Monday, February 13, 2012

Rowsley, Congreave, Stanton in Peak, Haddon Hall and Bakewell.

Today the weather was a lot milder, but although most of the snow had melted it was quite icy underfoot in some places, even though I was walking in some of the lowest parts of the Peak District.

I started at Rowsley, walking along the Pilhough road until I took a path which climbed up fields towards Congreave. The path comes out at the bottom end of the village and I continued along the road leaving the village, going further downhill.

The next section of the walk was uphill again, across more fields, and looked quite challenging on the map; yet I didn't really need to stop for breath...maybe I'm getting fitter or my bronchitis is getting better.

I arrived at Stanton in Peak and walked through most of the village. To me, it seems to have an austere appearance and to be somewhat out-of-place in the Peak District; I'm sure it wasn't just the weather - which wasn't too bad and was improving all the time.

At the bottom end of Stanton I found my intended footpath, but about twenty minutes later I was in the wrong place because I'd been concentrating on the cricket commentary on the radio and hadn't bothered to look at the map. I wasn't lost...merely in the wrong place.

I'd taken a track and then a lane which ran pretty much parallel to where I'd already walked and ended up just a few hundred yards further down the Congreave road. I walked across a bridge over a dangerous-looking River Wye and then reached the main road.

It was about half a mile to the main entrance to Haddon Hall; unfortunately you can't see anything of the house from the road. You can get decent views looking through binoculars from the nearby high ground though.




I then walked alongside the river to Bakewell. It was sunny when I arrived there and  I had sufficient time to look around the market and shops. I bought a pie for my tea from the farm shop. I looked in the window of the Chatsworth Farm Shop and when I noticed that it was charging £4.95 for quite a small pork pie, I went to the other shop.

2 comments:

  1. Nice walk lee - that's an iconic shot of the weir and bridge in Bakewell.

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  2. Yes it is Les; it's a pity about the tanker crossing the bridge though.

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