Skip to main content

The Churnet Way: bells at Alton

Alton village and Alton Towers are perched on opposite banks of the Churnet, with the river cutting a deep valley between them. Most people drive straight through the village on the way to the theme park. But I have a great liking for walks and no fondness at all for rollercoasters, so I found a large layby to park in at Town End, in Alton, and pulled on my boots.


The church bells were ringing as I set off. I vaguely wondered if there was an event. A wedding? Unlikely on a Tuesday morning. Maybe a funeral. I followed a footpath across a few fields to reach Saltersford Lane. This was the width of a single-track road, but mostly overgrown and muddy. I was grateful for the strip of stone flags (and some more modern concrete slabs) which provided a dry surface to walk on.



Presently I came out into some fields and dropped down a slope to the old railway line, at the point where I left it on my previous walk


bit of old rail
 

There followed several miles of walking along the railway path. Old railways always have a good flat surface, but they do get a little tedious. I was down in the bottom of the river valley now. Woods rose up on both sides of me, oaks and birch later giving way to tall straight pines. Occasional screams came from my right, which would have been alarming if I didn't know that Oblivion was hidden behind the trees.



 On my left, Alton Castle came into view. It's a Catholic youth retreat centre, apparently. I wonder if trips to Alton Towers are part of the program? 

I was surprised to arrive at a neatly-painted station, looking as if it were still ready for a train to stop at the platform. Alton station was busy in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when Alton Towers was already a tourist attraction. It closed in 1965, but is now a holiday cottage. I sat on the far end of the long platform to eat a bit of lunch.


 

A mile or two further along, I had just arrived at the less impressive remains of Oakamoor station when the rain came down. Hard. I quickly dragged on my waterproof trousers. There may not be much left of the station, but the old tunnel and crossing keeper's house were atmospheric in the rain.

Now that I was off the railway path, I had to climb the side of the valley. Taking a deep breath and mentally engaging low gear, I slogged up a steep woodland path with rain clattering on the leaves. A couple of large helicopters flew over, low.

At the top I met the Staffordshire Way and promptly dropped back down Ousal Dale, stumbling along a stony path with my glasses steaming up. At the bottom was a house and a lake, with a rowing boat pulled up on shore.



The Ramblers Retreat cafe would have been a tempting place to stop if I hadn't been so wet. I kept going, ascending high above the road and river, then dipping down to meet them again. Gradually the rain eased off, so I stopped on a mossy bench to finish my food. 

looking down to the river and Red Road

a very hollow way

From there it was a short climb through Toot Hill woods. Great hunks of sandstone stuck out of the ground. In Alton village, some of the houses (including the aptly-named Rock Cottage) had been built onto outcrops of rock. This blogger did a similar walk to me, with a more geological outlook.


build your house on a rock...

The bells were still pealing as I approached St Peter's Church. Had they been ringing for the whole three hours? I stuck my head through the church door and saw a group of people with very focussed expressions, along with a handwritten sign which said, "Please do not disturb the bellringers". I backed out quietly.


As I walked back to the car, the jangle of change-ringing changed to descending scales, and then silence. They'd finished! But no; a brief pause, and off they went again. I was sufficiently intrigued to investigate when I got home, and found this informative video. Looks like much harder work than a three hour walk, if you ask me!

8.4 miles / 13.5 km 

10 September 2024

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Trent Valley: the march of the pylons

In the 1980s, the River Trent supplied the cooling water for fifteen coal-fired power stations, each one gobbling up coal from the local mines and quenching its heat with gallons of river water. The area was known as Megawatt Valley . As the 20th century gave way to the 21st, the mines closed, the coal trains stopped running, and the iconic cooling towers, one by one, fell to the ground. The high-voltage electricity lines which connected the stations to the grid are still there, however, and they dominated the walk I did today. The stately silhouettes of pylons stalked across the landscape, carrying fizzing power lines which sliced up the sky. At one point, I was within view of two of the remaining sets of cooling towers. Diving further back into history, I parked by Swarkestone Lock on the Trent & Mersey Canal, walked past St James' Church, and arrived at Swarkestone Bridge, a 14th-century causeway which still, remarkably, carries traffic today. It was famously the southernmos...

Trent Valley: Twyford, both ways

To complete my loop along the Dove Valley  from the mouth at Newton Solney up to Dovedale at Thorpe, across to Matlock on the Limestone Way , and back south along the Derwent Valley , I needed to walk one last section along the River Trent from Derwent Mouth to Repton. Originally I planned to do it in that direction. But for various reasons I ended up doing it the other way. The walk from Repton to Ingleby was completed weeks ago, at the beginning of June, and, for the sake of completeness, I also, later, walked from Findern to Twyford, on the other bank of the river. If I had done the walk sixty years or more ago, I could have crossed the river by ford or ferry at Twyford, and that would have been my most direct route home. the Trent at Twyford Walk 1: Repton to Ingleby Starting from the centre of Repton, I made my way out of the village and crossed the fields to Milton. Wystan Arboretum Milton The Trent Rivers Trust has been busy establishing the Trent Valley Way . This sect...

The Churnet Way: a wonderful walk

The loop from Oakamoor to Froghall and back was one of the most enjoyable walks I've done in a long time. It had a bit of everything: woods, ponds, rivers and railways; steep climbs and sweeping views; an unusual church, an ex-industrial wharf, and, as a final bonus, car parks with toilets. Of course, the sunny weather helped too. I parked in Oakamoor and set off along a quiet lane called Stoney Dale. This is the route of the Churnet Way, which deviates away from the river for a couple of miles. After a while I turned right and climbed up through the woods on a gravelly path, then dropped down to the B5417. a spring in Oakamoor   Crossing the road, I entered Hawksmoor Nature Reserve. It has some fine gateposts commemorating John Richard Beech Masefield, "a great naturalist". I found a photo of the opening of the gateway in 1933; unsurprisingly, the trees have grown a lot since then! A track took me down through the woods to East Wall Farm. Lovely view! Nice duck pond as ...