Scotland C2C Training on NY Moors - Day 2

It was a cold night but our camp was both extremely comfortable and peaceful.  We were packed up and away by 9.15, having decided to make a short day of it rather than lengthen the route with either a lot of road work or a rather contrived loop around Slape Wath Moor.  It also meant that we could go down the Incline.

So we turned north and rode along the old trackbed to the road running along Blakey Rigg.  Then crossing over the road, we followed the continuation round the head of Farndale.

By the track across the moors to the Lion Inn, Blakey

The day was greyer and colder than on Saturday and we were both wearing an additional layer to keep the wind out.  At that time of a Sunday morning, there was nobody about and it felt like we had the whole of the moor to ourselves.

Looking into Westerdale

We took a brief photo stop where the track crossed the path which runs between Farndale to Westerdale before riding on to Bloworth Crossing.  As I rode along, a pipit flew ahead of me, landing on the ground in front and then darting forward again as I caught up with it. It reminded me of swifts in Borneo flying in front of the dugout as we went back along the river to camp in the late afternoon after surveying trips in Simon's Cave.  I was brought out of my reverie by a grouse which appeared out of the heather, flew across my path and almost brushed my nose with its wing tip.  I've never experienced a bird strike whilst on a bike.

And so we arrived back at the top of the Incline and with a final check of the brakes, threw ourselves headlond down the slope.  It felt a bit like skiing, where it's sometimes best just to go for it rather than dither around at the top worrying about where to get in the first turn.  It's not the most interesting bit of downhill.  There is nothing technical on it - no rocks or ruts or gullies to speak of.  The views are good at the top.  Otherwsie, it was just a case of pointing straight down the hill and hope the brakes wouldn't overheat too much with the extra momentum from the trailer.   

Hurtling down the Ingleby Incline

Back at the gate

And from the bottom we just retraced our outward route back to Great Broughton, where we had left the car.

We rode 15 miles on the Sunday with not much ascent, making a total of 40 miles for the weekend.  I'd hoped we would do a bit more than that but I was feeling pretty tired after the first day and Hilary wasn't arguing to go on any further.  She'd given the new bike a good first run and we'd both re-aquainted ourselves with riding with a trailer, identified a few things we need to sort out and had a good couple of days.

We decided a couple of weeks ago, to put back the Scottish ride until early June, to give the upper sections of the Corryairick a bit longer to clear of snow.  We've had enough mountain biking in snow for the year, on out Easter trip to the Vosges - blog posts coming soon(!) and neither of us fancy dragging a trailer through the white stuff.  This means that we can now use the last May bank holiday weekend for another training trip with trailers and for that, we have planned a 2-3 day, 50 mile circuit in Galloway Forest

 

 

Postscript:  There's a video of the full descent of the Ingleby Incline here

 

 

 



Stanage Long Causeway - Conservation Interest Document

Earlier today I googled for "Stanage SSSI" as I wanted to try and establish the SSSI boundary in relation to the Long Causeway.  At the top of the search results was this link to a pdf file on the peakdistrict.gov.uk site, headed "Appendix 1 - Long Causeway - Conservation Interest".  I haven't yest been able to find out what it's an Appendix to or even if it's meant to be in the public domain but it makes interesting reading.  It's not a long document and below are are the opening paragraphs of each of its three main sections.

Ecological Interest
The whole route passes through the South Pennine Moors Special Area of Conservation (SAC), Peak District Moors Special Protection Area (SPA), the Eastern Peak District Moors Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), Stanage Edge Regionally Important Geological Site (RIGS), Section 3 Moorland/Natural Zone and the Dark Peak Nature Improvement Area (NIA)

Archaeological Interest
The route forms the boundary of two Historic Landscape Character (HLC) areas – Enclosed Moorland and Open Wastes and Common - and is considered to be of medieval origin. A section of paving to the north of the route is a Scheduled Monument (SM).

Landscape Interest
Long Causeway lies within the Natural Zone within the National Park and the Eastern Moors
Landscape Character Area (LCA).

The National Park is designated for its internationally and nationally important landscape.

I think perhaps the Peak District National Park Authority need to remind Derbyshire County Council of the above.

Yesterday, in an email to someone on this subject, I incorrectly asserted that DCC were one of the stakeholder organisations in the Sheffield Moors Partnership.  I've just checked the draft masterplan document and they are in fact not listed in this capacity.  I find this quite staggering given that a fair portion of the 56 square kms of the "Sheffield Moors" as defined in the draft masterplan lies within Derbyshire. Looking at the detailed map on the SMP website, I see now that the Long Causeway runs right along the boundary of the Partnership area, and it's unclear from the map whether the Causeway lies within their purview or not.

More 'vandalism' of Stanage Long Causeway by DCC

Latest pictures of the resurfacing work that Derbyshire County Council are carrying out on the Long Causeway over Stanage.  This is mostly below the old gate posts towards Dennis Knoll car park but some larger rocks on the track up from the gate posts have been broken up now suggesting they are intending to continue their wanton destruction of this ancient byway.

Just above the gate posts looking towards Dennis Knoll

Looking back up the slope, showing the smashed up larger gritstone boulders

Below the gate posts looking back up the Causeway

 

Below the gate posts looking down the Causeway

I asked one of the guys working on this why they were doing it and I was told "because people wanted it".  When I ask which people, he said "Horse riders"

I don't know if that is the case and if so, if it is sufficient reason for creating this ugly scar through an SSSI.  I doubt that there are many walkers and almost certainly no mountain bikers want it.  I can't see the 4x4 drivers wanting it either - where is the challenge?

The next phase of work is to rebuild a retaining wall on the steep part of the Causeway running below the edge.  This will no doubt create a lot of damage to the adjacent moorland.  I can see the only need to rebuild the wall is to make it 'safe' for 4x4s.  If they re-open the Causeway to this group,  I imagine the amount of traffic will increase over previous levels.  If they cointinue the resurfacing up the top, it will practically be possible to drive from end to end in family car.

DCC is the county authority in whose region most of the UK's busiest national park lies yet they seem to be completely out of touch with how to preserve the natural or rural enviroments.

Why are theyu so intent on destroying this special place in the Peak District and why is the PDNPA allowing it to happen?  Surely they exist to protect the wild places within the Peak District National Park.