It was a walk with a time limit today. The car park at Middleton Top offered 3 hours for £3.50, or all day for £7. I decided I could do 8 miles in 3 hours. Let's go! No time to sit and look at the view! Along the railway line, then off to the right. I diverted from the official Portway route here, but any ancient path has been obliterated by quarrying, anyway. Onwards, past a considerable amount of building work at Moor Farm, and an overgrown cliff that used to be Hopton Quarries. I read the name off the map, but wouldn't realise its significance until later. A tramline ran from the railway to the quarry, and a narrow bridge still remains. I went underneath it and through a farmyard, then up a steep field full of sheep. I was pretty close to the wind turbines now. They really are formidable beasts. From afar they look delicate, but at this distance the huge blades scythe through the sky, tempting you to duck even though you are well out of range. Bearing right, I tramped steadi...
From a Heights to a Top and back again: that gives you an idea of the elevation profile of this walk. It looks like a sine wave. Wirksworth provided the trough between each peak - a town I had never thought of as down before, but which turned out to be surrounded by considerable amounts of up . The weather was cloudier than on my previous visit, but the views from Alport Heights were still stunning. I parked at a respectful distance from a guy who had a four-metre radio mast attached to his car. Across the valley I could see the Carsington wind turbines and the craggy hump of Harboro' Rocks to their right. That would have been the next landmark for ancient travellers on the Portway. I headed down, down, down on a series of small roads, paths and tracks. I spotted a Peak & Northern Footpaths sign, crossed a ford at Folly Well, and passed a farmhouse with the fantastic name of Boggart's Inn Farm. looking back up to Alport Heights Boggart's Inn Farm Gorsey Bank is a tuc...