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.
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| looking back up to Alport Heights |
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| Boggart's Inn Farm |
Gorsey Bank is a tucked-away part of Wirksworth that I had never seen before. I admired the many windows of Providence Mill, the calm elegance of Gorsey Bank House, draped with purple wisteria, and the peaceful surroundings of the Catholic Church of Our Lady and St Therese of Lisieux.
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| Providence Mill |
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| Gorsey Bank House |
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| Catholic Church |
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| no longer a shop |
Crossing the Ecclesbourne Valley Railway, I was soon on the main street of Wirksworth. I took a small detour to the parish church. It has some interesting and ancient bits of carving. I paused for a moment to pray.
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| T'owd man - 1000-year-old miner |
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| ancient sculpture with Biblical scenes |
And then it was up, up, up the other side. If this little nook were in Spain or Italy, it would surely be a shrine. Maybe it was, once.
There were signs warning "Quarry. Keep Out." every ten metres by the side of the path, but the quarry itself was obscured by a ridge of earth, leaving just a vague sensation of emptiness in that direction. It wasn't until I got to the top that I got a sense of the hugeness of the hole. Even then, the angle doesn't really do it justice: Middle Peak Quarry was massive.
Just as I thought there couldn't possibly be any more up, I had to ascend through a field of sheep, some of which obligingly posed for a photo, and finally I stood on the Cromford & High Peak Railway. Now, of course, it's a cycle path.
A short distance away was Middleton Top visitor centre. Unfortunately the cafe is only open at weekends. But there were picnic benches with a view, and a pretty little quarry on the other side of the path.
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| Silver Jubilee topograph |
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| The trees have grown since 1977 |
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| Middleton Top visitor centre and cafe |
Now that I was on a railway line, I assumed the walking would be flat. But I'd forgotten that the Cromford & High Peak wasn't a normal railway. Originally conceived of as a canal, it had a series of steep inclines at each end, with winding engines to haul trucks up the gradients. The engine house at Middleton Top, looking like a chapel of steam, is still there.
Fortunately I'd got to the Top, so the slope was descending. I followed a couple of other walkers down between quarried cliffs of limestone. At the B5023, I diverted onto a steep path between mounds of wild garlic.
At the bottom of this path were a couple of buildings which I took to be a barn and a farmhouse. The barn had freshly painted red windows, while the farmhouse was clearly in need of a lot more restoration. Something about it didn't quite fit, though.
So I looked it up when I got home and discovered that this was once Middlepeak sidings (or wharf; even after the canal idea had turned into a railway, some names stuck). Picture the Past had a photo of that exact "barn" from 1890 - evidently a workshop of some sort, with men in flat caps and waistcoats leaning casually on planks outside, while another group posed on an empty railway truck, standing where the sidings curved away to the right. It hadn't been a farm at all.
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| evidence of quarrying |
I passed Ravenstor Station, the top end of the Ecclesbourne Valley Railway, but was disappointed not to be able to see it. Then I came out onto a bustling road. Passing the Lime Kiln pub, I followed a lady with a pushchair past the Infant School and down a path to Wirksworth Station. There were no trains running today, but plenty to see anyway.
And now it was time to head upwards once more. I panted up a few fields, not feeling as if I were moving particularly fast, but was met by a man catching his breath at the top while his two dogs rested in the shade. "You bounced up that slope quickly," he said. I was at least thirty years younger than he was, but refrained from pointing that out.
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| view back to Wirksworth |
That brief interaction distracted me so that I turned right instead of going straight on. Fortunately there was another footpath that I could take when I noticed my mistake. It turned out to be rather nice; a bluebell wood and a sea of dandelion clocks.
Straight along this lane now. You can't get very lost when you're aiming for Alport Heights! Just aim for the masts and keep going up.
One last look at the view, and I was back. The radio mast guy was still there. I wondered who he was talking to - you must be able to get signals from halfway across Europe, surely. Well, I'd walked my own wave, and I was happy.
Alport Heights-Middleton Top 10 miles / 16 km
11 May 2026
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