Monday 9th September, A Saddleworth Saunter

This Blog hasn't been kept as up-to-date as I would have liked of late, mainly because of other stuff going on. I'm making a valiant attempt at putting some of the more significant recent events so earwiggo.......
 

Alistair's Birthday Walk

Alistair, in common with Norman, has a birthday on the same date every year. Like Norman, he tries to celebrate his birthday with a walk. This year he struggled to find suitable company for his birthday walk and so he ended up asking me to join him.
Rather chuffed at being asked to join him on this auspicious occasion, I jumped on the train from Altrincham to Stockport where Alistair collected me for the drive over to Dovestones Reservoir, east of Oldham.
The day was ideal for walking, bright and sunny but not too hot. This area of Saddleworth is really quite lovely, the edges make for gentle walking – once you've actually got up to them. My last visit here was last November when I'd been out for a run with Cheshire Tally-Ho. Now the colours of the countryside were quite different and it was much warmer.
Our route started at the car-park by the reservoir dam. Other than dog-walkers, a couple of cyclists and two runners, we seemed to be the only people out that day.
We headed out west, which the navigationally switched on will quickly note is NOT east. East is Good. Heading west was A Warning. We had planned to climb to the top of Alphin, a pleasant enough looking hill. We picked out what appeared to be an easy zig-zag route.....except that it wasn't. It was a bit of an uphill battle over heathery, boggy, overgrown upness. There actually wasn't a zig-zag route so we just ended up aiming for the top and going straight for it. Such fun.

Pots and Pans, above Uppermill

Close Encounter of the Frog Kind

The Birthday Boy climbing up the side of Alphin

Up until a couple of years ago I’d always thought that walkers carrying carabiners about their person were poseurs….wanalooklike climbers. Until I walked with Denis Pigeon. He pointed out that a carabiner is simply a brilliant way of holding down the top rung of a barbed-wire fence so you don’t catch your rude bits as you clamber over. Sooo…here’s the Denis method of dealing with a barbed wire fence:

Another very useful, er, use for a carabiner is for securing your pack on the well-overloaded luggage rack of the train from Glasgow to Fort William and the start of your TGO Challenge. It also earns brownie points from the train conductor / tickety person who would otherwise get very grumpy. 

Anyway, once at the top of the hill we found a pleasant spot and stopped for a quick cuppa and a gawp at the views which were spectacular, the Manchester skyline in the distance, the reservoirs in the middle distance and weirdly shaped rocks along the edges.

 Manchester in the far distance

Alistair trying to look a year younger than he actually is

Suitable refreshed, we wandered off south east-ish, sticking closely to the rocky edges above Chew Brook and north of Wimberry Moss.
I lived not a million miles from here in the 1970s and one of the annual delights was picking wimberries, they make the most wonderful fruit pies. The only drawbacks are that you end up with blue fingers and they take ages to pick.
The paths were generally good but there were the odd soft and soggy bits to negotiate, nothing life-threatening like wot you get on Kinder Scout though. After crossing one of these soggy bits, a steaming peat desert, Chew Reservoir became our next target.

  Chew Reservoir

We trotted merrily across the Chew Reservoir dam (the Dam Chew Reservoir?) and looked across the water. Emley Moor TV mast was quite clearly visible in the distance. A bit of a cool breeze had built up so we found ourselves a nice sheltered spot for lunch. Butties and flasks were produced....and Alistair was presented with his no expenses spared £1 birthday card. I would have bought a Gregg's birthday cake....but there isn't a Gregg's on the Saddleworth Moors. Oh well. Egg butties and malt loaf had to suffice. Oh, and it rained, but only a bit.

Wandering off in a sort of north direction, we crossed some boggy ground until we spotted a good path along the edges. We followed this easy path until we drew level with Greenfield Reservoir, stopping only to gawp at the wonderfully shaped rock formations. And to photograph them:

    The person in blue is Alistair, not a rock. It’s just that he’s a year older.

The sticky-up thing on the horizon is the Emley Moor TV mast. 

We came across Ashway Cross:

‘Here, by the accidental discharge of a gun, James Platt Esq., MP for Oldham, lost his life, 27th August 1857’
James Platt, Liberal MP for Oldham, was out shooting grouse on the moors when he lost his life. The Platt family were big in the textile industry, at one time Platts were the world’s largest textile machinery manufacturers.
There were clouds:

The descent wasn't quite as straightforward as the earlier part of the walk. There wasn't much of a path so we just followed the stream that flowed down Birchen Clough to pick up the Land Rover Track that served the reservoirs.

All was well until I took a tumble, nothing serious – my pride was more damaged than my body, although my bruised legs ended up being quite multi-coloured for a couple of weeks!
Fortunately the Land Rover Track, which soon became a tarmac-surfaced road, made for easy walking and my bruised pins didn't slow us down too much and we were back at the car soon after.

Enroute to the car

A lovely day out in good company, I'll have to see if I can drag Alistair out for a walk on my birthday!
Alistair reckons with walked around 18km with a total ascent of 500m. I reckon we walked a bit more than 11 miles and climbed around 1600ft.
If you want to know what we REALLY did, have a look at Alistair’s blog. He’s got a map too!
More pics here. – loads more rock formation stuff.