Hope, Derbyshire

Friday 24th August 2007

It was lovely weather today so we decided to make the most of it and go for a walk and hopefully avoid the Bank holiday rush. We drove to Hope in Derbyshire and started by walking gently uphill to Hope Cross, where we saw a hang-glider over Lose Hill. We then went steeply downhill through the forest to the path along the side of Ladybower reservoir. We sat and had lunch sitting by a stream, just out of the sun. The path was easy walking with good views of the water and of a floating branch with 3 Shags sitting on it and a brave fish which jumped out of the water just in front of them. We also passed under the Crook Hills. At the end of the reservoir we crossed to the picnic area to use the loos and had an ice lolly as it was so hot. We then walked uphill and across fields and through woods back to Hope where we were just in time for a cup of tea at the art gallery.

Leicestershire Round : Burrough Hill to Owston

Wednesday 22nd August 2007

Having had the guide books for the Leicestershire round for about 8 years I decided that it would be nice to be able to follow a local trail in the times when we can't get to dosome of our Coast to Coast walk.

The start of the Leicestershire Round is at Burrough Hill country park and we got stuck in a long traffic jam to Melton Mowbray before discovering that we didn't need to go that far, so we turned round and eventually got to the country park where I discovered that I had left the footbeds to my boots at home so had to walk without them. We walked to the top of the hill where the Round begins at a very impressive hill fort. We walked around the embankment and then followed a permissive path through woodland. We walked across fields to get to Somerby where we stopped for lunch at the 3 Crowns, (steak and ale pies, and 2 pints and 2 halves of Somerby Parish bitter for £14 -not bad). We continued the walk to Owston and then did a return circle, mainly across fields. The last field was very difficult to walk on as it had just been ploughed. My feet were suffering by now due to no footbeds but we eventually got back to the hill fort after 17km.

Northern tour 2007

July 28th to August 14th 2007
We had a three centre holiday this time, spending 8 days at Beadnell in Northumberland, 6 days in Edinburgh and 2 days at Clitheroe, Lancashire.

Beadnell Bay, Camping and Caravanning Club,Temporary Holiday Site

Beadnell was lovely, the beaches were clean and sandy with rockpools and early deserted. We will certainly return for another visit. The site was nice and flat and very well arranged. Not bad for £5 a night! We did two walks whilst we were here.

Tuesday 31st July 2007
A lovely day today so we drove to Banburgh and parked at the golf links. We then walked across a field with cows and calves to Banburgh which we looked round before continuing along the coastpath. The beaches were wonderful and empty. We then crossed the golf course and walked along lanes, woods and fields of peas, beans and wheat. We had views of Banburgh castle all the way round. While crossing one field we were chased by a herd of bullocks, who were determined to stop us getting to the stile, we made it - just. We got back to the car at 5.15 just in time to get an ice lolly and go across the dunes to sit by the sea. It was lovely.

Saturday 4th August 2007
We drove to Craster and were lucky enough to find a parking space. We set off along the coast path with wonderful views towards Dunstanburgh Castle. The shoreline was very different to the shore at Beadnell - lots of rocks but no sand. We sat and watched the Kittiwakes nesting on the cliffs for a while and then continued along the coast path until we arrived at a nice secluded bay so we diverted and sat and had a break for a while. The walk continued along the coast and then went through the arboretum of Howick Hall- the home of Earl Grey. We got a little lost as the route through the arboretum had changed but we finally got to the hall and had a cup of Earl Grey tea and a slice of cake. We then walked through fields and woods back to Craster. The walk was 12.7 km.

We also had visits to Alnwick Gardens and Lindisfarne whilst we were here.

We moved onto Edinburgh on 6th August, it was a good journey but we had some trouble finding the caravan site. This site was next to the airport runway but was surprisingly quiet. This was another temporary holiday site at £5 per night.

We didn't do much walking here as we mainly here to visit the Fringe and the Tattoo. Emily joined us on the Thursday.

We did climb up to Arthurs seat which gave lovely views over Edinburgh and over the Forth. The ants were flying on the summit so we didn't stay there for long.

Our final stage was to stop at the Camping and Caravanning club at Clitheroe partly to break the journey home and partly to drop Emily off in Preston. There was luxury at this site as we had electric hook up -it was £17.40 a night though!
We had a short walk along the Ribble which was very nice although John was very traumatised by the pub with no beer! We had passed a long crocodile of people at one stage and it turned out they had drunk the pub dry! We did very well having a 16 day holiday for just over £100 for the two of us.