16th October, A Nangreaves Recce

Rick and I needed to get out for a walk – it’s been, er, such along time since our last outing.

I had a route in mind for the Tally-Ho! that really needed checking out. It’s all very well plotting a route on the map, but it’s often a different matter when you actually run (or walk) the route.

Kick off is the Lord Raglan, home of the Leyden Brewery, in Nangreaves near Bury – where all the best black puddings come from. That’s Bury….although the Leyden Brewery might make black puddings too, I don’t know.

A short bit of tarmac up Snape Hill was endured before hitting decent footpaths and Land Rover Tracks. All went swimmingly well until we came across a ‘Private’ sign, barring our way through the Public RoW through the farm yard at Croston Close – SD820158 if you want to harass the property owner.  An additional sign offered an alternative route – a concessionary path across a boggy field. The sign pointed out that the original Right of Way was still valid – but it was quite clear that the owner’s successful deterrents had , er, successfully deterred walkers wishing to use the path.

The appropriate authorities have been informed.

 

The next ‘challenge’ was Croston Close Bottoms. This is a valley where, if the map is anything to go by, is an easy navigational exercise. Ho-ho, oh no it isn’t! We spent a long time trying to locate the path on the ground – we did eventually but it was damned hard work. And my feet got rather wet.

Around Ashworth Moor Reservoir following footpaths across what was Water Board land we crossed the Edenfield Road and began a gentle climb up to Knowl Hill – passing the thoughtfully planted windfarm en-route. The wim-wam trig point / pile of rocks at the top served as our lunch stop.

 

Rick posing, apres-lunch, in front of the pretty windfarm 

Following the route of the Rochdale Way, we descended in an Easterly direction (East is good….etc, etc) towards some reservoirs – where a pretty view was prettily presented to us:

Naden Middle Reservoir with Naden Lower Reservoir peeking out on the right (=south) 

Naden Higher and Naden Middle Reservoirs 

It’s pretty obvious that land owners don’t want you around here: barbed wire is abundant in totally inappropriate places, many paths are blocked and footpath signs just don’t exist where they really should. It’s a poor show.

 

Just for Alan:

Some of paths were dead easy to locate and follow, although the stony surface of this one may well catch out the faster runners:

More blocked and unmarked paths followed that entailed some serious map studying – much to the amusement of the audience that was gathering. Even sheep deserve a giggle sometime I suppose:

Another Right of Way difficulty presented itself at Sale’s Farm (SD818150 if you want a whinge). A Right of Way is clearly marked on both the 1:50K and the 1:25K maps – but not on the ground. There’s no footpath sign or any indication at all that a Right of Way exists. It DOES exist, and goes through a private house-type farm yard & stables. The addition of an openable (not sure if that’s a real word, but you catch my drift) electric fence gateway adds to the feeling of general path obstruction / lack of Right of Way.

Again, the appropriate authorities have been informed…..but don’t hold your breath.

Whatever, in a couple of weeks 20 – 30 hairy-arsed trail runners will be piling down that Public Right of Way – and there’s some big lads amongst them.

More blocked / overgrown footpaths followed:

 Can you spot the Footpath sign?

We eventually got back to the Lord Raglan at too late an hour to have a pint so we headed off back home – just in time to miss the worst of the rush-hour traffic. What we were expecting to take around under 4 hours actually took nearly 6 hours. I’ll be out on a re-recce next week, apart from needing to tweek the route I need the exercise.

At the end of the day we’d enjoyed (endured?) our little outing, there are some really cracking bits to the route – unfortunately there’s really crappy bits too.

This is what we SHOULD have done:

 

8.5 miles with around 1200’ of ascent.

We ended up doing nearer 11 miles after all the faffing about.

 

Reporting footpath problems

Footpath problems can be reported using FixMyStreet at www.fixmystreet.com

It’s very simple, just specify the location and describe the problem…..and your work as a responsible member of the great walking public is done.

FixMyStreet will then forward your complaint to the appropriate authority who will (hopefully) deal with it.