Taddington, Priestcliffe Ditch, Blackwell, Wormhill, and Castleton

I started the walk at Taddington, taking a few photos of the village before heading off to the north west.

I crossed over the dual carriageway bypass to reach Priestcliffe Ditch and then Blackwell.

It was an easy walk down to the Monsal Trail, which I actually crossed over on a bridge; I then crossed the wooden footbridge to pass next to the picturesque  Blackwell Mill Cottages.

I continued using the Pennine Bridleway which zigzags up the hillside here - I stopped to take a photograph of one of the trains coming from Tunstead Quarry - there are only a few a day travelling along the line.

The next path took me down to the bottom of Flag Dale, a new dale to me, and then back up the other side to reach the road just south of Wormhill. Most of the old mediaeval church at Wormhill was demolished and so the majority of the building is quite modern - mid eighteenth century I think. Despite its fairly recent construction I really like the building though, especially the unusual tower which wouldn't be out of place on a German castle nestled down on the banks of the River Rhine. Photographing the church isn't easy though, I couldn't get the angles or the vistas because of the close by tall trees in the churchyard.

For some reason there's a hole in my map right where Wormhill church is; this made it a bit difficult for me to find the footpath I was looking for which runs parallel to the main road through the village. I'm not happy about the hole and the general deterioration in the condition of my latest Ordnance Survey map - I only bought it in December so maybe I could return it and get a refund...and then end up not having a map covering half of the Peak District though for however long it would take.

I continued in a northeasterly direction, arriving at the entrance to Peter Dale. It's always a lovely walk through this dale, and then Hay Dale. At the head of Hay Dale I climbed up he bridleway to the road which itself goes to the main Buxton road which I needed to cross to pick up the Limestone Way again for the final three miles to Castleton...with the difficult rocky and wet descent through Cave Dale on the final approach to the village.