A Lyme Park Loop

12.4.12

Walking with; Nobody

When I first moved to the North West one of the first places I visited was Lyme Park and it's remained a firm favourite ever since whenever I get the itch for a few miles. The house itself is the largest in Cheshire and is Grade one listed. It was built in the latter part of the 16th Century and modified in the 1720s by Giacomo Leoni and then by Lewis Wyatt in the 19th Century. The Legh family gave the house to the National Trust in 1946 and more recently it found fame as the "Pemberley", Mr Darcy's house in the BBC adaptation of "Pride and Prejudice" by Jane Austen.

I started out in Disley and made my way towards the Park before beginning the slow ascent towards The Cage, originally built as a hunting lodge and commanding 360 degree views including a herd of Fallow Deer. Bypassing the house I started out on The Gritstone Trail and climbed steadily through Knightslow Woods and out onto Park Moor. The path leads up to the Bowstones, remnants of an Anglo-Saxon cross before following a ridge with beautiful views across the Peak District. It was clear and I could see snow on the slopes of Kinder as well as views all the way to the distinctive profile of Shutlingsloe in the South. It was muddy underfoot but the walking was easy and there were plenty of new lambs and a couple of buzzards to keep me entertained. I dropped down towards Pott Shrigley and then started another climb up Bakestonedale Moor which had great views across to last weeks walk on White Nancy and the Kerridge Saddle. Dropping down past Moorside Quarry I continued down to re-enter Lyme Park at the West Gate and climbed the track through Pursegate Woods which had a few late bluebells and a plentiful supply of Wild Garlic coming through and making the lower half of the track smell like an Italian restaurant.

It started to rain as I reached the carpark and I was regretting my decision not to park on site, but as I pottered on towards Disley I was rewarded with some fantastic views of the stormclouds hovering over Kinder which made the last half mile in a torrential downpour almost worth while!

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Ashton Clough and the Shelf Stones on Bleaklow

14.03.12

Walking with; Nobody

I fancied something a little more challenging today and a spot of navigation practice, so where better than Bleaklow and the peat bogs atop it? Bleaklow is a classic example of peat covered gritstone moorland riven with Groughs and in poor visibility very hard to find your way around. It has two peaks above 2000 feet and today I was aiming for the Trig Point at Higher Shelf Stones which sits at 2037 feet.

The initial route along Shelf Brook was a pleasant meander along the valley floor with Pheasant and Curlew plentiful and good views towards Bleaklow and James's Thorn. The path is known as Doctor's Gate and is reputed to be a Roman route linking the forts of Ardotalia in Glossop and Navio in the Hope Valley. The track is supposed to be named after Doctor John Talbot who had a family seat in Sheffield and needed to link it to his parish in Glossop, either way it is a pleasant introduction ahead of the tougher work required to ascend Bleaklow. Shortly after the Edwin Ambler memorial footbridge I left the path and followed the Brook along to the foot of Ashton Clough, a perfect spot for a coffee before tackling the climb. One of the great advantages of Open Access Land is how easy it makes it to find yourself some real solitude. Sat down by the water with Grouse scudding by and Curlews calling I felt as if I could have been the only person in the hills......

The climb up Ashton Clough involved a little scrambling and the stream bed made footing a little uncertain from time to time but it was exhilarating stuff and as I climbed the views back down towards the valley were worth the effort. I passed some wreckage from a June 1945 plane crash and when I sent a hail of stones tumbling behind me I disturbed a Mountain Hare, still in his Winter coat which now made him stand out starkly against the non-snowy background. By the time I'd reached the top the clouds had dropped pretty low and visibility was not fantastic so I skirted the edge and headed across to Lower Shelf Stones where I thought I might sit it out with a tuna sarnie and a book until the cloud lifted. It didn't take long and refreshed I headed over to the high point of the walk at Higher Shelf Stones Trig point. This whole area is crisscrossed with deep groughs and peat bogs and has a real rugged beauty to it, it also has the most spectacular plane wreck on the moors. In November 1948 , a Boeing RB-29A American Airforce reconaissance plane with 13 crew members on board crashed in heavy cloud killing all crew members and the wreckage is still strewn across a wide area (for more information on this visit http://www.peakdistrictaircrashes.co.uk/pages/peakdistrict/peakdistrict44-61999.htm). The whole site still has a very eerie air to it which was exacerbated today by cloud blowing across it.

I headed East towards the Pennine Way but decided to take the path running parallel to the edge of the beautiful and spectacular Crooked Clough. Another Hare broke cover up here and I put up numerous Grouse en route as I followed the Clough back down to Doctor's Gate which led me gently back down to Shelf Brook and my starting point on the outskirts of Glossop.

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Kinder with the Rangers

4.3.12
Walking with; Simon Huddlestone from The Peak District Rangers


I was back at Kinder this weekend for the first of my "pre-walks" as part of my bid to become a Peak District Ranger. I am starting to see why people love what I'd always considered a big, ugly lump quite so much. We set off from the Briefing Centre at Bowden Bridge after visiting the plaque that immortalises the Kinder trespassers. We headed back the way I'd come on Wednesday, along the Sett valley and up Coldwell Clough, even at this stage we could see the snow dusting the tops and Simon warned me that conditions might be pretty bad on Kinder. Walking with a Ranger of 30 years standing was informative and Simon told me a lot about the industrial history of the area and how Hayfield used to be famous for printworks due to the quality of the water in the local rivers. We climbed up to the Edale Cross with a bitter wind driving the snow into our faces and decided that we'd head for the relative shelter of Edale Rocks for some lunch.
On Wednesday I'd followed The Pennine Way but today we headed along the brilliantly named Swine's Back tramping through the virgin snow and following a tumbledown wall to the Rocks where we wedged ourselves into a sheltered-ish spot and considered our options. Although the visibility was poor, it was better than in the fog on Wednesday so we continued on to the Kinder Cairn and head down, battling into the wind, we carried on towards Red Brook. Red Brook was running fast and although the snow was still falling we'd come across a few other walkers and so decided to press on towards the Kinder Downfall and aim for a descent at William Clough. We spotted a couple of hardy Grouse by the Downfall and the views from the edge down towards Broad Clough and the Kinder Reservoir were fantastic. We decided to drop down into the valley just before William Clough and although the conditions underfoot were very slippery we made our way down towards the Reservoir and a welcome brew in the shelter of the valley. Simon told me a few more tales about the area, including the fact that before the Kinder reservoir Hayfield wasn't connected to the sewerage system and as a reward for the inconvenience that building the reservoir caused the village was finally connected to mains drainage. We headed back along the reservoir watching a flock of 14 Curlews before the Kinder Road took us back in the shade of Kinder Bank Wood to our starting point, cold, wet but exhilarated!
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