Tuesday January 21st

Hartington and Three Dales

We decided that we'd like to south for a change of scenery, and we knew that Hartington had at least one nice café (which we'd visited in October 2024). The OS map showed some excellent potential and we weren't disappointed. The walk took us south below the "bump" of Pennilow, a distinct promontory, into Morson Wood and into Beresford Dale below the grounds of Beresford House. After a kilometre or so, Beresford Dale turned into Wolfscote Dale with impressively hight walls- true limestone country.

Into Wolfscote Dale

The path suggested that this was popular walking country but we met only a few other walkers, including a gentleman with two aging boarder collies- we chatted with him for a while; it turned out that he has an apartment in Chamonix. We should have asked him if he rented it out!

We passed quite a few nonchalant sheep making the most of the slopes. They're probably used to lots of visitors at the weekends and in the summer.

Athletic sheep!

After reaching Drabber Tor and the precipitous Peasland Rocks, we reached the junction with Biggin  Dale, leading northwards and starting our return towards Hartington. On reaching the minor road at Dale End, we took Highfield Lane (very much a "Green Lane") back directly to Hartington. The sheep of the day were some very handsome brown and white ones, possibly Jacobs.

Sheep of the day

We stopped for a few minutes to look at Hartington Hall Youth Hostel, a magnificent 17th century manor house. After that, we stopped for a longer walk around St Giles church before returning home.

A walk of 6½ miles with 175m ascent.


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