Well after a pleasant stroll through the rolling Buckinghamshire countryside last week it was back to the Hills of Derbyshire. The weather didnt promise to be too good but we set off for Castleton with the fallback of doing the caves, but upon arriving at the Mam Tor car park it wasnt too bad so we set off.
The initial walk to the summit of Mam Tor was steep by a stone path,but because we were already fairly high up, not too long. Mam Tor is the site of an Iron Age hillfort although all we could really see was the lines of the defencive ditch that runs fairly close the the summit, Once on the top we could see across towards Edale and Kinder Scout, the start of the Pennine Way. We descended Mam Tor on to opposite side, still on a Stone path to walk along the ridge of the Hill that seperates Edale valley with Hope valley, It was quite breezy here but the views were lovely when the low lying cloud allowed.
As we left Mam Tor, we also left the paved path and we continued along the ridge toward the next climb, a relatively short climb up a rough path, on the Castleton side of this rise we started to see gorse bushes with Pipits flying around the bushes, also skylarks were singing in the air before falling back to the ground. We continued along the ridge, now heading for Back Tor, a hill with a steep cliff face on on side and a small plantation on the other. This was probably the hardest climb due to the steepness of the climb and the rough state of the ground. Now we were on the last part of the outward journey, after a short descent we now started on the climb to the summit of Lose Hill again the path became paved and we finally arrived at the top. Here we could see down to plain where the valley from Edale meets the Hope Valley. The picture at the top was taken form here looking back to Mam Tor with the clouded summit.
Now would have been a good place to take a break and use the shelter of the Plantation we had passed earlier, so back we went along the same path, the descent of ;Back Tor was tricky as apart from the rough terrain it was also getting quite wet, but we reached the plantation and took a deserved break.
We left the plantation and now detoured slightly, my walking trousers, which I found out were not waterproof, were really soaking so we took a path we had seen earlier that ran around the side of the next rise, which, although a little longer, was easier going and we soon reached the start of the paved climb upto the summit of Mam Tor. Having walked up to what were the ramparts of the hill fort, and a very steep climb, we spotted another path which appeared to be going around the summit, so we took that and although muddy going we eventually found ourselves just above the carpark, where we gratefully changed into dryer clothes.
We then drove down into Castleton for coffee and scones at the cafe we are becoming regulars in. As we drove into Castleton we could look up and see Mam Tor and the ridge we had walked, or we would have been able to see it if it hadnt now been lost to view by the mists.
All in all apart from the weather it was an enjoyable walk and one of the most strenuous we have done, but we made good time taking 3 and half hours to walk the 7 miles (plus a bit more for the detours). I think we walked faster because although the views were very good there was nothing much to stop and look at, so we kept moving a lot more than usual.
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