Diary Walk
46
Brassington
Quarry CP (Four Churches Walk) Depart
10 a.m. 9 miles Leaders: David and Shirley Davison
This, a
gentle walk across fields and lanes taking in four churches of contrasting
characters; Brassington, Ballidon, Parwich and Bradbourne, started with a brief
talk describing the walk and why. In 2005, Amber Valley Ramblers produced a
walk in memory of a rambler who loved this area and had died whilst out
walking, a donation by the Pilgrim family of Crich enabled leaflets to be
produced for general circulation.
Ongoing from this, the Ramblers Association,
in conjunction with Collins the publishers, are producing a book to commemorate
the 75th anniversary of the formation of the Association, asking
each area to put forward a walk for publication, this walk being chosen to
represent the Derbyshire Area.
Today, with a copy of the proof in hand, we
decided to try the walk, and way mark where possible, to ensure those using the
book as a guide, would be able to walk the route easily, enabling them to enjoy
this extremely pleasant part of Derbyshire. We did find one or two anomalies
that we will put right in the next few weeks. Therefore, St. James’ Church,
Brassington was our first stop, after passing through the village that had an
almost carnival atmosphere, with stalls and flags all along the streets, it was
Brassington Wakes weekend.
The Church of St. James, Brassington, visited on St. James’ Day
The church built in 1281 and restored in 1880 stands elevated above this pretty, lead mining village. Our next stop was for a coffee break outside the now redundant 13c. Church of All Saints. Ballidon, a grade one listed building and in much need of repair, much of the village and manor house have long since been demolished, leaving this small church extremely isolated.
The redundant, All Saints, Ballidon
Before we moved off another walker who had arrived late caught up with us, swelling our numbers to twenty-one. Strangely, the church of St. Peter, Parwich is only a grade 2, listed building, with some parts of it dating back to the 12c.
The in’spire’ing church of St. Peter, Parwich
Again, as with Brassington, some of our number entered to admire and meditate on its historic values in the life of the village; Ballidon and Bradbourne were both locked. After lunch, we proceeded to our last church, that of All Saints, Bradbourne, a 13c, structure with a huge square tower that seemed out of proportion to the rest of the church, many visited the grave of the late actor Alan Bates, - for me, the highlight of this church was the 9c. Saxon stone cross standing in the south churchyard, a reminder of how long Christianity has been practiced in this place.
All Saints, Bradbourne, with Saxon Cross in foreground, circa 800 A.D.
A fairly easy and leisurely walk back to Brassington, where we were disappointed
to find that the Wakes celebrations had finished and the tea rooms closed, but
never mind we had had ourselves a very pleasant and interesting day.
Diary Walk
47 Wednesday 28th
July 2010 Weather. 18o C Cooler than of late.
Alport
heights Depart 9.59 a.m. 6 miles Leader:
Gerry White
Sixteen of
us gathered in the National Trust car park beside those tall metal structures
that we mostly see, as landmarks on the horizon, that have now become our
starting point for today. There was a slight chill in the air as we set off,
down hill most of the way until lunchtime, or so we were told, that could only
mean one thing, that being, uphill after lunch, as it was, there was a
surprisingly steep climb, to ‘hilltop’ as named on our maps, immediately
preceding our lunch stop.
Again the views over the beautiful Ecclesbourne
Valley were superb, from our vantage point we could see the traffic moving
along the Duffield – Wirksworth road, looking like slow moving toys from this
distance.
Probably by this time next year, regular steam and diesel passenger
trains will be running on the heritage railway that runs the nine-mile length
of the valley below us, a whistle, a puff of smoke and hiss of steam, will take
some back to the mid twentieth century when that was a common sight.
Little else has changed, one or two farming practises maybe ,
but, basically the scene will be the same as it was all those years ago, sheep,
lambs and cattle still roam the hillside fields, wild flowers, especially the
dainty harebells, festoon these slopes, last week we only found a few harebells,
this week they seemed to appear around every corner.
Always amazing how these dainty things can l survive such an environment.
During the walk, we took our time to replace some way markers and do a bit of
judicious pruning where stiles were in danger of being overgrown by encroaching
hedges. The promised rain threatened, but passed us by quite quickly, and didn’t
spoil what turned out to be a really very lovely day. Thanks Gerry.
Classic view southwest from Alport Heights.
Next Walks. (double issue this week due to holidays)
Sunday 1st August 2010
Edale Station
CP SK 124 853 Depart 10 a.m. 11 miles Leader:
Gerry White
Wednesday 4th August 2010
Duffield
Church
(A.V. Routways, Walk 10)
Sunday 8th August 2010
Monyash
Village CP SK 149 666 Depart
10 a.m. 11 miles
Leaders: Janet and John Topliss
Wednesday 11th August 2010
Duffield
Church CP SK 348 428 Depart 10 a.m. 6 miles
Leaders:
David and Shirley Davison