Great Hucklow, Windmill, Old Dam, Hargatewall, Tunstead, Wormhill, and Blackwell

This is the walk I had originally planned to do on Monday, when there would have been a lot more snow.

I travelled to Great Hucklow, walked through the village and then joined the footpath which goes alongside the road to the old mining hamlet of Windmill: there are some lovely views over to the right looking towards the north...which of course would look a lot better if the sun was shining.

After leaving Windmill I needed to walk along the road for a few minutes until I reached the ruins of High Rake Mine.

I continued along the footpath until I crossed a narrow country road and then started the gentle climb up the broken ground of Tideslow Rake.

Another short section of road followed and then I took the footpath across Tideswell Moor, arriving at the outlying farms of Old Dam before crossing the busy Buxton to Ashbourne road to the east of Peak Forest.

There's a dense network of paths here and I had to consult my map a couple of times to find my way to the top of Dam Dale.

I kept walking southwards down Dam Dale and then Hay Dale and then made my way over the fields to Hargatewall. There was nothing interesting for me to see here...neither was there at the next place I visited, Tunstead. Just out of sight though is Tunstead Quarry, the largest active limestone quarry in Europe.

It was a pleasant walk heading eastwards towards Wormhill: I arrived at the southern edge of the village.

It was then a fairly gentle descent into Cheedale, mainly grassy as well...so no slippery limestone underfoot to worry about.

[I didn't go this way in the bottom of Cheedale, but the conditions didn't look too bad.]

I was walking on grass again, a bit muddy in places though, as I climbed up the other side of the dale. It was a good physical workout for me though, my heart was beating noticeably faster and I was relatively short of breath, but I didn't need to stop on the way up, and didn't need a rest at the top.

As I was walking down the lane at Blackwell towards the bus stop I saw the TransPeak bus go by - it was frustrating at the time but there was nothing I could do about it. I wasn't rushing to get to the bus stop - I wasn't expecting a bus to come along...it was running fifteen minutes late: I was expecting to have to wait forty five minutes for the next bus anyhow. I found a fence to sit on which turned out to be rather uncomfortable and used the time to write up my notes for this blog post.