Collected Musings of a Hill Wanderer

A weekend may have been spent around Cowal during the spring but it has taken until now to get the trip report more or less written, such has been the course that my life has taken. Just setting down the words took me back to that weekend and even to other walking trips where peace and quiet were abundant. That ambiance made it feel far, far away from the pressures of modern life and even recalling them is enough to distance myself from everyday cares and concerns. It’s the sort of thing that makes me want to undertake new trips featuring more of the same.

Though there may have been only two days of walking, there still has been enough written that a single posting would be very long so I am splitting it. After those entries, I need to share other outings too: Northumberland & Scottish Borders, Isle of Man, Northwest Wales and Gower. These may date from a few months ago but the pleasant experiences of walking out in the countryside remain fresh as I discovered while reliving those I enjoyed around Cowal.

In recent months, my excursions into the countryside have been around Macclesfield and involved cycling rather than walking. That there has been so much sunny weather this past autumn has made these snatches possible though it have been nicer to have had longer escapades too. Even the shorter local ones have left me with ideas to follow up such as an out and back stroll from Alderley Edge to Hare Hill and overlooking Pott Shrigley from Nab Head. Both are short outings but they could come in handy on the short days that abound this time of year. Of course, I feel the need to go further afield but I need to do some pondering and planning before something comes of that; a certain Cameron McNeish is editing a new magazine called Scottish Walks that could come in handy as will the ones that I usually consult. Before and during those though, there are some trips to share.

Some of us have been getting unseasonably hot sunny weather over the last few days; Scotland and Ireland are getting plenty of rain with a blocking area of high pressure keeping that away from England and Wales for now. That made a little too hot for walking among hills around Macclesfield so I went for an evening cycle around lower parts instead. The leaves are well into the business of changing to their autumn colours now and some have fallen already too. The dryness of these produced an unmistakeable smell for me that complemented the senses as I plied country roads that had to be shared others. Other smells such as that of grazing cows were part of the mix too as the light faded. The cycle may not have been that long but it returned me to a little of the natural world after a few weeks when work took me away to more built areas. Encounters like this have me thinking of setting aside some more time to savour the quiet and peace of hill country since I last did just that a few months back.

After a little break, I am back cycling to and from work again. In the mornings, it is possible to revel in the way that everything has come to life over the last few weeks. That we have what feels like summer weather only can have helped. This year, it seems that the display of cherry tree blossom is better than ever. Whether this is because I wasn't looking in previous years or this is a bumper year is hard for me to say. Regardless of that little triviality, there certainly are plenty of trees in bloom for many of us to enjoy. Regardless of whether flowering trees are putting their display for a while, it is the freshness of the green foliage at this time of year that always delights me, especially in golden morning light.

These are sights that soothe the soul and induce a certain reverie. They also draw thoughts of walking and cycling trips into the mind and the fact that there are a series of long weekends coming our way offers opportunities for doing just that. So far, no firm decisions have been made though Cowal and the Isle of Man have come to mind when I left my mind wander earlier today. Not being a royal watcher of any sort of fervency should help me to get away when many eyes are focussed on televisions. Trains and buses may even be quieter away from London but the day itself will tell its own story.

While it sounds simple to say that it's just a matter of making plans and then making them happen, it's been something of a weakness for me in recent months due to one very big distraction in my life. For instance, I had designs on heading to Caernarfon and Beaumaris in Wales last weekend but it never came to pass. In the event, I contented myself with an hour or two on my bike wandering around Sutton and Langley. Sights of surrounding hills were taken in and the low level of Bottoms Reservoir noted, a consequence of a largely dry March and April this year. With good things on your local patch, it's easy to feel consoled.

Saying that, going away somewhere is good too. Last year's Easter Sunday walk from Baslow to Bamford had me wishing that I'd booked somewhere to stay so I didn't need to leave for home that evening. With the prospect of savouring the countryside between Buxton and Ashbourne that is something that applies to such a venture too. While on the subject of past Easter escapes, there was a stay in Leeds that allowed me to fan out into the Yorkshire Dales. While I am sure that you wouldn't have chosen that base for those purposes, it did what I asked of it. Both of these trains of thought are revealing possibilities for getaways that aren't so far away from home and they have their place too. Then, there still is that aborted trip to Caernarfon and Beaumaris too. Ideas are queueing up for anything, not a bad state of affairs at all. Time needs to made for planning so that something can happen.

If you have been here at this part of cyberspace before, you may have noticed a navigation bar at the top with an indication of where you are on the website. In spite of the glorious weather that has been with us over the last few days, I didn't have the opportunity of celebrating its arrival with a trip away somewhere. In fact, I more needed a rest at home after the hectic demands of work over the last few weeks. It was during my little recuperation that I made the little modification that now appears at the top of every page in the website. Hopefully, it helps to make getting around here that little bit easier.

That isn't to say that I never got out at all. As it happened, I stole out of the house for a few hours to stroll from Bollington back to my abode again. What that granted me was the chance to look over familiar hills whose sight I haven't been able to enjoy for longer than really should be the case. My course took me from the top of Bollington into Ingersley Vale and from there to the White Nancy by way of the Gritstone Trail. Surprisingly perhaps for terrain that I have trodden a good few times already, the route had plenty of new twists and turns for me to explore. Given the vantage point that it is and the glory of today, it came as no shock to me to find folk lounging around the White Nancy but that is never to say that the place was overrun. As it turned out, there was plenty of time for undisturbed stopping and staring.

That sense of space for relaxation was very much a feature of the afternoon escape. It meant that details such as my camera batteries running out of charge before they should have done or there being quarries to my right on Kerridge Hill made no inroads into my sense of enjoyment. Again, neither the haze over the Cheshire plain or the drifting sound of a horse show PA system from below me had no impact on how I felt either. The familiar hills to my left were what was holding my attention as I wandered along the Saddle of Kerridge. The sights may have been seen before before they also were a little different in the glorious sunshine and with fresh green foliage in the process of emerging.

Being drawn along the ridge of Kerridge Hill was the cause of changing my intended route. By now, my camera batteries had completely run out of power but I stuck to recharging my own internal batteries instead of getting grumpy. It seems that having to commit scenes to the photographic plates of the mind was a help too. Any sights of freshly emerged greenery or cherry blossom against a bright blue sky were treated much in the same way as scenes savoured of a glorious late July evening on my first trip to Skye. One upshot of that was that an evening cycle from Dunvegan to Portree from quite a few years ago still remains in my memory now.

It didn't take long for me to be dropped on the side of the B5470 Macclesfield-Whaley Bridge road at a saddle between Rainow and Higher Hurdsfield. From there, I followed that road down into Macclesfield with a deviation onto the Middlewood Way and a short section of public footpath on the way home. This had been a walk that never was far from civilisation but there was plenty of time and space during which to relax too. The peacefulness of the evening must have had something to do with it and has put me thinking that I need to get back to sampling experiences like this again. It's just no good feeling as if you are being kept away from enticing areas of hill country while watching BBC programmes on the iPlayer like Country Tracks (the recent one on south Cumbria, for instance) so a spot of re-balancing looks to be well needed.

Travel arrangements:

Bus service 10A from Macclesfield to Bollington.

There was one event in my life over the last year that very firmly punctuated the year in outdoors terms: a change of job. Whether it was the cause of putting my hill-going off track or not, there clearly were less outings in the second half of the year and those that were enjoyed weren't so extensive. The strange thing though is that a Christmas spent with the folks in Ireland seems to have recharged things for me. After all, there already has been a proper day out among the waterlogged hill country around Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon) in Wales very early in this year with a mad dash up to Fort William and Glenfinnan together with a crossing to Ireland to savour the delights of Howth near Dublin following it. In previous years, it often has fallen to the last weekend of January before I managed to get out at all. There are other schemes in mind but more armchair exploring could be needed before anything comes of them.

The first few months of last year had me standing on hilltops more often than is usual for me and January and February fitted into this pattern with walks over Place Fell in Cumbria and Diffwys near Dyffryn Ardudwy, respectively. The weather was very amenable in both cases with a touch of spring being felt on the second excursion to contrast with the sights reminding onlookers of winter during the previous one. The other major outing in February was a cycle that took in Gawsworth, Astbury, Little Moreton Hall, Holmes Chapel, Goostrey, Over Peover and Chelford. Though I was tired after that jaunt, it sowed the seeds for a cycle to Chester later in the year.

March saw me move things up a gear again by heading to Scotland to see some Scottish snow-covered hillsides around Glen More among the Cairngorms. Braving some showers was the price that I had to pay for this but the rewards from the short sampling session more than compensated. In fact, it may have set the scene for a busy April that featured an Easter Sunday trot from Baslow to Bamford while shadowing the River Derwent. That wasn't as low level as it might sound but I headed to greater heights in the form of Carnedd Moel Siabod and Y Llethr in Wales too. Revisiting the trip reports for these makes me realise that I was more active than I now remember myself to be.

My recollections of May are stronger and it started with a Mayday bank holiday weekend visit to the Isle of Man where I savoured some of the ups and downs of the coastal path, Raad ny Foillan. That was a good introduction to Manx walking and I hope to follow up the outing some time. A trot from Selkirk to Melrose had it share of ascent and descent too as it brought back to a part of the world where I hadn't been for a few years. Later, I discovered that the Kerry mountains around Killarney can get some hot sunny weather. In fact, it could have been the most sun that I have had on a visit to the alluring area.

As it happened, May ended with the commencement of the distraction that was to occupy my mind for much of the next few months: a change of job. It was amazing to see how this really punctuated my outdoors year. The weather remained balmy as I pondered what I was doing with visits to the National Trust managed woods around Alderley Edge for some unwinding on lengthening evenings. That spell of good weather came to an end later in June but not before I snatched the chance to head north to the Isle of Arran and Kintyre for what became my only real longer summer break in Scotland. That didn't prove to be the end of my feeling hot sunshine for the year because a business trip took me to Sweden where long hot evenings allowed me to savour the delights both of Sodertalje and Stockholm.

From July on, the rest of the year gained a much quieter feel when it came to enjoying the outdoors. Nevertheless, I did manage to base myself in Aberdeen for the English August Bank Holiday weekend. Having not been there after a first visit more than a decade before, it was time to revisit places encountered before and exploring those that were new to me. The latter point brings to a first visit to Braemar that took me up to the top Morrone/Morvern with heavy showers making rainbows in the sunshine before things dried up later on an otherwise chilly day. The outing had a real end of year feel with that coolness though Edinburgh felt warm in the sun when I sneaked in a trot about its heart between trains. Maybe I should have based myself there instead, like I did for the same weekend in 2009.

For some reason, the rest of the year felt as if the stuffing had been knocked out of it for me and my outings appeared to reflect that. Nevertheless, I did get to cycling all of the way from Macclesfield to Chester, a brainwave that came to me earlier in the year. It also proved that Cheshire is far from flat though I knew that anyway. Ironically, my end of British Summer Time hike along the High Peak Trail and the Tissington Trail from Pomeroy to Ashbourne on a day when cloud overcame sun as I went further south. Following old railway alignments meant that ups and downs were kept to a minimum on that October afternoon but the distance covered was felt for a while afterwards, ironically for longer than the effects of my exertions in crossing Cheshire if my memory is not failing me again.

Breaking away for a hill country outing seemed to have become difficult for me but November saw me on top of Caer Caradoc in Shropshire due the perceived accessibility of the hill. Shrewsbury remains another idea for urban pottering as does Oswestry so it wasn't about standing atop a hill. In fact, the very next issue of Country Walking featured low hills with good views and put into my head the idea of collating a list of a few of these for times when inspiration was hard to locate.

December's snows may have been disruptive and I was to feel the effects of that when I popped over to Ireland for the Christmas but they were restorative when it came to getting me out of doors again. For one thing, there was a quick visit to the hills near Glossop that was more about broadening my experience of winter condition than covering much in the way of distance. Then, there was wandering around local haunts in Wilmslow (Lindow Common became a 2010 discovery for me), Macclesfield, Prestbury and West Limerick. Surroundings may have looked totally different and very pretty on these short strolls but they very much helped me in the restoration of my hill wandering mojo. Now, I need to ensure that it doesn't leave me again. After all, 2011 has started well and I really do need to set down some more trip reports as well as ensuring that my working life doesn't overwhelm everything else on me again.