Hayfield

Hayfield

November 1, 2017

KINDER ROAD, HAYFIELD, NEAR SPORTSMAN INN, HILL HOUSES, FARLANDS BOOTH, BROAD CLOUGH, WILLIAM CLOUGH, WHITE BROW, MIDDLE MOOR, PARK HALL ESTATE, LANTERN PIKE INN AT LITTLE HAYFIELD, SNAKE PATH, TWENTY TREES, SPORTSMAN INN

Distance: 8 miles                 Ascent/descent: 1,900ft

Difficulty: Moderate

Weather: Dry, bright and warm with some sunshine

Walkers: Peter Beal, Colin Davison, Alan Hart, Steve Kemp, Chris Owen, Jock Rooney and Tip, Julian Ross, George Whaites

Apologies: Laurie Fairman (family wedding in USA), Tom Cunliffe and Micky Barrett (both injured), Mark Gibby and Hughie Harriman (at police reunion), George Dearsley (in Turkey)

Leaders: Beal and Davison                      Diarist: Beal

Starting point: Sportsman Inn, Kinder Road, Hayfield

Starting time: 9.44am                     Finishing time: 2.25pm

You can follow the route by clicking on the word "here"  here

http://my.viewranger.com/track/details/NjIxNjY4Nw==

Today's walk was a repeat of a route completed a mere three weeks earlier. However, since misguided weather forecasts on that occasion caused a mass wimp-out, leaving only Colin and your temporary diarist to complete the walk, it was decided to repeat the exercise.

One of the objectives was to allow the Wanderers to pay their first visit to the Lantern Pike Inn in Little Hayfield since the departure of fellow walker and erstwhile landlord Tom earlier this year.

We were rewarded with glorious weather and fine views on what was a broad circuit of the Kinder Reservoir above Hayfield.

We turned left along Kinder Road outside the Sportsman and almost immediately turned right through a gap in the wall to descend a zig-zag line of steps to cross a footbridge over the River Sett.

Our route took us left again along a track which took us past Hayfield campsite (7  minutes) to join a lane near the Bowden Bridge Quarry car park, where we turned right, following the river. At a junction of the road and two tracks we turned sharp left uphill (17   mins), bringing us to the attractive hamlet of Hill Houses.

We followed this track until it descended gradually through a farm to join a lane near the collection of houses at Farlands Booth (29 mins), where the nephew of Agatha Christie once lived. She was said to have visited here frequently. We climbed up the lane past the large house on our left, soon reaching a footpath sign at a gate on the right.

From here we had a view of the grassed dam of the Kinder reservoir.  It is worth repeating that this huge engineering project was completed in 1911 and at the time the construction was the biggest earth dam in the world. The 44-acre reservoir holds 515 million gallons of water.

The path climbed steeply through a field and at its crest we ignored a path higher on the right to follow a track running alongside woods on our left. 

The path dropped down to a stream running from the Kinder plateau high on our right down through Broad Clough (53 mins). We crossed two stiles with helpful hinged top bars.

The stream here was in spate and the crossing tricky, not helped by Colin eagerly wielding his cameraphone in gleeful anticpation of walkers coming to grief.

At a gate at the top we slanted left at a National Trust fingerpost across a grassy field. We bore right on a faint path and joined a track which descended to bring us to a footbridge over the River Kinder.

Pie time was declared on a bank at the other side of the river(76 mins) in pleasant sunshine.

Continuing, we followed a narrow path through woods with views of the reservoir on our left and descended to reach a footbridge spanning the stream of William Clough, shortly before it enters the reservoir (93 mins). We crossed this and headed up the clough for a short distance before turning sharp left up the hillside on a path which headed back towards the reservoir.

On its crest at Nab Brow we descended slightly before taking a right fork up through the heather, bringing us to the two white-painted shooting boxes and a wooden bridge over a boggy area (106 mins).

We crossed the bridge and followed the path until it dropped down a paved section to a stream. We forded this and climbed slightly, soon reaching a path to the left, which we descended to reach the stream again at a ford just before a gate at the entrance to the wooded Park Hall estate.

 As has been recorded before this was once the home of local benefactor and textile baron Joseph Hague. He did well in the textile business - but apparently the bulk of his fortune was made by the masterstroke of deciding the offcuts from his factories would make ideal loincloths for slaves being exported from Africa. He duly sold them as such to the slave traders.

We turned right through the gate and soon emerged on the Hayfield to Glossop road, where a right turn brought us to the Lantern Pike Inn (134 mins).

For many Wanderers this was the first visit since Tom's departure. The Timothy Taylor's Landlord (£3-55) and the Abbeydale Moonshine (£3-35) were excellent and your diarist had the privilege of buying a round to mark his 69th birthday.

In fact one of our number provocatively remarked that the beer was tastier than he remembered on his last visit. Those present swore a solemn pact to keep his identity secret for fear of unpleasant consequences. The name of this former senior police officer will never be revealed.

We left and retraced our steps to the gate at the top of the Park Hall estate, where this time we turned right on a track which brought us to a wall on our right, which we followed up the moor to a metal kissing gate on the Snake Path, after which we paused for lunch (165 min).

The path led us down through a series of fields, past the local landmark of the copse known as Twenty Trees, joining Kinder Road in Hayfield a short distance from the Sportsman Inn on our right ( 195 mins).

The pub has been improved recently and the Wainwright's bitter at £3-60 a pint was excellent.

Photos by Colin

These photos by Steve Kemp

Next week's walk will take us to Castleton. We will meet outside the Castle Inn at 9.45am.

There is free parking on the road between the Winnats Pass junction and the mini-roundabout just before the village centre. En-route refreshments will be taken at the Cheshire Cheese in Hope around 12.15pm and afterwards at the Cheshire Cheese in Castleton around 2.20pm.

Happy wandering!