Brough, Aston, and Bamford

My train was late this morning but so was the bus at Sheffield and so I was able to catch it. I travelled to Brough in the Hope Valley and walked to Hope Station and then uphill across the fields to Aston.

I continued climbing, using the Aston Bridleway to reach Hope Cross.

I descended through the woods to the shore of Ladybower Reservoir. It had been a mostly misty and cloudy day so far but for an hour or so as I was walking down by the water's edge it was quite bright, and even sunny at times.

'Dogs must be held on lead' seems to be an unusual choice of wording on this Peak and Northern sign; does it mean that dogs must be put on their leads and then carried?

The majority of today's photos feature the reservoir.

When I reached the dam wall I headed south along the Thornhill Trail to finish the walk at the bus stop at Bamford Station.

Heatherdene, Hope, and Castleton

I travelled to Heatherdene this morning, on the bank of the Ladybower Reservoir. I started taking photographs as soon as I got off the bus and continued to do so until I reached the woodland on the other side of the dam wall.

The smell of the pines and the autumnal dampness was quite calming as I climbed up through the woodland and then used a path I'd not used before to get to Hope Cross, providing me with some different views of The Great Ridge.

I looped round to Edale End, went south for about a mile and then turned right heading for Losehill Farm and the way to Castleton. However, when I reached an area known as Townhead just to the north of Hope there's a footpath shown on the map, but there's also a chained up gate and no sign of the path. So I had to backtrack and go along the road for a few hundred yards, entering the fringes of Hope until I found the next path going across the fields to Castleton.

I had time to pop in to the Peak Hotel, billed as 'the Peak District's eccentric alehouse' and take a photo of one of the regulars.

From Fairholmes to Castleton

The automatic doors at Doncaster Railway Station weren't opening properly this morning and I slammed my shoulder hard into one of them; I wasn't looking ahead of me but rather concentrating on a group of drug addicts loitering near the entrance.

I travelled all the way up the Derwent Valley on the bus to Fairholmes and climbed up through the woods to the Lockerbrook area, enjoying a chat with a fellow walker from Leicestershire as we continued to where our paths diverged just before Hagg Farm...he was visiting Alport Castles. 

I then continued alone down to the Snake Pass road and then climbed up the other side of the valley to Hope Cross.

I didn't go all the way to Hope village, I turned right and went uphill just before reaching Townend Bridge, and then made my way to Castleton via Losehill Farm, a route I've not used before.

A shorter walk than I would have liked today, but I needed to be back home for 4:30. A lovely warm sunny day though, but no so good for taking photos because of the haze.


Today's route:

Fairholmes To Hope

I travelled to Fairholmes, as far up the Derwent Valley as the bus goes before turning round and then continuing to Castleton.

After visiting the toilets at the Information Centre I walked up to the Derwent Dam; there are several information boards both here and at the Information Centre explaining all about the Dambusters Squadron, the construction of the dams, the water supply to the major cities of the East Midlands, the temporary prefabricated town built for the construction workers, and the temporary railway laid to transport stone quarried at Grindleford. There are also some nice views.

I then took a footpath that leads up through the woods to Lockerbrook Farm Outdoor Centre. There were some lovely views of the reservoir as I climbed higher; unfortunately the sun was at the wrong angle for any decent pictures. There are many paths in this area that I haven't explored yet and I will have to return, the infrequent bus service tends to put me off though.

In one location I walked past a feature which might have been natural, or it might have been an embankment; I couldn't tell - I'm neither a geologist nor an archaeologist. It looked like a Roman wall to me, but obviously isn't.

I turned right before reaching Hagg Farm and came out further along the Snake Pass road. When I reached a ruined barn I stopped to finish off my sandwiches, and also to make sure that my trousers wouldn't end up around my ankles. Since being prescribed both vitamin D and metformin tablets I've been steadily losing weight, it seems to drop off me with every step I take and by now I really had to do something about my trousers. My belt really needs an extra hole cutting, but for the time being I did an emergency repair job by tying a length of string tightly around my waist...the string is an item that's always buried somewhere at the bottom of my rucksack. Since I started taking the tablets I've lost nearly a stone and a half in weight and my 46ins waist trousers are now too big; I can now even get into a couple of 42ins pairs that I didn't throw away several years ago as I started to put on the weight.

There are some lovely views along here, looking up the Snake Pass.

I crossed the road and continued down into the valley of the River Ashop and then climbed up the path to Hope Cross; there are more lovely views looking from this direction.

It seemed to be especially busy in the Peak District today, by the time I reached Hope Cross I had already passed dozens of mountainbikers, but I now encountered a large group of horseriders...I'm very wary of horses...they're a lot bigger than me.

When I reached Hope I enjoyed a pot of tea and a chocolate chip cookie at The Old Hall Tearooms. The cookie contained 13 grams of sugar; at the moment my daily allowance is 100g; fortunately my diabetes is only very marginal and so an occasional treat shouldn't do me any harm.

I had a few minutes  to spare before the bus was due and so took a few photographs in the village.

As I was sitting in the bus shelter waiting for the bus an eccentric woman, a widow from Tideswell, came and sat next to me and started talking. She had put all of her things into a blue laundry basket and was carrying it with both hands in front of her; she explained that she went to Sheffield once and was mugged. I didn't follow the logic but thought it better not to ask.

As I was travelling on the bus back to Sheffield a woman, her young son, and their dog got on at Fox House - together with about thirty other people. The three of them sat in the seats behind me; she was very chuffed that the dog had been issued with its own ticket, something that hadn't happened before. I couldn't work out whether her son, or the dog, was called Harry.