously his
horse died in the town and is buried in the grounds of the parish
church. Its grave is marked by an unusual toblerone-shaped stone, also
known locally as the "Donkey Stone". In his Journal for 1761
we read, "July 6 Monday; In the evening I preached at Otley and
afterwards talked with many of the Society. There is reason to believe
that ten or twelve of these are filled with the love of God." One of
the main streets in Otley (Wesley Street) is still named after him.