| Date: | 156th. July 2015 | |
| County: | DERBYSHIRE (some STAFFORDSHIRE, ending in S. YORKSHIRE) | |
| Location: | Peak District National Park | |
| Viewed by: | DRIVE (with Walks) | |
| Season: | Summer | |
| Camera: | Panasonic DMC-FZ150 Bridge Camera (RAW) |
| Type: | Scenic Areas | ||
| Sub-Type: | Tors, Moors, Cliffs, Rivers, Lakes | ||
| Roads: | Winding roads, many narrow but not single track | ||
| Distance: | |||
| Car Parks: | See linked articles | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Good light. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Lunchtime to Evening | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
Please note: all data and opinions presented on this site are offered in good faith, but they are advisory only and are utilised at the risk of the user. The authors can accept no blame or liability for any loss or accident or other negative effect resulting from errors, omissions or data that has changed over time.
Having now made our first two-day foray into the Peak District, I think it's fair to say that the more spectacular areas of the park are to be found in the north, although there are also parts of the park in the south that we would not wanted to miss (like Dovedale for example.) Unfortunately for those whose ability to walk is compromised by age or health (although possibly "fortunately" for those who do like to hike away from the mechanised crowds!) the chance of getting into these wild heathered fells in a car is very limited. The expanses around Kinder Scout, between Edale and the Snake Pass and north of the Snake Pass (apologies if that sounds like a John Ford western) are well provided with trails, but have few, even single track, roads.
That's not to say that there aren't a lot of very beautiful places that are accessible by car, or by car with short walks, and many of them are covered in this drive. Bear in mind, however, that we were Peak District initiates when we made this trip, and we would probably do it a little differently now. Our basic route was cut and paste from various internet resources such as the Daily Telegraph's Great Brish Drives series, which are often quite good apart from an obsession with places to eat and get good cappucino, with which we're not much concerned - although if you are that's the place to look. Scenic loops also need to start and end in a certain area, and The Telegraph was starting from the Manchester, rather than the Sheffield part of the park.
We also weren't prepared to read The Telegraph'sdirections, like rally drivers, so we often missed exactly where they wanted us to go - and we sometimes changed our mind on the spur of the moment anyway, so the route we intended didn'tt exactly match the route we got in any case!
There were also parts of the route that we were less fond of and which we would probably change should we do it again. As I observed in my more general introduction to the Peak District in our first Peak District Drive "it should not be assumed that as soon as you cross the designated (National Park) border you will be in a wild landscape of heath, tors and tarns." There are some bits that are better than others, and it's only after you've been there that you know what these are! (Or you could read this site, which will at the very least, give you a leg-up ;-)
This puts us in a slight quandary as to how to publish the route of this drive, since the aim of the site is both to visually document our trip and to help people make the best of their own trips - and these seem something at odds here. To give the best solution we have come up with so far, the little map of the route below shows our actual route. As always, however, clicking on the small map brings up a larger one, and this contains our proposed route based on our experience (and further research) that we think will be an improvement!
As per our normal practice, we have split the route into sections and have given data about these separately. This proved to be especially valuable here, where section ratings varied between 2 and 5, which should help your own cutting and splicing when you plan your own optimal route.
We were pleasantly surprised by the number of places that scored the highest rating and, though we probably had a slight preference for the Yorkshire Dales National Park (visited a few days later) we were certainly very impressed by the Peak District and sincerely hope to visit unexplored areas further towards Buxton or the far north, like Buxton itself, the Roaches (pity that sounds like the insect the Dutch call "kakkerlak,") and Holme Moss. We are also hankering for a longer trip to explore the trails north and south of the Snake Pass Inn, with our walking boots on!
The road enters a mixture wide moorland sheep paddocks and evergreen tree plantations immediately as it exits the village, and the moorland becomes wider with more heather within two kilometers. Near the 3Km mark the countryside widens out into spectacular valley panoramas looking down towards Surprise View (the last stop on our previous night's drive on the left hand side, and wide heather moorlands on the right.
It's at this point that you can find the Upper Burbage Bridge car park (on the left, overlooking the valley) which is well worth the stop and is the feature of a separate article. The car park is very obvious and you won't miss it. There is parking both sides of the bridge, so don't panic if the first bit is full.
Postcodes mean very little in such unpopulated countryside, so leave the satnav set to Hathersage when you pull out of the Upper Burbage car park, but when you have travelled 400m round a long left hand bend that gives nice views of the climbing cliffs ("edge" here) below Burbage Bridge note that the road splits and turn right. There is no signpost but the road splits off at a shallow angle and is obvious. We stopped here for another quick photo of the Upper Burbage edge and surprised 3 grouse, who quickly ran off with their strange and ungainly puff-chested run. Too slow to get a photo, sorry!
This road is called "The Dale" on Google maps, although there's nothing to tell you that from the road itself. Once it has settled down the satnav should continue to take you down the road towards Hathersage. After another 200m you will see a hardcore layby on the left. It's worth a stop here to admire the wide views to the left and to take a walk past surprised sheep to a low "edge" where you may find newbie rockclimbers.
Continuing down the road, a slow left curve reveals the Hollin Bank car park, which is immediately below the impressive cliff called Stanage Edge. The parking is hourly pay and display, so it's well worth an hour's stop to walk along the base of the rocky cliffs. There are wide views down the Hope Valley from here too. (We're already in Derbyshire here, by the way.) Our stop and mini-walk is described in a separate Stanage Edge article. We have seen some others on the internet say that you can almost make a nice, but longer walk up to Stanage Edge from some free car parks in Hathersage. Can't verify that, but it may be worth a look. There is a railway station in Hathersage too.
Or if you want you can by-pass Hathersage and take the back-roads into the Hope Valley. If you continue in the same direction as the line of the car park, you will drive under the length of Stanage Edge through a mix of moors and paddocks. Try setting your satnav to S33 0AZ, which should bring you out just south of the Ladybower Reservoir that we saw in yesterday's drive.
If you wonder why I am suggesting alternatives, it's this: the route from Hathersage through Hope and on to Castleton [visitor centre: S33 8WP] is mostly fairly standard farmland that, apart from a few flashes of distant ridges through the mainly tree-lined A6187, could be almost anywhere in England. The River Derwent, which forms the centre of the wide valley floor, is little in evidence from the road and the village of Hope - despite giving its name to the valley - is not a place that bears much investigation.
Whichever route you take you will go through Hope anyway, but you could turn right here and drive up to Edale, then loop back to Castleton - rather than going to Castleton and making a spur to Edale as we did. The Eastern road to Edale, from Hope, is a C-Class road and for the first few kilometers is also tree-lined, so you don't see a lot. The trees do open out again later, however, allowing views to the right across the wild fells between Edale and Snake Pass (which we saw the previous day.) On reflection that is probably the preferred route, although whichever you choose you will still find yourself backtracking at some point.
The scenery down the main A6187 improves the closer you get to Castleton, but it's in and beyond Castleton that it really comes into its own...
The emphasis of this particular drive (you can't do everything in a day, so the drive was inevitably more of a "taster" or fact-finding mission than trying to extract every drop from every juicy area) was on Scenic Beauty, which meant that our focus was more on Winnat's Pass than the areas closer to town - although we've since found that the castle and the ridges and valleys that border it offer some great walking, and offer the potential of photographs that rival Winnat's Pass for grandeur.
Our route took us through Winnat's Pass - in fact, being unable to stop there, we eventually went through it 3 times, in order to saturate our senses (a open-topped car would have been good!) - before finally stopping at the bottom of a road that ended in a car-park beneath the dramatic fallen escarpment of Mam Tor (near Blue John Cavern.) Confusingly at least 3 of the many commercial caverns in the area - which were a few kilometers apart - have the same postcode, so the satnav wasn't much help here! But, from Castleton, if you continue on the main road, you'll see the steep "V" of Winnat's Pass on a road that splits off to the left 200m from the edge of town. (Set your satnav to the centre of Sparrowpit [SK17 8ET] if you are unsure, and this will take you through - but remember to go away from the satnav's route and turn right after Winnat's Pass, then right again towards the Blue John Cavern, or you'll miss some of the best parts of both sections 3 and 4!) Again, if you are unsure, set the satnav to Edale [S33 7ZA] which will take you past the road to Blue John Cavern after about 250m: the road goes off to the right on the first sharp left bend.
Knowing that we still had a long way to go, we probably spent only an hour or so in the small Winnat's Pass and Mam Tor small area. But we were also painfully aware that it was in no way enough to do justice to the beauty of this spot! You should allocate at least a half a day to make a few short walks around Peveril and Winnat's, and a day or so if you want to explore the town and make a longer walk from Peveril through Winnat's and on to the summit of Mam Tor. On a good day you will be amply rewarded by photographic memories!
Our article on Winnat's Pass and Mam Tor has a number of photographs that reveal something of the beauty you can experience, but there are so many car-parks and trails within this small area that we've tried to incude those too - for people who live closer and who can give the place the time it deserves - or ready for our next visit!
The National Trust's site has photographs that suggest the views from the top of Mam Tor are well worth the walk. But following the narrow C-road past the cutting, there are also wide vistas of the range of hills from Kinder Scout to Dark Peak as the road snakes down towards the valley. Fortunately there were a couple of lay-bys where we could also stop for photographs.
Once we reached the River Noe valley floor, however, the road become more claustrophobic. Hedges and trees either side of the narrow tarmac meant, frustratingly, that you couldn't see much of the hills on the left. And this was the situation all the way to Edale, which has a large car-park (with toilets, BTW) that allows people to escape from the blinkered hedgerows and climb up on the range between the village and Snake Pass.
Much of the area is owned by the National Trust as their so-called Dark Peak Estate, although the NT website is strangely miserly about details of trails in the area - except for mountain bikers!
Edale does seem a place that you should hike from, but trails on the map seemed longer than we had time for, so we noted what we could, used the loo and then mounted up for the next leg.
This road gradually revealed itself as being in a valley, with long Pennine ridges extending both sides, but gradually becoming lower and inhabited by migrating tribes of trees. The grass was rich enough to support cattle here, which were dotted amdist crazy stone wall rectangles across the hummocks, through which the road wound it's lightly drunken course
Had we rated this section by itself, we would have probably awarded 4/5, but even by the time we reached Sparrowpit, the valley had shallowed and was looking more like stone-edged farmland and the road had broadened into a respectable width, with centre-line markings, that wasn't remarkably different to the A623, on to which we now turned south-east and set the satnav to Miller's Dale [SK17 8SN.] The A623 runs along the valley floor, flanked wide tree strewn pasture. With even the Pennine ridges to our left covered in a patchwork of fields the scene now looked decidedly domestic.
Approaching the village of Peak Forest there is supposed to be a nice bouldered stream in a wood to the left, but it certainly wasn't obvious, if there was! At Peak Forest the route turned off the A-road, down wide country roads that crossed rolling cattle and sheep countryside that could have been in just about any county in England. The wooded Wye crossing at Miller's Dale was slightly more interesting, but also like many wooded crossings elsewhere. Resetting the satnav to a hotel near Taddington [SK17 9TJ] we passed the chalk hillsides near Blackwell, which were like being home in Wiltshire. And even when the countryside opened out into wide rolling plains south of Taddington there was really nothing that remotely resembled the word "Peak" in Peak District.
And so it went on as we set the satnav to Ashford-In-The-Water [DE45 1QB] and journeyed through the large waving grass paddocks south of Sheldon and past more Wiltshire like sheep-slopes into Ashford itself, where we parked in the street and walked across the bridge to have a look at the ducks cavorting in the shallow River Wye. Actually it was all very pleasant, but we couldn't help feeling a little disappointed that it wasn't more like the north of the National Park. If this was what we'd wanted we could have saved petrol and driven around Oxfordshire or Dorset :-O
For this section, therefore, our advice would be: if you live in the city, you may find this drive relaxing and calmingly bucolic. If you live in the country yourself then it will probably seem familiar here, so you'd be advised to pend more time around Mam Tor and Edale - or if you want to visit Ashford and Bakewell take the quickest route from Sparrowpit down the A623 and the B6465 through Wardlow to stop at Monsal Head. You can then use the time you've saved for a bit of a walk on the Monsal Trail (currently in our Section 6.)
Incidentally, Ashford-In-the-Water is only about 3Km away from Lathkill Dale, which we've described in another article.
Monsal Head consists of a large Pay and Display (hourly) car park before and above the Monsal Head Hotel [DE45 1NL] and a smaller one (also Pay and Display) below the pub. You can get between the two through the pub's outdoor seating area, which - on a sunny day - will probably be busy and require tight slalom turns around the tables full of drinkers.
There are walled viewing areas into the valley from both the upper and lower car-parks. If you want to walk, the upper car park is probably the best option. For a short photo-stop, the lower car park gives more of a view of the viaduct and usually has the benefit of an ice-cream van (Oo! my waistline. Need to do the Monsal Trail to walk it off...) Both car parks have good views into the Monsal Valley and the steep slopes that descend from the road to Wardlow.
I'm still unclear as to why Monsal Dale (and hence the Monsal Trail) are so called. According to purists, the (now a walking path) "Monsal Viaduct" is properly called the "Headstone Viaduct" and even "Monsal Head" was called "Headstone Head" until the construction of the railway. So why "Monsal"? The river that runs through the valley is the Wye and not the "Monsal", although it seems that little of the Wye Valley is called by that name (it's Miller's Dale above Cressbrook, for example.) Doesn't seem to be a place called "Monsal" either...(?)
Besides the view into the walley, the most popular feature here is the Monsal Trail, which follows a 13Km section of the former Manchester, Buxton, Matlock and Midlands Junction Railway built in 1863. The trail starts in Wye Dale, 5Km km east of Buxton and runs to Coombs Viaduct, about 2Km south of Bakewell. When you are on it the trail is, of course, level - but from the Monsal Head car park there is the small matter of descending the valley to get to it and then climbing back up!
The line was closed in 1968 by Barbara Castle (and not, unusually, by Dr. Beeching) and was taken over by the Peak District National Park in 1981. They have made it into a popular walking, riding and cycling trail, although the trail bypassed the line's many tunnels, due to worries about their safety, until 2011. The most popular walks from Monsal Head are to Cressbrook (about 2.5Km round trip) or to Miller's Dale (about 6Km.) There's a map of these routes in a separate Monsal Head article, although there's not much more to say about it beyond what we've said already ;-)
If you've taken our alternative route (suggested above) then you will have traversed the side of Monsal Dale on the way down and this will probably take away the final rationale for the longer route. In that case the more direct route to Bakewell via Ashford is recommended.
We had, of course, made a walk along the pretty River Wye meadow and town path in Bakewell the previous day, but we did make a quick stop again to reshoot the bridge in sunlight. If you haven't followed any of our Peak Walk (1) sectors before, however, it's worth seeing this. There is a separate article on Bakewell anyway.
Haddon Hall claims to be "probably the finest example of a fortified medieval manor house in existence," dating from "the 12th Century to the early 17th Century, whereupon it lay dormant for over two hundred years" until "the 9th Duke and Duchess of Rutland restored the house and gardens, and once again made it habitable." There is a large car park to the left side of the road about 3Km from Bakewell. From here (£2 flat parking fee) you walk across a bridge over the River Wye (with apologies to Alec Guinness) to get to the house, which is still privately owned by the Duke of Rutland (although his relatives actualy live here - the Duke has a castle in Leicestershire.) There is a £12 adult entry fee.
From the photographs we've seen on the web, the house and gardens are quite impressive. The long well lit (and hence probably cold in winter!) rooms reminded me of Lanhydrock, near Bodmin - although Lanhydrock is a Victorian building that harks back to a Golden Age, while Haddon Hall is a restoration of the real thing.
(Oops, I've just read that the Duke of Rutland is a prominent supporter of UKIP - maybe scratch the visit!)
From Beeley the B6012 takes you up another valley next to the River Derwent, through paddocks that look more like a stately parkland, with hedges and shade trees. Again the river is far from obvious, until the road crosses it near the Chatsworth Garden Centre [DE4 2NX], which has a large £2 car park (and also a Restaurant, should you not want to eat the seeds, flowers or lawnmowers.) Just past the car park there is a cattle grid and you are in the Chatsworth House grounds - although the railings along the side of the road between the bridge and the car park suggest that the Chatsworth estate actually starts at the bridge. There seems to be a footpath after the cattle grid that headed for the river, and there seemed to be people walking along the edge of it, so it seems that the Chatworth House site's claim that the grounds and woodland (outside the House's gardens) are free for everybody to use - which is nice of them.
You can see Chatsworth House down in the valley the other side of the river as you drive the other side of the cattle grid, through the wide parkland grounds, but it's another kilometer before you get to the point of actually being able to turn down its car park. The house and gardens are still privately owned by a trust run by the Duke of Devonshire (not sure why he lives in Derbyshire - what's wrong with Devon?) There's a £3 parking fee and initially the £20.00 fee for an adult House and Garden ticket looks non-trivial.
Having researched what you get for the ticket (especially when one of the many ad hoc Art Exhibitions are being shown - the've had sculptures in Chatsworth's wonderful garden and water feature settings featuring artists from Barbara Hepworth and Marc Quinn to Yue Minjun, which give an added depth and beauty to the landscape) I would now say that a £20 ticket is good value. It's a great pity than the sculptures are not permanent features, since they fit in so well.
You could easily spend a full day at Chatsworth, so there's more about what we've found out about the house, gardens and the village of Edensor in a separate article. May I also suggest scuptures by Zhu Wei as another possibile exhibition?
Sadly for us, however, it was drawing towards evening and we only had time to quickly transit the place and admire the peaceful setting, on this occasion...
That's not to say that there aren't a lot of very beautiful places that are accessible by car, or by car with short walks, and many of them are covered in this drive. Bear in mind, however, that we were Peak District initiates when we made this trip, and we would probably do it a little differently now. Our basic route was cut and paste from various internet resources such as the Daily Telegraph's Great Brish Drives series, which are often quite good apart from an obsession with places to eat and get good cappucino, with which we're not much concerned - although if you are that's the place to look. Scenic loops also need to start and end in a certain area, and The Telegraph was starting from the Manchester, rather than the Sheffield part of the park.
We also weren't prepared to read The Telegraph'sdirections, like rally drivers, so we often missed exactly where they wanted us to go - and we sometimes changed our mind on the spur of the moment anyway, so the route we intended didn'tt exactly match the route we got in any case!
There were also parts of the route that we were less fond of and which we would probably change should we do it again. As I observed in my more general introduction to the Peak District in our first Peak District Drive "it should not be assumed that as soon as you cross the designated (National Park) border you will be in a wild landscape of heath, tors and tarns." There are some bits that are better than others, and it's only after you've been there that you know what these are! (Or you could read this site, which will at the very least, give you a leg-up ;-)
This puts us in a slight quandary as to how to publish the route of this drive, since the aim of the site is both to visually document our trip and to help people make the best of their own trips - and these seem something at odds here. To give the best solution we have come up with so far, the little map of the route below shows our actual route. As always, however, clicking on the small map brings up a larger one, and this contains our proposed route based on our experience (and further research) that we think will be an improvement!
As per our normal practice, we have split the route into sections and have given data about these separately. This proved to be especially valuable here, where section ratings varied between 2 and 5, which should help your own cutting and splicing when you plan your own optimal route.
We were pleasantly surprised by the number of places that scored the highest rating and, though we probably had a slight preference for the Yorkshire Dales National Park (visited a few days later) we were certainly very impressed by the Peak District and sincerely hope to visit unexplored areas further towards Buxton or the far north, like Buxton itself, the Roaches (pity that sounds like the insect the Dutch call "kakkerlak,") and Holme Moss. We are also hankering for a longer trip to explore the trails north and south of the Snake Pass Inn, with our walking boots on!
Route Section 1:
Starting at the village of Ringinglow [we chose the Norfolk Arms pub - S11 7TS] Ringinglow Road runs deep into the high moors. The postcode for our first stop is listed as S32 1BR, but this seems to cover several square miles, so better to set the satnav to a point in Hathersage [S32 1BB.] | Type: | Scenic Area | ||
| Sub-Type: | Moors, Tors, Panorama | ||
| Roads: | Good gently curving road | ||
| Distance: | 3Km | ||
| Car Parks: | Free at Burbage Bridge. Pay and Display at Stanage Edge | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Light cloud. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Mid morning | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
The road enters a mixture wide moorland sheep paddocks and evergreen tree plantations immediately as it exits the village, and the moorland becomes wider with more heather within two kilometers. Near the 3Km mark the countryside widens out into spectacular valley panoramas looking down towards Surprise View (the last stop on our previous night's drive on the left hand side, and wide heather moorlands on the right.
It's at this point that you can find the Upper Burbage Bridge car park (on the left, overlooking the valley) which is well worth the stop and is the feature of a separate article. The car park is very obvious and you won't miss it. There is parking both sides of the bridge, so don't panic if the first bit is full.
Postcodes mean very little in such unpopulated countryside, so leave the satnav set to Hathersage when you pull out of the Upper Burbage car park, but when you have travelled 400m round a long left hand bend that gives nice views of the climbing cliffs ("edge" here) below Burbage Bridge note that the road splits and turn right. There is no signpost but the road splits off at a shallow angle and is obvious. We stopped here for another quick photo of the Upper Burbage edge and surprised 3 grouse, who quickly ran off with their strange and ungainly puff-chested run. Too slow to get a photo, sorry!
This road is called "The Dale" on Google maps, although there's nothing to tell you that from the road itself. Once it has settled down the satnav should continue to take you down the road towards Hathersage. After another 200m you will see a hardcore layby on the left. It's worth a stop here to admire the wide views to the left and to take a walk past surprised sheep to a low "edge" where you may find newbie rockclimbers.
Continuing down the road, a slow left curve reveals the Hollin Bank car park, which is immediately below the impressive cliff called Stanage Edge. The parking is hourly pay and display, so it's well worth an hour's stop to walk along the base of the rocky cliffs. There are wide views down the Hope Valley from here too. (We're already in Derbyshire here, by the way.) Our stop and mini-walk is described in a separate Stanage Edge article. We have seen some others on the internet say that you can almost make a nice, but longer walk up to Stanage Edge from some free car parks in Hathersage. Can't verify that, but it may be worth a look. There is a railway station in Hathersage too.
Or if you want you can by-pass Hathersage and take the back-roads into the Hope Valley. If you continue in the same direction as the line of the car park, you will drive under the length of Stanage Edge through a mix of moors and paddocks. Try setting your satnav to S33 0AZ, which should bring you out just south of the Ladybower Reservoir that we saw in yesterday's drive.
Route Section 2:
The drive from Stanage Edge down into to Hathersage is less impressive than the upper part, so the alternative route to the Ladybower Reservoir suggested in the section above is probably more scenic. Te slow descent is characterised initially by stone walled sheep paddocks, often overgrown by ferns, but turns into more conventional headge-bordered farmland before the village. Hathersage is pleasant enough, but so are most villages in the area, so it's certainly not a "must-see." Even if you take the backroads to Ladybower, however, you will be funnelled back into the Hope Valley, if you want to get to Castleton.| Type: | Scenic Area, Historical Buildings | ||
| Sub-Type: | Cliffs, Tors, Panorama | ||
| Roads: | Good country road then A-Road | ||
| Distance: | 13Km | ||
| Car Parks: | N/A. See next section | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Good light. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Mid Morning-Lunchtime | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
If you wonder why I am suggesting alternatives, it's this: the route from Hathersage through Hope and on to Castleton [visitor centre: S33 8WP] is mostly fairly standard farmland that, apart from a few flashes of distant ridges through the mainly tree-lined A6187, could be almost anywhere in England. The River Derwent, which forms the centre of the wide valley floor, is little in evidence from the road and the village of Hope - despite giving its name to the valley - is not a place that bears much investigation.
Whichever route you take you will go through Hope anyway, but you could turn right here and drive up to Edale, then loop back to Castleton - rather than going to Castleton and making a spur to Edale as we did. The Eastern road to Edale, from Hope, is a C-Class road and for the first few kilometers is also tree-lined, so you don't see a lot. The trees do open out again later, however, allowing views to the right across the wild fells between Edale and Snake Pass (which we saw the previous day.) On reflection that is probably the preferred route, although whichever you choose you will still find yourself backtracking at some point.
The scenery down the main A6187 improves the closer you get to Castleton, but it's in and beyond Castleton that it really comes into its own...
Route Section 3:
A brief drive through the streets of Castleton was enough to see that that it was a quaint town with a lot of 300+ year old buildings and pubs that would reward a wander. With a name lke Castleton, you would also expect that there would be a castle somewhere - and indeed there is. Peveril Castle (English Heritage: £4.80) is perched on an imposing crag to the south of the town. | Type: | Scenic Area, Old Town | ||
| Sub-Type: | Cliffs, Tors, Historical Buildings | ||
| Roads: | From A-Roads to hill roads too narrow for cars to pass without care | ||
| Distance: | 3Km | ||
| Car Parks: | Many. See article(s) | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Good light. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Luchtime-Early Afternoon | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
The emphasis of this particular drive (you can't do everything in a day, so the drive was inevitably more of a "taster" or fact-finding mission than trying to extract every drop from every juicy area) was on Scenic Beauty, which meant that our focus was more on Winnat's Pass than the areas closer to town - although we've since found that the castle and the ridges and valleys that border it offer some great walking, and offer the potential of photographs that rival Winnat's Pass for grandeur.
Our route took us through Winnat's Pass - in fact, being unable to stop there, we eventually went through it 3 times, in order to saturate our senses (a open-topped car would have been good!) - before finally stopping at the bottom of a road that ended in a car-park beneath the dramatic fallen escarpment of Mam Tor (near Blue John Cavern.) Confusingly at least 3 of the many commercial caverns in the area - which were a few kilometers apart - have the same postcode, so the satnav wasn't much help here! But, from Castleton, if you continue on the main road, you'll see the steep "V" of Winnat's Pass on a road that splits off to the left 200m from the edge of town. (Set your satnav to the centre of Sparrowpit [SK17 8ET] if you are unsure, and this will take you through - but remember to go away from the satnav's route and turn right after Winnat's Pass, then right again towards the Blue John Cavern, or you'll miss some of the best parts of both sections 3 and 4!) Again, if you are unsure, set the satnav to Edale [S33 7ZA] which will take you past the road to Blue John Cavern after about 250m: the road goes off to the right on the first sharp left bend.
Knowing that we still had a long way to go, we probably spent only an hour or so in the small Winnat's Pass and Mam Tor small area. But we were also painfully aware that it was in no way enough to do justice to the beauty of this spot! You should allocate at least a half a day to make a few short walks around Peveril and Winnat's, and a day or so if you want to explore the town and make a longer walk from Peveril through Winnat's and on to the summit of Mam Tor. On a good day you will be amply rewarded by photographic memories!
Our article on Winnat's Pass and Mam Tor has a number of photographs that reveal something of the beauty you can experience, but there are so many car-parks and trails within this small area that we've tried to incude those too - for people who live closer and who can give the place the time it deserves - or ready for our next visit!
Route Section 4:
From the cliff side of Mam Tor, near Blue John Cavern, we set the satnav to S33 7ZA, then looped around to the other side of Mam Tor and took the next right. The National Trust's says its Mam Nick car park is roughly at that point, but we didn't see it. There is a National Trust trail that takes off to the right after about 200m and there are also a couple of gravel lay-bys after going through a cutting just past this, so maybe that's the "car park." The road has already climbed up quite a lot at this point and NT rate it as "easy" despite the further climb to the summit. There is also a Blue "P" style car park on the right of the road just before you turn off to Edale if you need backup. Both that Car Park and the cutting by Mam Tor also have bus-stops, so presumably there is a bus service that passes through here too.| Type: | Scenic Area | ||
| Sub-Type: | Cliffs, Tors, Panorama | ||
| Roads: | C-Road | ||
| Distance: | 5Km | ||
| Car Parks: | Hourly Pay and Display at Edale | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Good light. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Early - Mid Afternoon | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
The National Trust's site has photographs that suggest the views from the top of Mam Tor are well worth the walk. But following the narrow C-road past the cutting, there are also wide vistas of the range of hills from Kinder Scout to Dark Peak as the road snakes down towards the valley. Fortunately there were a couple of lay-bys where we could also stop for photographs.
Once we reached the River Noe valley floor, however, the road become more claustrophobic. Hedges and trees either side of the narrow tarmac meant, frustratingly, that you couldn't see much of the hills on the left. And this was the situation all the way to Edale, which has a large car-park (with toilets, BTW) that allows people to escape from the blinkered hedgerows and climb up on the range between the village and Snake Pass.
Much of the area is owned by the National Trust as their so-called Dark Peak Estate, although the NT website is strangely miserly about details of trails in the area - except for mountain bikers!
Edale does seem a place that you should hike from, but trails on the map seemed longer than we had time for, so we noted what we could, used the loo and then mounted up for the next leg.
Route Section 5:
Section 5 was the longest section of our loop and took us back to the centre of the park, down to Ashford-In-The-Water (less than 2Km from Bakewell, although we didn't do directly between the two.) Setting the satnav to Sparrowpit [SK17 8ET] should bring you back on the right route from Edale. The first part of the drive was back the way we came until we reached the top of Winnat's pass. You then strike off past a gravel lay-by (the start of yet another approach to Mam Tor and over the hills) to Sparrowpit.| Type: | Scenic Area | ||
| Sub-Type: | Cliffs, Tors, Panorama | ||
| Roads: | Mix of A, B and C-Roads | ||
| Distance: | 34Km | ||
| Car Parks: | Street Parking in Ashford-In-The-Water | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Good light. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Mid Afternoon | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
This road gradually revealed itself as being in a valley, with long Pennine ridges extending both sides, but gradually becoming lower and inhabited by migrating tribes of trees. The grass was rich enough to support cattle here, which were dotted amdist crazy stone wall rectangles across the hummocks, through which the road wound it's lightly drunken course
Had we rated this section by itself, we would have probably awarded 4/5, but even by the time we reached Sparrowpit, the valley had shallowed and was looking more like stone-edged farmland and the road had broadened into a respectable width, with centre-line markings, that wasn't remarkably different to the A623, on to which we now turned south-east and set the satnav to Miller's Dale [SK17 8SN.] The A623 runs along the valley floor, flanked wide tree strewn pasture. With even the Pennine ridges to our left covered in a patchwork of fields the scene now looked decidedly domestic.
Approaching the village of Peak Forest there is supposed to be a nice bouldered stream in a wood to the left, but it certainly wasn't obvious, if there was! At Peak Forest the route turned off the A-road, down wide country roads that crossed rolling cattle and sheep countryside that could have been in just about any county in England. The wooded Wye crossing at Miller's Dale was slightly more interesting, but also like many wooded crossings elsewhere. Resetting the satnav to a hotel near Taddington [SK17 9TJ] we passed the chalk hillsides near Blackwell, which were like being home in Wiltshire. And even when the countryside opened out into wide rolling plains south of Taddington there was really nothing that remotely resembled the word "Peak" in Peak District.
And so it went on as we set the satnav to Ashford-In-The-Water [DE45 1QB] and journeyed through the large waving grass paddocks south of Sheldon and past more Wiltshire like sheep-slopes into Ashford itself, where we parked in the street and walked across the bridge to have a look at the ducks cavorting in the shallow River Wye. Actually it was all very pleasant, but we couldn't help feeling a little disappointed that it wasn't more like the north of the National Park. If this was what we'd wanted we could have saved petrol and driven around Oxfordshire or Dorset :-O
For this section, therefore, our advice would be: if you live in the city, you may find this drive relaxing and calmingly bucolic. If you live in the country yourself then it will probably seem familiar here, so you'd be advised to pend more time around Mam Tor and Edale - or if you want to visit Ashford and Bakewell take the quickest route from Sparrowpit down the A623 and the B6465 through Wardlow to stop at Monsal Head. You can then use the time you've saved for a bit of a walk on the Monsal Trail (currently in our Section 6.)
Incidentally, Ashford-In-the-Water is only about 3Km away from Lathkill Dale, which we've described in another article.
Route Section 6:
Following the long 5th section, this is back to a short one - just a 3Km hop from Ashford-In-The-Water to Monsal Head!| Type: | Scenic Area | ||
| Sub-Type: | Cliffs, Valley, Viaduct | ||
| Roads: | B-road | ||
| Distance: | 3Km | ||
| Car Parks: | Street Parking in Ashford-In-The-Water | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Good light. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Mid Afternoon | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
Monsal Head consists of a large Pay and Display (hourly) car park before and above the Monsal Head Hotel [DE45 1NL] and a smaller one (also Pay and Display) below the pub. You can get between the two through the pub's outdoor seating area, which - on a sunny day - will probably be busy and require tight slalom turns around the tables full of drinkers.
There are walled viewing areas into the valley from both the upper and lower car-parks. If you want to walk, the upper car park is probably the best option. For a short photo-stop, the lower car park gives more of a view of the viaduct and usually has the benefit of an ice-cream van (Oo! my waistline. Need to do the Monsal Trail to walk it off...) Both car parks have good views into the Monsal Valley and the steep slopes that descend from the road to Wardlow.
I'm still unclear as to why Monsal Dale (and hence the Monsal Trail) are so called. According to purists, the (now a walking path) "Monsal Viaduct" is properly called the "Headstone Viaduct" and even "Monsal Head" was called "Headstone Head" until the construction of the railway. So why "Monsal"? The river that runs through the valley is the Wye and not the "Monsal", although it seems that little of the Wye Valley is called by that name (it's Miller's Dale above Cressbrook, for example.) Doesn't seem to be a place called "Monsal" either...(?)
Besides the view into the walley, the most popular feature here is the Monsal Trail, which follows a 13Km section of the former Manchester, Buxton, Matlock and Midlands Junction Railway built in 1863. The trail starts in Wye Dale, 5Km km east of Buxton and runs to Coombs Viaduct, about 2Km south of Bakewell. When you are on it the trail is, of course, level - but from the Monsal Head car park there is the small matter of descending the valley to get to it and then climbing back up!
The line was closed in 1968 by Barbara Castle (and not, unusually, by Dr. Beeching) and was taken over by the Peak District National Park in 1981. They have made it into a popular walking, riding and cycling trail, although the trail bypassed the line's many tunnels, due to worries about their safety, until 2011. The most popular walks from Monsal Head are to Cressbrook (about 2.5Km round trip) or to Miller's Dale (about 6Km.) There's a map of these routes in a separate Monsal Head article, although there's not much more to say about it beyond what we've said already ;-)
Route Section 7:
From Monsal Head we followed a loop north towards Wardlow, the back down through Great Longstone, although this is mostly farming land so there seems not much reason to do that. It's also largely impossible to quantify in satnav terms, since rural postcodes are so large. We can only only describe it: from Monsal Head keep heading north along the B6465 towards Wardlow for about 1.6Km. Having ignored the first turning right, you will see a minor crossroads, with the turning right signed as "Foolow, Stoney Middleton." Take this for about 600 yards and then turn right at the T-junction. Then set the satnav to Great Longstone [DE45 1TA,] Hassop Station [DE45 1NW - you can hire cycles and get on to the Monsal Trail here, so it's a much easier way of entering the trail than at Monsal Head] and then Bakewell [DE45 1BU will take you past the Pay and Display hourly Car Park].| Type: | Scenic Area | ||
| Sub-Type: | Valley, River | ||
| Roads: | B-road then A-Road. | ||
| Distance: | 13Km | ||
| Car Parks: | Hourly Pay and Display parking in Bakewell | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Good light. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Mid to Late Afternoon | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
If you've taken our alternative route (suggested above) then you will have traversed the side of Monsal Dale on the way down and this will probably take away the final rationale for the longer route. In that case the more direct route to Bakewell via Ashford is recommended.
We had, of course, made a walk along the pretty River Wye meadow and town path in Bakewell the previous day, but we did make a quick stop again to reshoot the bridge in sunlight. If you haven't followed any of our Peak Walk (1) sectors before, however, it's worth seeing this. There is a separate article on Bakewell anyway.
Route Section 8:
From Bakewell our route follows the A6 down the Wye Valley, although most of the time the meandering Wye is not obvious, except as a line of trees. The main point of this part of the route is to reach Beeley [DE4 2NR] so as to give a more scenic entry to the Chatsworth House grounds. The route down the Wye is pleasant enough, though not especially exceptional. Devotees of Stately Homes may also be interested in visiting Haddon Hall [DE45 1LA], which is older and has featured in many BBC costume dramas, from those set in Tudor times onwards.| Type: | Scenic Area, Historical Building | ||
| Sub-Type: | River, Valley, Stately Homes | ||
| Roads: | A-road. B-Road | ||
| Distance: | 12Km | ||
| Car Parks: | £3 fee at Chatsworth House if no online ticket booked | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Good light. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Late Afternoon | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
Haddon Hall claims to be "probably the finest example of a fortified medieval manor house in existence," dating from "the 12th Century to the early 17th Century, whereupon it lay dormant for over two hundred years" until "the 9th Duke and Duchess of Rutland restored the house and gardens, and once again made it habitable." There is a large car park to the left side of the road about 3Km from Bakewell. From here (£2 flat parking fee) you walk across a bridge over the River Wye (with apologies to Alec Guinness) to get to the house, which is still privately owned by the Duke of Rutland (although his relatives actualy live here - the Duke has a castle in Leicestershire.) There is a £12 adult entry fee.
From the photographs we've seen on the web, the house and gardens are quite impressive. The long well lit (and hence probably cold in winter!) rooms reminded me of Lanhydrock, near Bodmin - although Lanhydrock is a Victorian building that harks back to a Golden Age, while Haddon Hall is a restoration of the real thing.
(Oops, I've just read that the Duke of Rutland is a prominent supporter of UKIP - maybe scratch the visit!)
From Beeley the B6012 takes you up another valley next to the River Derwent, through paddocks that look more like a stately parkland, with hedges and shade trees. Again the river is far from obvious, until the road crosses it near the Chatsworth Garden Centre [DE4 2NX], which has a large £2 car park (and also a Restaurant, should you not want to eat the seeds, flowers or lawnmowers.) Just past the car park there is a cattle grid and you are in the Chatsworth House grounds - although the railings along the side of the road between the bridge and the car park suggest that the Chatsworth estate actually starts at the bridge. There seems to be a footpath after the cattle grid that headed for the river, and there seemed to be people walking along the edge of it, so it seems that the Chatworth House site's claim that the grounds and woodland (outside the House's gardens) are free for everybody to use - which is nice of them.
You can see Chatsworth House down in the valley the other side of the river as you drive the other side of the cattle grid, through the wide parkland grounds, but it's another kilometer before you get to the point of actually being able to turn down its car park. The house and gardens are still privately owned by a trust run by the Duke of Devonshire (not sure why he lives in Derbyshire - what's wrong with Devon?) There's a £3 parking fee and initially the £20.00 fee for an adult House and Garden ticket looks non-trivial.
Having researched what you get for the ticket (especially when one of the many ad hoc Art Exhibitions are being shown - the've had sculptures in Chatsworth's wonderful garden and water feature settings featuring artists from Barbara Hepworth and Marc Quinn to Yue Minjun, which give an added depth and beauty to the landscape) I would now say that a £20 ticket is good value. It's a great pity than the sculptures are not permanent features, since they fit in so well.
You could easily spend a full day at Chatsworth, so there's more about what we've found out about the house, gardens and the village of Edensor in a separate article. May I also suggest scuptures by Zhu Wei as another possibile exhibition?
Sadly for us, however, it was drawing towards evening and we only had time to quickly transit the place and admire the peaceful setting, on this occasion...
Route Section 9:
| Type: | Scenic Area, Historical Building | ||
| Sub-Type: | Valley, Stately Home | ||
| Roads: | A-road. B-Road | ||
| Distance: | 12Km | ||
| Car Parks: | £3 fee at Chatsworth House if no online ticket booked | ||
| Weather: | Mostly sunny. Good light. | ||
| Time Of Day: | Late Afternoon | ||
| Drive Rating: | ••••• |
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