Wednesday 10 July 2013

Three Derbyshire dales, strange hillsides and 40-year-old memories

Today we had good walking weather, dry and not too warm, so walking is what we did. From the cottage we walked through Hartington to where a footpath took us down Beresford Dale and into Wolfscote Dale. Had we continued south we would have reached Dove Dale, but we turned left into Biggin Dale.

Along the way I spotted a good location for a self-timed photo: of the two of us on a bridge over the river. It took several attempts before I was satisfied. The first and second were overexposed; on the third I hadn't quite got into position(!); I can't remember what was wrong with the fourth; and I've uploaded the fifth (and best) in a bigger size.

The sides of the valley were very steep, and some had strange horizontal lines. I don't know what caused these; they look more natural than man-made.

At the end of our walk, 6.25 miles after we started, we came to Hartington Hall Youth Hostel where we had a cup of tea.

The last time I was here was exactly 40 years ago, when I'd stayed here on a youth hostelling trip with a schoolfriend. I remembered the old wooden interior of the place, more or less unchanged since 1934 when the Youth Hostelling Association acquired it.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Which schoolfriend was this? HS

Halfie said...

Dennison.