Walk 23/2007 – On the Dragon’s Back

Sunday 4th November 2007

The long group, made up mostly of short people, undertook an ambitious 16 mile walk with around 750m of ascent over 3 hills. A short stop was taken near to Pilsbury castle to take in the lovely views down the valley where the knife-edge ridge profile of Chrome Hill, our third hill, complemented the views.

After passing through Crowdecote, Stuart finally got his wish to climb on to the top of High Wealdon. Apparently this had previously been shunned on club outings as it was always near the end of a walk, what sort of poor excuse is that?! Lunch was taken on top, typically in a cool wind during the only part of the day when the warming sun went behind a cooling cloud. When we came down two climbers were preparing to play on Aldery Cliff, and it was noted that the flat cap (there were no Whippets) on one of the heads would not afford too much protection should he fall.

A slight change of route then took us through Earl Sterndale past the implausibly named Quiet Woman pub which is reputed to be over 400 years old and was in the occupation of the the Heathcote family for over 300 years. The name is unusual with only two others in the country. It is said to refer to a too talkative woman who was decapitated as a consequence! The pub sign shows a headless woman with a caption ‘Soft words turneth away wrath’. The parish Church in the village, opposite the pub, was the only Derbyshire church to suffer a direct hit from a Second World War bomb (not a lot of people know that!).

Our next hill to bag was the distinctive Parkhouse Hill, another narrow ridge, and a good place to find fossils and carboniferous corals. Just as we reached the top a phone call was received from the ‘shorters’ who could see us from Hitter Hill, who questioned our ability to complete the full walk. In disgust at this aspersion we waved them a polite goodbye and after a few slippery moments coming down the steep side headed off for Chrome Hill.

Despite being the third hill it was easily completed and we all enjoyed the views from the coral ridge. There was still some way to go and a short but hard pull up a grassy slope near the foot of Chrome Hill got us all searching for oxygen again. The path back along a quarry edge was notable as we couldn’t find it so we finished the walk following some quiet roads where we were twice engulfed by milking herds going to their sheds. It was commented that the first herd had much bigger, fuller udders than the first!

We finally got back to the others in the pub in deep dusk, but as Stuart pointed out 16 miles and three good hills in seven hours wasn’t bad. Everyone was happy that we were out later than normal, on a mild, sunny, windless day, enjoying the sunset. A cracking walk on a cracking day.(Ed – yes, quiet women and big udders, what more could you want?)

Report – Graham

The slow team took a much more leisurely route, cutting out a lot of this tortuous hill climbing and sticking to a comfortable 10 miles. It was during the first part of the walk that Carol informed us that brown cows were prettier than black and white cows! I am still not quite sure on basis she had come to this conclusion.

We had lunch near the top of Hitter Hill from where we got some good views. After lunch we decided to go right to the summit even though we could have avoided it. When we got to the top we noticed these seven walkers climbing the hill in front of us. On closer inspection we decided it was the rest of our group, much to our surprise, as, since it was after lunch, we would have expected them to be much further through their walk. We decided to give them a call to see if any body wanted to switch to the slow group, since we were close enough for that to happen. However they all decided to carry on.

Since they were obviously going to take much longer than us to complete their walk, we decided that we had to stop at the Quiet Woman pub for a drink. Our route back took us along the edge of a vast quarry which fortunately is generally hidden from view; but it was interesting to see how they were excavating the rock in layers leaving a hole which must have been more than 100m deep. From there we made our way back to the start where fortunately there was another pub where could wait for the “fast” group to turn up, which they did eventually just as the light was fading.

Report – Alan

Walk rating – Alison’s best so far! – Excellent

Pilsbury Castle Hills.	Autumn leaves add colour.
Parkhouse Hill and Chrome Hill plus some “pretty” brown cows.	Parkhouse Hill and Chrome Hill.
Parkhouse Hill and Chrome Hill.	A view from Hitter Hill.
A turkey at the Quiet Woman pub.	The sun sets as the long walkers complete their day..