After my brief trip around Austria and the Ukraine, I flew back to London to spend a few weeks checking out my new flat in Derbyshire. It had been 12 months since I committed to buying the flat and 7 months since I had owned it so I was most interested to see what shape it was in and whether I still thought it was worth the price. Fortunately I found it to be in great shape and just as wonderful as I expected.
I landed in Heathrow in the afternoon (Wednesday 11 Aug) and rented a car for the drive north to Derbyshire. The code for the key lock box worked as expected and the key inside let me into the flat. Everything was in place and it was in perfect condition. The prior owner had left everything - furniture, towels in the bathroom, sheets on the bed, plates, cups, knives, forks, soap, cleaning materials, vacuum cleaner, iron - literally everything I might need.
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| The new flat in Cressbrook Mill |
My first job was to figure out how everything worked - turning on the water supply, figuring out the water heater, investigating the TV setup. It was all a bit different from the way things work in the USA but I eventually figured out which switch controlled which appliance and how to navigate the FreeView TV box. All went very well and I was impressed by how quickly things were all sorted out. I hadn’t really given much thought about how I would have handled things if the prior owner had left the flat empty but it would have been seriously difficult and expensive to purchase all that I needed and to get it delivered to the flat. I was very lucky.
Cressbrook Mill from the Monsal Trail
I finally got out for a decent run on Saturday morning. I ran down the road to the bridge over the river and crossed over and climbed up to the Monsal Trail. This is a wonderful old trail that runs on the now disused railway line from Bakewell to Buxton. I ran out through the Cressbrook and Litton Tunnels before returning on the same route. The tunnels are really impressive - wide enough for two train tracks, quite long, still caked with soot from the steam trains that used to pass through them, and, of course, now lit with electric lighting.
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| River Wye near Cressbrook |
Over the next few days I explored more and more of the trails in the neighborhood - the trail on the river Wye up to Litton Mill; the climb up over the top to Brushfield and then back down to the Monsal Trail through Priestcliffe Lees; the Monsal Trail out to Millers Dale and beyond to the Lime Kilns and the "Abseil Bridge", the trail back from Millers Dale avoiding the tunnels by skirting the edge of the hill; the trail up the hill from Cressbrook through the wood and across the fields to Litton. There is no shortage of beautiful trail to run over there. I am so lucky to be in such a wonderful part of the country.
I was getting to know my way around the roads a little too - they are all so narrow so you have to be careful with approaching traffic and cyclists (of which there are many around the Peak District). I had my first house guests when Margaret, Chris, Andrew and Val came over one afternoon. I think they were suitably impressed with the area. Sue and David visited one evening and Joy and Paul came over for lunch one day. With Joy and Paul we walked through the woods and fields to Litton and had a great lunch at the Red Lion there. On Thursday evening Mick and Elaine came over and we went for dinner at The Barrel in Bretton. The Barrel is a wonderful pub sitting on the top of the moor with great views and with great food. I tried many times afterwards to get a reservation for dinner there but they were always fully booked.
Mary Ann had flown over from California on the Wednesday and had stayed a couple of nights in London. She caught the train up to Chesterfield on the Friday and I met her at the station. We did a little walk over to Litton Mill and up to the Monsal Trail in the afternoon.
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| The Cathedral of the Peak, Tideswell |
On the Saturday morning we did a run over towards Brushfield and down Priestcliffe Lees back to the Monsal Trail. In the afternoon, we drove over to Tideswell to have a look around the church. The church is known as the Cathedral of the Peak an, for a relatively small town, is quite impressive. Later we drove over to Matlock. At the weekend and with everyone unable to travel overseas the Peak District is really crowded. Matlock and Matlock bath were a bit of a nightmare, there were so many people.
Cromford Mill
We stopped at Cromford Mill, a UNESCO site, where Richard Arkwright built one of the first water powered cotton mills in 1769. My flat in the Cressbrook Mill is also an Arkwright cotton mill built a little later. While the whole site is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, to be honest, it wasn't that impressive.
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| Bakewell Church |
On Sunday we did another run this time from Bakewell through the woods in an attempt to run to Edensor. My knowledge of the area was not that precise and we didn't make it to Edensor but we did find some wonderful trails through the woods and through the sheep pasture. After the run when we were back in Bakewell we walked over to the church to have a look inside. Another very impressive church for such a small town.
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| Buxton Crescent |
That afternoon we drove over to Buxton and had a walk around. Buxton is a lovely town with its Pavilion Gardens, its Georgian Crescent, the Opera House and the Devonshire Dome (once the largest unsupported dome in the world).
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| Buxton Opera House |
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| The "ladies" performing in Buxton Pavilion Gardens |
There was a music festival going on in the park and there were lots of people there. Some amusing entertainment was provided by a group of middle aged men dressed in white skirts and orange hats waving pompoms and parading around the gardens to music.
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| Kathleen Kennedy's Grave |
On the Monday morning we tried again to run to Edensor from Bakewell, this time we were on the right road and a lot closer to Edensor than before. Edensor (pronounced Enser) is a lovely little village that is a part of the Chatsworth Estate. It has just a few houses (many of them holiday lets), a cafe and an impressive church. The sister of John F. Kennedy, Kathleen, is buried in the Edensor church yard. She was married to one of the Cavendish family and somehow ended up buried on the family estate. There is a memorial to the visit of JFK to the gravesite while he was president - just a while before he was assassinated.
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| The Tower at Chatsworth |
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| The Aquaduct at Chatsworth |
From Edensor we ran over to Chatsworth House and up to the tower behind the house. From the tower we went through the woods to the aquaduct that takes water down to the fountains below. Chatsworth is truly a remarkable place - what wealth the Cavendish family has/had and what an amazing environment they created for themselves.
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| Heather at Ringinglow |
In the afternoon we drove over to Ringinglow for a short hike. On the way we stopped at Mompesson's Well - one of the locations food and money were exchanged with the outside world during the voluntary quarantine during the plague in nearby Eyam. The walk on the moors was quite beautiful with the outcrops of Millstone Grit and the purple heather in full bloom.
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| Bolsover Castle |
After the hike we had an appointment for afternoon tea at the Cavendish Hotel in Baslow. That provided more deserts than even I could eat.
The next day, Tuesday, we drove over to Bolsover to visit the Castle. It is an impressive castle sitting on the top of the hill with a great view over towards Staveley and beyond.
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| Ai WeiWei's Iron Tree |
After the castle we drove up towards Wakefield and the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. I had visited the park before and found it to be quite remarkable so a second visit was no problem. Mary Ann found it to be pretty good too - I think perhaps the best thing she saw in her visit. We covered most of the grounds but we were a little rushed towards the end. I would certainly go again to find all the bits and pieces that we missed. I particularly liked the Andy Goldsworthy pieces, the Ai WeiWei iron tree and the Damien Hirst pieces, but there were so many other interesting things too - many Henry Moore's, Sean Henry's Seated Man, Sophie Ryder's Hare, Barbara Hepworth's Family of Man......
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| Sean Henry's Seated Man |
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| Damien Hirst |
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| Damien Hirst |
After a day of being tourists we went to Whitby’s in Catcliffe for fish and chips. Always a favorite of mine.
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| View from Stanege Edge |
Wednesday morning we ran along Stanege and Curbar Edges from just below the Grouse Inn to the Curbar Road and then up onto White Edge. This section along the gritstone edges is one of my favorites and is truly spectacular. The blooming heather makes it all the more beautiful.
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| Hardwick Hall |
In the afternoon we paid a trip to Hardwick Hall. Unfortunately we were a bit late for the Hall interior as it closed at 3:00. We had to make do with the grounds which in themselves are quite impressive.
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| View down to Ladybower Reservoir |
Thursday morning's run was on the moors by Cutthroat Bridge on the Manchester Road. It was a nice day but quite windy which made it a little on the cold side up on top. The run up to the top was through wonderful purple heather. There is a spectacular view on top down to the Ladybower Reservoir below and the heather covered moors. At the top there were three people from Clowne and Eckington. We had fun talking with them. We went off along the moor towards the millstone rock formations - Coach and Horses, Salt Shaker, and Loaves of Bread. We only saw Coach and Horses. We returned down through the heather and the Grouse Butt’s to the road.
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| Coach and Horses |
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| Chatsworth House |
In the afternoon we had tickets to Chatsworth House. The house is really splendid and it is full of treasures. The current Duke and Duchess, who still reside in the House, also mix in some more modern pieces along with the splendid period pieces. There is a Damien Hearst and Lucien Freud sketches and several other modern pieces. The really spectacular piece is the trompe l’oeil violin painted on a door. After the house we walked around the gardens through the green houses, past the cascade of water, over to the maize and then the Rock Garden. It was all very impressive. Capability Brown did some of the work and was instrumental in moving the village of Edensor out of sight of the house, and of straightening the River Derwent below the house. They thought big in those days.
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| The Dam Wall at Ladybower |
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| Ladybower Reservoir |
On Friday we did an early morning run around Ladybower Reservoir. It was a cloudy day but no wind and it is a nice relatively flat trail. It afforded us good views of the prior days run up on the ridge.
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| Covid Test |
After breakfast/lunch we had to do our Covid tests for entry to the US. I had bought 2 Ellume Covid tests in the US and brought them over. They are Lateral Flow/Antigen tests and in association with a witnessing of the test by a company called Azova are valid for US entry. Of course for the witnessing part we needed cell service so we had to drive to the top of Monsal Head for that. We parked in the Monsal Head car park and at our assigned test time we joined a video session on the iPad with our observer who was somewhere in Utah. She was comfortable with doing both tests at the same time so we both started them. Me first with swabbing both nostrils, dripping 6 drops of solution into the test device and then inserting the swab. The test device had a Blue Tooth connection to our phones and the Azova app on the phones. The observer lead us through the test observing all stages. The app then started a 15 minute countdown which did not need to be observed, the app simply reported the result to the Azova server. Mary Ann came next and all was well. We thought the whole process was rather fun. We said goodbye to our observer and waited for the timer to run out.
At the end of my timer I got a negative result. Unfortunately at the end of Mary Ann’s timer she was diagnosed positive. This was not expected and we found this a bit distressing. If she truly had Covid then our trip would be extended not to mention there might be Long Covid side effects.
We decided Mary Ann needed a more accurate PCR test and we found an Express Test center in nearby Manchester so we headed that way. The test came with the promise of a 24 hour turnaround. There was little we could do then but isolate and wait for the results.
Saturday - no run today but a hike instead. We went up from Cressbrook on the road then up Cressbrook Dale and along Tansley Dale to Litton. We had a very mediocre coffee from the Community Shop in Litton and then continued down the Miller’s Dale trail to Litton Mill and back home. We were still anxiously awaiting the results from Mary Ann’s PCR test but it didn’t come until midnight. Thankfully the result was negative so once again all was well with the world.
On Sunday, our last full day in the UK, we ran up to Miller’s Dale on the Monsal Trail and continued further to Chee Dale and the intersection with the Penine Bridleway. From there we climbed up the side of the dale through a farm and along the edge of the quarry/cement works before heading west towards the top of Monk’s Dale. The going down Monk’s Dale was a bit technical and it really was not appropriate for a run but we pressed on and eventually came out at the now very busy (with hikers and cyclists) Miller’s Dale station before running back up the Monsal Trail and back to Cressbrook.
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| One of the fine tapestries in Hardwick Hall |
In the afternoon we went to Hardwick Hall to visit the interior of the house. It is a beautiful and impressive house and has an extensive collection of tapestries. Bess of Hardwick was an impressive woman - bearing 6 children and having 4 husbands and supervising the construction of Hardwick Hall.
Interestingly the Hall was once a part of the Chatsworth Estate but in the 1950’s the then Duke of Devonshire died and his heir after inheriting the estate was subject to significant Death Duty taxes. As part of the settlement to the Internal Revenue, the Hardwick estate was passed over to the state (The National Trust) along with a few other significant art works from Chatsworth.
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| Bess of Hardwick |
After Hardwick it was back to the flat to clean and tidy up and pack our bags. We had been having difficulty in securing dinner reservations and this night it was no different. All we could find was a table at Raja’s the Indian restaurant in Bakewell. It was our third time there in just one week but it was another excellent meal.
We had an early start on Monday morning and we set off for Heathrow and our 11:10 am flight to San Francisco and home. An uneventful return trip but a long day.
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