Dave Sheldons Whore House

It's all Davina's fault. She is the one who shuts all the roads in Derbyshire, or she is the one whom we blame for them (it's her job). Road shut signs on Manystones Lane and a big hole in the road just in front of our intended car park. Humm! We had to park on the road; well there was not going to be any traffic on it was there (so a farm tractor drove past).

In spite of that eight of us set off on a sunny morning over Harboro Rocks on a route that I had pinched off one of Sid Uptons Irregulars walks. I liked it because it had a lot of paths that I did not know and there are not many of those in the Peak District, and I wanted to introduce our group to them. We then headed tthrough the lovely hamlets of Ible and Slaley, cut across by Bonsal Churchyard to arrive at Tinkers Shaft on the heights of Abraham. Before Sid's walk I had never heard of it. Tinkers shaft is a 110ft tunnel down to Lead mines and caves under the heights of Abraham. It is now boarded over plus info signs and etc. It is a superb viewpoint and made an ideal elevenses stop. I got some plus points for this but soon lost them by overshooting the next turn off, not once but twice! Finding it we headed up a steep slope on a narrow path overgrown with brambles. Many grumbles about cut legs and much cursing of the leader. All my plus points lost now. We circled past Bonsal again and through Jughole Woods finding the 'Jughole', a system of clefts and caves, again something that I had never heard of before Sid's walk. We had a lunch stop in Wensley Dale, found the 'Hobbit House', through Wensley, got lost finding the path around a house with a grass roof (I really shold have done a recce for this walk) and into Clough Woods were we lost the path. As I said I should have done a recce.

Climbing through Winster we arrive at the Miners Arms. Quentin had been waiting there for us but we were late so we missed him. Another customer asked for a coffee 'You can't have one, the coffee machine is bust. Oh I suppose I will have to go and put the kettle on (grumble)', said the bar manageress who is not getting the bar manager of the year award. The beer was warm too. This pub is now off the list.

Just past the pub is a building that someone said is 'Dave Sheldons Whore House'. WHAT! Now as we all know, Dave (the High Peak group secretary) is a man of the highest integrity and sobriety, surely he would not be associated with a whore house. He isn't. The building is a LEAD ORE house, a safe place to store lead ore. So his reputation is safe.

The rest of the walk is flat from here, apart from all the ups and downs and the bit near Longmire were the path has been turned into a dump. Well the last mile on the High Peak Trail was flat and we could still get our cars out.

The distance was about 17.4 miles with approx 3,050ft ascent.