Making the most of the good weather, me and my friend Annie (Bernard for short) set off in the direction of the small village of Brassington. Oddly enough for us, we found it without any complication and parked up on one of the few side streets through the village. There were pats on the back all round when we discovered that we’d parked right around the corner from the start of the walk too! Bonus.
Now, I’d voiced my concern about heading out anywhere on the 1st sunny Sunday we’d had in months, but this had been met with “Ah, it’ll be fine, we’ll be out in the countyside, there’ll be no-one there.” Within 2 minutes of being on the track, we’d joined 2 other groups of walkers. Damnit. We stopped, consulted the book to see if there were any other ways we could go, which put some distance between us and them, and on realising there were no other ways, we carried on.
Here's Bernard at the start of our walk, just having left Brassington Village.
Right from the start of this walk, and for most of the 5.5 miles of it, you can see rock jutting out of the ground all over the place. I gather from certain references in our book, that there was plenty of mining done around these parts in the past, so the rocks you can see, and probably all the lumps & bumps in the ground can be attributed to old mining. Definitely makes for an interesting landscape to walk around.
One of the hundreds of rocks showing in the fields around here. That's Carsington Resevoir you can see in the distance.
So, first up was Rainster Rocks. The book states that this is the site of a Romano-British Settlement and a roadway and enclosures are visible in the earthworks there. After spending about half an hour looking at the ground from every angle possible, I reluctantly stopped trying to see it. Part of me hoped it was like one of those magic eye pictures that you can only see if you don’t actually look for it. I still couldn’t. There were definitely some strange looking bumps in the ground and some things that looked man made, but it was far from clear. Ah well. After scrambling to the top of the rocks (and finding the skeleton of a possibly murdered sheep – see picture below for full story) and finding that there was not a great view to be had, we set off on the trail again.
The remains of a sheep we found on the way up Rainster Rocks. Natural death or something more grisly?
From here, the route takes you through a few fields upto the road, where you may or may not nearly get hit by a speeding car, like us. After a few minutes we joined up with the High Peak Trail, which had lots of people on bikes on it. This section (and all the other sections for all I know) follows the route of an old railway line, which is interesting for a bit, and you get to walk through a creepy cut out from the hillside that makes you feel like you’re in that bit from Star Wars where the Jawa’s jump out on the 2 droids!!
There was a lot of mining around here and there are loads of old covered mineshafts. A bit like this one.
Next on the route is the impressive Harborough Rocks. The site of an old Iron Age settlement, these rocks are also a haven for rock climbers on sunny Sunday afternoons, and were crawling with them when we arrived. We stopped at the remains of some kind of structure that we had no idea about. Absolutely clueless as to what it was used for when it was a bit less collapsed. It made for suitable shelter to eat our sarnies in though, so it’s still good for something. The top of the rocks gives you great views of the surrounding countryside and the lovely scenic brickworks at the base of the rocks.
Rainster Rocks in the background with some small rocky outcrop in front of it. It was around here that we almost got charged at by a sheep that had just given birth. Bless.
A quick mooch about the top of the rocks, a quick sit in The Chair and a look in Harborough Cave later, and we were off again. Around the brickworks and over some more fields full of strange lumps and bumps and we were on a country lane that led us back down into Brassington. By now the sun was out in force and any signs of grey clouds were long gone. Not a huge walk, and with all our stops and fannying about, it probably took us about 3 hours. Although the last 2 walks have been selected not because of their length, but merely their proximity to my house. I’m running out of local walks in the book now, so will soon have to go farther afield!
There’s a little more information on Rainster & Harborough Rocks at these links:
DerbyshireGuide.co.uk
Wirksworth.org.uk
TheModernAntiquarian.com
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So here's Rainster Rocks, complete with the Romano-British settlement in front of it. Even looking back at the photos I still can't work out what's settlement and what's just natural rock. Bah!
A different angle of the bumps in the field at the bottom of Rainster Rocks in the hope that someone can point out this roadway and enclosures to me!
The section of the High Peak Trail that cuts through the hillside (aka that bit that looks like the scene on Tatooine from Star Wars)
The weird ruins of something at the bottom of Harborough Rocks. We stood for ages trying to work out what it used to be. Any ideas?
Derbyshire Photos 