David and Jacinta's Walks- 2025

Firbank and Bridge End Walk 14 in Cicerone's "Walking in the Lune Valley and Howgills".  We drove from home to the tiny  hamlet of Firbank on the edge of the Howgills. The starting point was a farm called "Goodies" with its own post box and Village Institute notice board. Goodies' post box We set off and after a bit of route finding, joined the Dales Way just after Hole House Farm and started towards Nether Bainbridge. Hole House Farm and The Howgills The view opened up, including that of the old Ingleton railway which ran towards an amazing viaduct, more of which later. Stile with sometime fence protecting walkers from the railway. Remains of the railway line just visible The next section was across a number of fields towards a farm at Bramaskew, made more interesting by the fact that the heavens opened and it was rather uncomfortably wet for a while. The Dales Way continued with a scenic walk down to Low Branthwaite from where we were able to progress easi...

Mortimer House, Back Tor and Agden It promised to be a cold, but dry day, so we headed out to Mortimer House in the Derwent valley to have a favourite walk. As before, the first section along the Dukes Road is straightforward, but the views all around are superb. Back Tor and Lost Lad (Trig on Back Tor just discernible) The temperature was freezing, but clear and we did not stop until we reached a sheltered spot below Back Tor to have lunch. View from lunch spot- snow on Bleaklow Fortified by our provisions, we went up to the top of the Edge and briefly admired the view, before descending to the road and the next section of our walk. Approaching Back Tor Cakes of Bread (R.) and Wheel Stones (L.) It is always a rather nerve wracking half mile or so along the road to the start of the track down to Strines Reservoir. Strines is really impressive with the combination of the various reservoirs, the woodland and the prominent  and impressive folly which seems to be visible from all angle...

A Short Walk to Laddow It was an extremely chilly day and the intention was to walk from Crowden to Black Hill via Laddow Rocks and return via Tooleyshaw Moor and Hey Edge. However, common sense prevailed and I found a nice, sheltered spot just below Laddow to enjoy my lunch and the view, before returning to Crowden via the Pennine Way. Lunch spot with a view of Tooleyshaw Moor A walk of 4.1 miles with 340m ascent.

Hebden Dale, Hardcastle Crags and Horodiddle A great walk, suggested by Rachel. We met in Hebden Bridge and had a coffee and cake at The Hermit- an idiosyncratic café which had a wealth of '60s décor and books to browse. We parked up at the National Trust car park at New Bridge, and followed the path through the woods of Hebden Dale, stopping to take a couple of pictures before taking the steep path up to the farm at Walshaw. Approaching Walshaw From Walshaw the walk was much more open, passing the intriguingly named Horodiddle farm. We followed the Calder / Aire Link for a while, descending past a derelict house (with its own electricity supply) marked as Coppy on the map and turned southward at another derelict house called Nook! Our return to the car was graced by sheep greedily enjoying a salt lick. Move over, sister- let me have some! Also passing some very lost Highland Cattle on the skyline. A very long way from home It had been very chilly on the walk so we ate our picnic i...

Sett Valley Café and Chinley Churn As we have done for the past two years, we had a "Celebration Breakfast" at the Sett Valley Café- an enjoyable indulgence as ever! Breakfast portraits! We had left our choice of walking route pretty fluid but, in the end we decided to walk up towards New Allotments and see how we felt from that point. Looking back to Lantern Pike The cloud base was pretty low, but we could see the dusting of snow on Kinder Low. Kinder Low (with snow) in the distance We were going pretty well, so we decided to go the whole way down to the Throstle Bank farm and return via Cracken Edge and Peep o Day. Striding out above New Allotments Even though there was a very chilly breeze from time to time, we had a thoroughly enjoyable walk of 7.8 miles with 450m ascent.

Crowden, Laddow and The Chew Reservoir- David I went for a walk on my own today and wanted to stretch my legs a little. We had done the Chew Reservoir walk from Crowden at around this time last year, and it's a familiar yet challenging walk, so it suited me well. For a little variety, and because I was starting a little late, I decided to walk the route in the opposite direction to usual as the last section is relatively flat and well-surfaced compared to the descent from Laddow. The day was beautifully clear, and the first hour or so of the walk is dominated by the view of Laddow Rocks. Laddow Rocks Progress up to Laddow can be gauged by looking across to Bareholme Moss and May Moss, and seeing both the rock strata and Crowden Great Quarry. Bareholme Moss and Crowden Great Quarry It was something of a revelation to walk east to west across Laddow Moss to the reservoir as it was much easier to keep my feet dry and keep to a more defined path than when traversing west to east! The C...

Trentabank and Shutlingsloe Note the Curlew notice! It's great to have the choice of familiar walks so that we can adapt to the weather forecast (or choose our café...) and today there was a likelihood of rain in the early afternoon. We'd been to Chinley and Shining Tor quite frequently and Shutlingsloe was somewhere that we'd not been for quite some time. That fitted the bill, despite the lack of a reliably open coffee stop. Our ascent was punctuated by stops to talk with a couple of well-insulated babies- one a three-month-old being  entertained by a dancing fruit video on a mobile phone, the other just enjoying the day out. Everyone enjoying a chat We stopped to look at the signs for the Peak District Curlew Recovery Project and were very concerned that the curlew population had declined by 80% since 2000  and chicks rarely survive because they are "unruly wanderers". Apart from falling victim to foxes, badgers, ravens and crows, they're also killed by dogs...