Light & shade

Country-walking traditionally starts again after Easter (at least, it does for light-weights like me).

 

I do love these Springtime moving-picture vistas, with the sun and cloud moving rapidly in the sky, sweeping light and shade in quick succession over the hills. 
Fast-changing moments have rather been a theme of the last year.

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Legend fades away

This innocent looking mound on Tittensor Chase in the centre of the county has been known for centuries as Saxon Lowe. The word lowe indicates a burial chamber,  so... could it be the burial place of the most illustrious of Middle England's Saxon kings, Wulfere??? He did have a fort nearby.

Probably not.
Archaeologists can be kill joys sometimes. They think it's just a natural hillock.

Bavaria in Staffordshire

This view could be one taken in Bavaria, or even the Czech Republic - but no, this is good old Staffordshire. I like taking visitors along the now-disused Alton railway line, and when I say "hey - look up at that!", they look up and - as they see this sight - their eyes widen...

Alton Castle - a neo-Gothic romance built in the 19th century - is owned by the Catholic Church, and is now private offices, so you can't go into it, though you can get close to it from the driveway in Alton village.

Quite a view, this one, aint it?

Grey Ilam

Definition of English summer: the greenest countryside under the greyest skies. 
The gloomy grey stone of these Staffordshire countryside buildings is typical; and, to be fair to the architects of same, one can hardly have buildings decked out in rainbow colours when we are usually under such louring skies.

These are the grounds of Ilam Hall in the Staffordshire Peak District.

Hidden factory

I can't help admiring the way that the JCB Earthmovers factory at Uttoxeter is so beautifully concealed. It is deliberate of course: a great desire to disturb the visual environmental as little as possible is the motivation.

Walking without fear

Now that Easter is been and gone, all walkers can go out on the hills without fear of extreme wet or cold.
These walkers are on Ecton Hill.

Making a monument to himself

There was a certain arrogance to some of the rich squires of old.
John Wedgwood’s will specifically wanted a huge monument to be erected to himself after his death: "I desire my body to be interred within my estate at Bignall End in a vaulted tombe at the summit of a certain field called Old Hill…..and my executors to cause an obelisk or monument to be erected."
Sure enough, his executors built this monument, in 1845.

What's more, the present sight is only a quarter of its original size - after a lot of it fell down a few years ago.
I wonder if any of us would, nowadays, want to seen as so openly self-important.

Greens return

Shades of green are seeping back into the landscape after the black lines of winter; and we have had a bit of sun too (though it hasn't been a reliable feature!).

This is a view looking down from the ridge over Mayfield.

Snow on the hills

Just when we thought it wasn't going to happen, Winter started. The north of the county, in the Moorlands, got the most snow of course - as here at Cauldon overlooking the quarry works.

Where the saint stopped

And so we enter Christmas week... 
It's been wet and blowy, though with incredibly mild temperatures.  Nature has gone green again; and it has felt like Spring, not winter.

Scalpcliffe Hill can be seen from the Burton side of the River Trent, and marks the vision of St Modwen, the patron saint of the town.  She arrived in the seventh century, and built two churches - one at the foot of Scalpcliffe, on the site of what is now St Peter's Church.
What was in the vision that caused her to halt in her journeys for a while (she was a great traveller) at this spot, we are not told.

Malbank mound

A simple mound in the ground?  Not to the expert eye of my walking compnaion.  This, he said, is clearly the site of an old moated house from medieval times.

Being a bit of a sceptic, I had to check when we got back.  He was right: the house, near Hilderstone, was probably part of the possessions of the Malbanks, a family who acquired a lot of land in England thanks to their loyalty to William The Conqueror in supporting his wars against the Anglo-Saxons (and Welsh).

I shall take mounds more seriously in future.

Industry's toxicity is not new

Environmental degradation caused by industry is not new.  The patch of grey in the centre of this photograph - looking rather like a man's bald-spot - is a 'toxic tip', where the hillside is bare of vegetation.  It has been devastated for 100 years.

The patch lies just below the tiny adit (i.e. entrance to underground workings) of the old 'Dutchman's Mine', on Ecton Hill, where copper was mined up to the end of the nineteenth century.  Basically, as the spill came up from the deep mine, the miners chucked what they didn't want out of the entrance, where it then just accumulated on the slope.  The toxic minerals poisoned the surrounding few acres - as you can see.

I gathered these facts from a fabulous book of walks called 'In The Footsteps of Our Ancestors - Heritage Walks' by John Barnett, which is a terrific guide to the hidden history of the White Peak area. Definitely recommended.

St Bertram's healing well

On the Ilam Estate, which, because it's owned by The National Trust, is open to the public for free, one finds this ancient stone well, not far from the estate church.
This 'well' is more of a large bath than the sort of place one might simply draw water.

St Bertram (aka Bertelin) is the local saint, and his tomb is in the church, so the water in this well has supposed healing qualities, and pilgrims would dip themselves in the freezing pool therein.  If it didn't kill, it might have cured...
Nowadays, there is a small iron fence to act as a deterrent to bathers, but I daresay some do climb in.

Bring on the bangers

Easter is also the time that 'summer sports' get in gear - and the phrase is a literal one for the Hednesford Hills Raceway, where bangers and hot-rod racing is on view.

I like Hednesford Hills.    The circuit is small so you can see everything, and, because the arena is in a crater at the top of the hills, as a spectator, one looks down on the whole event.
It's an odd feeling too.  All we spectators are up there in the arena at the top of the hills, knowing that, down below in the town, they can barely hear the crashing din of what's going on...

View from 'Shangri-La'

I've always liked walking round Brown Edge. It's the point where the city (of Stoke) peters out into moorland; but even more, it is strangely locked in on itself, with hills on one side and a forbidding main road on the other - a bit of a Shangri-La in fact, with tiny streets and a very enclosed air.

This picture shows the view from the top of the village towards Endon and on to the main moorlands.

English landscape feelings

The English landscape can be just perfect some days. I can’t always put my finger on the reason, but sometimes one can just stop (while on a walk) before a view; and find a moment that is, somehow, idyllic.  Staffordshire is, in its own way, the centre of things English of course.

Following the path near the prep-school at Marchington, I had this very feeling. 
On another day, another season perhaps, the view might have been dull – but the combined sight of the church on the hill, the golden rapeseed fields and the empty sunlit playing fields all made it quintessentially English.

Beautiful Ilam

The Ilam estate is completely idyllic, isn't it?
Because it's all owned by The National Trust it's beautifully maintained, and in this instance, is free to access - even the garden in the forefront of this photo, which is part of Ilam Hall (now a local youth hostel).
The estate church is a gem - it's St Bertram's, and goes back to Saxon times. Pilgrims come to the saint's tomb to pray.

Great walks too!

Links: Ilam Estate / St Bertram

Rudyard Lake 'Lady'

Rudyard Lake (just north of Leek) is unique in Staffordshire as the one reservoir which has private homes lining its shores. The others are generally reserved for water activities or for wildlife.
Only the western shore of Rudyard has homes, and, as you can see, they nestle into the steep bank that rises from the waterline. It's a great setting for a home, and properties come expensive there.
The building on the far left of the photo is the historic Lady In The Lake boathouse.

The 'disadvantages' to owning a home here are the children who scream in mock-horror as they take boats out (from the sailing club), and the flood of walkers like me, as one five-mile path circumnavigates the lake very neatly.

Incidentally, the parents of the writer Rudyard Kipling honey-mooned here, and named their son after the lake.