As the bank holiday weather wasn’t very good and I was on call at work too, I decided to take Friday off, the weather was forecast to be good and my walking partner was on holiday so it seemed a good opportunity to get out walking.
We decided to walk Froggatt Edge , which over looks part of the Derwent Valley in Derbyshire. The starting point of the walk was a car park at Curbar Gap, at the top of the hill from the village of Calver. As the end of the walk would be up this hill I decided to check the distance from the bottom, it was just over a mile and quite steep, not the ideal way to finish a 7 mile walk.
The route said to leave the car park through a gate, which we did and set off to walk to the ridge which we could see in front of us, this turned out to be our first mistake. After a little climb to the top, we then set off along a path they lead along the edge, we thought that the edge wasn’t as dramatic as it appeared in the guide book (pictured) but we assumed this would change.
The walk took us along a path with a moor on one side and a short drop down to fields on the other, we passed groups of rocks, there was a pleasant breeze up here which was welcome as the sun was high in the sky, we saw lots of hooded crows and meadow pipits, also heard what I think was a grouse but didn’t see it.
The route was easy going and very quiet, we only saw about half a dozen people on the edge.
As we continued the scenery remained constant and still no sign of the dramatic cliffs shown in the guide.
The directions said when the path turns north, descend, but when we reached this point there was no sigh of a path down so we continued onwards. We then saw a road that was shown on the route map and we could also see a pub, that wasn’t on the route map. We looked at the OS map we had with us and noticed a pub further along the road than the point where we should have descended We now realised that we were not following the route we should have been on. There was nothing to do except continue, we had walked too far to retrace our steps, so we continued along the path , passing at one point a couple of inscribed block which appeared to have a poem carved around the sides and another inscription describing it as a companion stone.
Eventually we arrived at another path leading down towards the road. We descend through a small wood, with strange constructions on the side of some of the trees, strange things, could they have been wild bee’s nests? No sign of bees around though. Emerging from the wood we crossed a field and arrived on the road opposite the pub.
Another look at the OS map showed a footpath leading from the pub back to our original route so rather than follow the road back to the route we decided to follow this path which initially led through fields full of wild flowers, a lovely spot to take a break and have a snack.
We set off again and left the meadow to enter a wood which is where we thought we would pick up our original route. we followed a path through the wood, as described, which should have led us down through the wood towards a track the would lead us down to the river Derwent but the one we were on took us around the edge of the wood, so it looked like we had gone wrong again, We persevered along this path and finally reached a broader track which we followed down the hill to emerge in the middle of an upmarket housing estate, large houses with electric gates. We continued along a road that seemed to go in the direction we needed and found a very overgrown footpath which further down the hill, lots of nettles here so we got a few nettle stings, but we eventually reached a main road which we followed and arrived at the bridge over the Derwent at Grindleford. Finally we were on the route again! We took a path that led into another wood and continued onward emerging into farmland and a path that lead to the village of Froggatt.
From here we could look up and see the cliffs of Froggatt Edge, definitely not where we had walked,
We walked to another bridge over the Derwent and then took a path which followed the river where we saw a family of Coots, the young are very cute and quite unlike their parents. We soon reach New Bridge where the river pools and there is a weir, not sure what the flow of water powers though. There was a small preservation area here where there were Lamprey and Great Crested Newts but we didn’t see either. Continuing along the river we saw a Mandarin duck, what I think was a Blackcap and the unusual sight of 2 swallows attacking a Crow, maybe the Crow had got a swallow chick. The path then took us through a small camp site and we arrived at Calver Mill, now apartments but once the setting for the castle in the TV series Colditz.
By now we were both quite weary after having walked for over 5 hours and we did not relish the climb back up to the car park, we enquired at the local pub to see if there were any taxis in the area but were told there weren’t any, so we had a drink at the pub and decided that I would leave my rucksack with my friend. It would be easier to to climb the hill unladened. As I walked up the hill I could again see the cliffs where we should have walked. Once I reached the car, I drove back down the hill to the pub to pick up my friend and have a welcome drink.
The walk should have been 7 miles but with us taking the wrong route it ended up being over 8 miles, and quite a struggle towards the end. It was still very enjoyable and we must go back and walk Froggatt Edge itself sometime, it turns out we actually had walked over White Edge.
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