Unfashionable fun around Coombs

Get away from the honey pots

To some extent if you go to the US on holiday and you don't go to New York, or Florida or any of the places people expect you to, then you haven't really gone… that said I've had two very interesting trips to Wicheta, Kansas it's the home of the first Pizza Hut.

And the same is true of thePeak District. If you visit and don’t climb Mam Tor or Kinder, or wander along Dove Dale, then what were you doing?

I'm all in favour of that kind of view because it leaves other places to the rest of us.

Walking along to Coombs with the Moss in the distance

One of the better bits, in my opinion, is the Coombes Valley, north of Coombs Moss. It's just off the A6, and fairly handy for Chapel En le Frith.

Looking across the reservoir

Nobody goes there, which is a pity. The landscape is dominated by the brooding bulk of Coombs Moss, the slopes of Ladder Hill and views over to South Head on Kinder are complemented by the still waters of the Coombs Reservoir.

Through the woodland

Take the 199 bus to the Hanging Gate and follow the route on the excerpt from OS mapping below and after an hour and a half you should end up in Whalley Bridge. There'sa bonus couple of hundred meters on the trackbed of the old Cromford and High Peak Railway.

A PNFS waymarker

On a day like today — surrounded by birdsong from ciffchaff, wren, blackbirds, robins and black caps and the flowering cherry blossom and campion in the hedgerows — it was a real treat.

We arrived in Whalley Bridge 90 minutes and 8k after we started, caught the 61 Bus back home and rehydrated at the Cheese.