So what is it I always used to say at the end of each new piece ? Oh yes, ‘walks since last blog entry’. So in this case I will start with that, as there have been quite a few since I last put something on here. The trouble being that they have been of the small (5 miles or less variety), been walks that have featured here in the past (think Chatsworth, Baslow, Chander Hill etc.), and been walks where I didn’t think it necessary to bring a camera. So yes I have been neglecting this blog of late. Although to be fair to me, none of this has been helped by the depressing cold/winter, my change of job, and that fact that we haven’t been able to leave Luther (the oldie Labrador) home alone for too long.
Anyway to get things moving again we (the Royal we doncha know) will start with a walk of 5 miles, that we have done before, only on this occasion we did bring a camera (Helen’s).
So parking at Castleton this time (with Pevril Castle looking down on us and suggesting another day out) we set off through a series of fields, making both of us feel somewhat sluggish (not Molly though you understand). Now Helen had convinced me via the BBC website that this was going to be a nice day. Well no actually, having underdressed I found myself shivering through this first part of the walk. So having exerted ourselves in the cold for half an hour, we decided to stop for lunch on a stile in sight of the abandoned road, at the bottom of the shivering mountain (so that’s how it got its name), whilst watching some lambs butt heads and bleat over a lick bowl.
With lunch over we then had to start climbing up onto the ridge at Odins Mine, and that soon warmed us up. What also warmed the cockles was the fact that as this walk was during the working week, there wasn’t that many people up there with us. Unfortunately for Molly though the preponderance of sheep meant that she had to be kept on the lead a lot of the time.
Thus our climb took us along and through Hollins Cross, Back Tor with its Aztec Pyramid type steps to the lonely tree (where the wind tried to blow us off) and eventually to the summit of Lose Hill. On our approach to which, we saw what appeared to be a dead sheep in the field, with two small lambs watching the carcass from nearby. Feeling somewhat impotent in what we could do, given that there were other sheep in the field, we just hoped that a shepherd would be keeping an eye on his flock.
From Lose Hill we began our descent to Castleton, which initially seemed to be taking us somewhat in the other direction, but after more negotiation of the flocking woollies we hit town, with just one small amount of sheltering from a shower. Castleton (home of the Blue John retailers) strikes me as something of a tourist trap, which nonetheless didn’t stop us trying the coffee and cake in one of it’s many teashops. So no thanks to the BBC weather centre it all turned out rather spiffingly (including Molly’s collar –in joke).
Anyway to get things moving again we (the Royal we doncha know) will start with a walk of 5 miles, that we have done before, only on this occasion we did bring a camera (Helen’s).
So parking at Castleton this time (with Pevril Castle looking down on us and suggesting another day out) we set off through a series of fields, making both of us feel somewhat sluggish (not Molly though you understand). Now Helen had convinced me via the BBC website that this was going to be a nice day. Well no actually, having underdressed I found myself shivering through this first part of the walk. So having exerted ourselves in the cold for half an hour, we decided to stop for lunch on a stile in sight of the abandoned road, at the bottom of the shivering mountain (so that’s how it got its name), whilst watching some lambs butt heads and bleat over a lick bowl.
With lunch over we then had to start climbing up onto the ridge at Odins Mine, and that soon warmed us up. What also warmed the cockles was the fact that as this walk was during the working week, there wasn’t that many people up there with us. Unfortunately for Molly though the preponderance of sheep meant that she had to be kept on the lead a lot of the time.
Thus our climb took us along and through Hollins Cross, Back Tor with its Aztec Pyramid type steps to the lonely tree (where the wind tried to blow us off) and eventually to the summit of Lose Hill. On our approach to which, we saw what appeared to be a dead sheep in the field, with two small lambs watching the carcass from nearby. Feeling somewhat impotent in what we could do, given that there were other sheep in the field, we just hoped that a shepherd would be keeping an eye on his flock.
From Lose Hill we began our descent to Castleton, which initially seemed to be taking us somewhat in the other direction, but after more negotiation of the flocking woollies we hit town, with just one small amount of sheltering from a shower. Castleton (home of the Blue John retailers) strikes me as something of a tourist trap, which nonetheless didn’t stop us trying the coffee and cake in one of it’s many teashops. So no thanks to the BBC weather centre it all turned out rather spiffingly (including Molly’s collar –in joke).
