After my Arans trip I headed back to Shropshire for a meet up with THO ready for a walk the next day. Quite by chance we found the Brow Farm campsite near Ratlinghope. A real find, pretty basic but a wonderful open field and relaxed atmosphere. The D of E groups were a little noisy after hours but no harm done and a site I’d love to go back to. Especially with the excellent Bridges Inn just down the road
We had a fine meal and a few beers over a catch up in the sunshine. I’d been looking forward to a couple of cold ones throughout my hot walk in the Arans
We met more friends for breakfast back at the Bridges Inn on Sunday and set out to repeat a walk we’d done on a very dark, very humid and very wet day in August a few years ago.
It was pretty hot this time but thunder clouds were replaced with abundant blue skies and no army of flies that plagued us on the previous attempt
Our route took us up onto Linley Hill
With great views across to the south end of the Stiperstones ridge
Along through Nipstone Woods where we found this line of sheep sheltering from the heat of the midday sun
I really like this grassy meadow just before the main ridge. The grass has always been long when I’ve walked through and it waves in the breeze in a mesmerising way
The main ridge seems completely out of character for the rest of the rolling green fields and heather moorlands that characterise the rest of the Shire
It bristles with rocky outcrops and tors, most of which require a little scrambling and a head for heights to reach
The Trig Point is perched on top of Manstone Rock and further along is the Devils Chair, both of which providing some entertaining rock scrambles
A well earned snack break between the two
THO showing off his rock skills on the Devils Chair ridge
I’ve read that these are the hardest English summits and whilst it takes only mild scrambling to reach the top, I can’t think of another summit in England where the easiest route is harder than these. Possibly Parkhouse Hill in the Peak now its open to the public
We did have a plan for a mid-walk beer but in the heat we couldn’t be bothered to walk down to the village and back up again (when there was a pub conveniently placed at the end of the walk!)
Instead we took a walk over the un-named hill to the east and very fine it was too
The views across the northern half of the Shire were mighty fine, all rolling green fields and small hills, some wooded, some grassy
Earls Hill in the distance really caught the eye and more ideas for further exploration of this fine county were planned
A walk along the road (and through a farm yard with the most extraordinary collection of clutter that included a tank!) brought us back to the cars, a cold drink and to head back home after a long, varied and very fine weekend of walking. This one was around 11 miles
surfnslide 