Nanpantan, Leicestershire

The weather forecast was not good so we decided to do a local walk. We drove to Loughborough and parked in the sports club in Nanpantan road. We walked across fields and through woods to Woodhouse Eaves , it was exceptionally muddy after last nights torrential rain and in places we were walking through streams of water. We saw daffodils in flower next to clumps of snowdrops (shows how spring is progressing) but not much in the way of wildlife -1 squirrel and a few blue tits and possibly a yellowhammer. We stopped for lunch at the Pear Tree. It has been modernised since the last time we went there but was very welcoming, even with our muddy boots. We had a crayfish ciabatta roll with Macdonald style chips! It started to pour with rain while we were eating so we stopped for a coffee. We continued walking when it the rain stopped. We followed the road to a lane and then through woodland past the site of an old windmill (couldn't see it) and then through to Beacon hill. It was a long slog up to the hill but we had good views at the top. The rock outcrops were interesting, the oldest rocks in Britain! We sat for coffee and then worked our way off the hill and down through more small bits of woodland. We past several small electricity generation wind mills which were quite noisy. At the bottom of the hill we had to cross a stream via stepping stones which was interesting after all the rain as the stones were mostly under the very fast flowing water. We next worked our way onto Buck hill which was a nice short ridge walk and then down through more woodland to Jubillee woods, the Outwoods and finally back to the car. The walk was 13.2 km and we were exceptionally muddy at the end. Plus my boot had sprung a small damp patch.