peak district walks

hartington walk

17.Hartington, Pilsbury Castle 13th July 2013

Another hot day as we stopped the car on some grass in Pilsbury which is nothing more than a hamlet, hoping that a tractor or some other farming equipment didn’t run into our car while we were out on the walk. We headed north, north west to Pilsbury castle where there are no remains . It’s a just a big lump which we scaled like kings and then got down like dirty rascals. Almost back on ourselves now heading up the hillside south eastish then directly south following the ridge to Hartington where liquid refreshment awaited, compliments of the Devonshire arms. There was another establishment, the Charles Cotton Hotel but we feared we might get chased away with a posh broom for treading cowshit into the axmister. It was a nice position just watching the activity going on in the village square which boasts it’s own village green, centrepiece, pond and ducks to boot. It used to have its own cheese factory but closed in 2009, the cheese shop though still survives…what’s all that about? I think it’s an Irish owned firm ‘ BUY CHEESES ! ‘ best pronounced in an irish accent! We did buy cheese from the shop and continued down past the derelict cheese factory and over to Sheen road, turn right along the road until High Close Farm on the right where there was a stile through a nicely strimmed fenced path past a donkey, hens etc. A very nice lady chatted with us as she collected pieces of donkey muck in a bucket. Her husband continued to strim everything in sight making it very difficult to hear what she was saying ( think he was doing it on purpose!) We made our way back down to Pilsley and the car (still in one piece!). )