Weir waterfall and pool along Monsal Dale
It was another hot day, glad that the fans we had ordered from Amazon as an emergency purchase were on the doorstep when we got back to the cottage last night. They are brilliant and nice they don’t have to be plugged into a socket.
We had initially intended to do a couple of cycle rides one of them being the Monsal cycle trail from Bakewell to just outside Buxton and back. A couple of challenges, there was an annual fair in Bakewell and we were not sure what parking and traffic would be like. We were also concerned that the trail would be quite busy given there aren’t may cycle routes in the area. So we binned the cycle idea and researched a hike instead.
I had wanted to see the Headstone aqueduct at Monsal as had seen some lovely photos of it online and found a hike that took us north from there to Litton, (where there was a pub and small shop so we could get some lunch) and back on a circular trail through Cressbrook Dale, the promise of a beer at the end of our hike was also appealing!
Here is a link to an interesting article on its construction LINK to ARTICLE and draws attention to the fact that whilst we think it is now a glorious landscape what was there before was in a sense more impressive and less tamed. At 300 feet long, with five arches reaching some 70-feet at the centre, it appears a triumph of Victorian engineering. But it wasn’t met with universal approval when work started around 1860
Both the pictures show the river as far more of a feature than it is now.
We parked at Monsal Head and then made our way down the steep footpath to the Aqueduct, very impressive, I was taken by the idea of walking along the river valley below, (ignoring our planned trail) so we made our way down and really enjoyed walking through the fields next to the river. Tried to take a photo of a man fishing but he wasn’t happy – probably didn’t have a license. Anyway we decided we were going in the wrong direction so crossed the river and went back on ourselves. Seemed good to begin with however, we soon realised we needed to climb back up to Monsal Head and then go back over the aqueduct to get back onto our trail! Still it was worth it.
Didn’t really enjoy walking along the bike path / ex railway line, it was hot and fairly busy with cyclists. We struggled to find the path leading down to the valley as we weren’t really keeping a close eye on the map! Had to backtrack a short distance but we soon dropped down back into the river valley. Unfortunately we then had what seemed like a long walk along a minor road. On a hot day not that much fun and it felt a bit of a grind. Even the cows were trying to stay cool!
At Cressbrook we took a detour to look at the weir on the Wye river which I enjoyed. In fact I liked this spot so much that I wanted to explore further another day, which we did when we explored Millers Dale later in the holiday.
A steep climb, on road out of Cressbrook until we emerged at the top of the valley (about 300m). The next section through the woods along the steep sided shoulder of the Dale was also challenging. The path was narrow very overgrown, lots of brambles, and had a downhill camber which made it difficult to walk along, took ages to make any distance. Eventually we were able to cross into the fields which ran down towards Litton and felt far happier with the trail.
The village shop was open as well as the pub, good choice. After our ‘secret’ picnic lunch and beer at the pub we had an ice cream from the shop which we tried to eat before it melted whilst making our way along to the return trail down to Cressbrook Dale. This was a delightful section and made up for the less than ideal walking earlier in the day. We were both amazed by how dry the Dale was, no running water in the river, but we were happy in the shade offered by the trees.
Halfway down the Dale the footpath seemed to disappear / become very overgrown with one more travelled way appearing to climb up out of the valley. Well we didn’t want to get tangled up in the upper trail so decided to push our way through the overgrowth and happily not for too long and we were back on a lovely dirt trail meandering through the woods with a moss covered wall to our right on the far side of the river bank.
We soon popped out at the end of an access road to some houses. Had a lovely chat with a lady tending her garden and made our way back down to Cressbrook. Although we were back on tarmac it didn’t feel as bad as this morning and we enjoyed the short section along the bank of the river before climbing back up to the Aqueduct and then on to Monsal Head where we enjoyed a drink in the shade before heading home.
Overall there was too much road walking for this to be a special hike, although we really enjoyed the section from Tansley Dale down through Cressbrook Dale as well as the Monsal Dale section along the river. I can see a potential hike on the map linking Monsal Dale with Deep Dale which we did on our first day. We also researched a circular walk from Litton which we did on our last day and really enjoyed.
