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Touring with Byercycles.

The Peak District 83

I was sorting through the papers that had accumulated in our bureau over many years, and I came

across this short story that Richard had written, after a cycling weekend in the Peak District when

our two children were still small. Daniel was only six and Rebecca four years older. Reading it

through again after eighteen years was quite amusing as we appeared to spend a lot more time

eating than cycling, but it was good fun to do as a family and we all enjoyed the Easter break. It

seemed a waste to leave it hidden away in a drawer, so I typed the story out for publication on

our web site.

(Christine Byers)

Our Easter tour of the area between Buxton, Castleton and Bakewell began at Ilam

Hall on Thursday the last day of March. We had travelled to Ilam by car with our four bikes carried

on the roof rack, ready to start cycling on Good Friday morning, which also happened to be April

Fools Day. Ilam Hall and the surrounding grounds are owned by the National Trust, it is about one

mile from the popular Dovedale and set on a hillside overlooking a valley and a near by church.

The actual hall is leased to the YHA for use as a hostel, where we were to stay on Thursday night.

It was eight o'clock and nearly dark when we arrived, so we quickly put the bikes away and made

ourselves at home in a family dormitory. Daniel found a snooker table and a juke box which kept

him happy for the rest of the evening, while Mum and me made tea and cornbeef rolls for supper.

The entrance at Ilam Hall

Shelter from the rain - Tissington

First stop on Friday morning after leaving Ilam was along the road to the beautiful

Dovedale. Fortunately as it was fairly early in the morning, the Dale was still very peaceful but

during the holiday periods, it does get a great many visitors in motor cars, which does tend to

make life difficult for cyclists like ourselves. Passing through the White Peak district, are two

disused railway lines that have been made into paths to be used by cyclists, walkers and horses.

They are known as the Tissington and High Peak Trails.

Two miles south of Tissington we started our ride along the trail, named after the

village. The path having been a railway was obviously very straight with slow gradients, in some

parts it was covered with a coal waste material and in others it was just limestone or chalk. After

the recent heavy rain, this surface was soft which made the going quite hard work. Daniel started to

complain about the surface as soon as we were on the trail and was still at it, when we sheltered

under a bridge from the first April shower of the year. (Since 1983 the surface has been improved).

A large group of cyclists on hire bikes had the same idea and stopped under the bridge too. One of

them was having some bother with the front brake on their small wheeled machine and borrowed

our spanner to make an adjustment. The group set off before us but were travelling at a slower

speed, so by the time we reached Tissington we had passed them all. It had started to rain once

more while we were looking around the village, we stopped again this time under a porch covering

the entrance of a workshop. A bench along the front of the workshop gave us the opportunity to sit

down and take elevenses. That was the last shower we were to experience until Monday although

it did stay cold and dull, at least we kept dry.

Our plan had been to stay on the railway trails until Buxton, but two miles further

along the Tissington trail, it became so mucky it was impossible to ride. Daniel began to complain

even more and the only thing to do was to return to the road and the steeper hills. Rebecca

managed to climb most of the longer slow gradients without any trouble. Daniel struggled a bit and

occasionally I had to help him with a push. The route took us through the villages of Hulme End

and Sheen by now 1 in 7 or 1 in 5 gradients were not uncommon, these step hills were also a bit

too much for Chris and she was pleased to walk with Daniel to keep him company.

Our progress throughout the day was very slow with lots of stops to rest and eat.

At a cafe in Longor where a young girl served us jam and cream scones, Chris noticed that a lot

of racing cyclists were going by. We were to find out from a marshall along the course a bit later

that they were all competing in the Buxton CC 32 mile mountain time trial, consisting of two very

hilly 16 mile circuits. At this point we were eight miles from Buxton. We found ourselves on the

last half of the circuit and for the rest of the days ride to Buxton hostel. One of the competitors in

this race, passed us nearly every minute either struggling up a hill on their small chainring. Or

steaming past down hill, turning a gear high enough to buckle anyone's legs had it been a flat road.

The wardens wife at Buxton hostel where we stayed Good Friday night had a friendly

nature and made an effort to mix with the hostelers and talk to them. She had young daughter

named Laura, about the same age as Daniel who played with our two until bedtime. The lady

told us that they had enjoyed looking after the hostel for four years, although sometimes it was

was hard work, with the only holidays being in the winter closed period. Her husband who had

been a cyclist and walker, had written a book about the Snowdonia National Park, he had also

assisted with information in a book we bought about the Peak District.

One of the main reasons for visiting the Peak District, was to enable me to show

Rebecca and Daniel the caves and underground mine workings, that are open to the public near

Castleton. On Saturday morning we rode the fifteen miles between Buxton and Castleton, stopping

in a bus shelter at the small village of Peak Forest, to drink our flask of coffee and eat the food we

had bought in Buxton before setting out. The height of the tour was Bradwell Moor, where the

road climbs to 1451ft above sea level, then it begins a long decent into Castleton. Finishing with a

hair raising drop along a loose gravel surface with a hairpin bend and a 1 in 6 hill to negotiate.

After arriving at the hostel our first consideration was to make sure the bikes could be left secure,

so that the afternoon could be spent on a pothole expedition. Once this was done we ate sausage

and chips from the local fish shop, then made our way on foot to Peak Cavern.

The entrance to the cavern is 100 feet wide and nearly as high. It has been

used until quite recently as a place for making ropes, the equipment used for this practice is still

very much in evidence. It is said that the old rope makers of years ago built their small cottages

inside the cavern. The only buildings there now are a small gift shop and hut where a man collects

the entrance fee. As it is rather dangerous to allow the general public to go wandering about inside

on there own. They are formed into groups and taken on a tour by a guide, who explains all

features of the cave in some detail. After the initial entrance we all had to stoop very low to pass

through lumbago walk. Daniel being an exception as his head just touched the roof of this short

low passage that leads into the great cave. There are many stories and legends attached to this

cavern which burrows into the hillside under Peveril Castle which stands 350 feet above. It has

been suggested that in the middle ages when the castle was inhabited, unwanted prisoners were

taken from the dungeons and dropped to certain death down the chimney, that rises from the

Great Cave to the castle above. Roger Rains house, high up on a ledge in the chamber is also a

favourite tale of the guide. He was a village idiot who lived on this ledge and pulled faces, danced

about and did all manor of stupid things to amuse visitors in times gone by. We were also shown

the Orchestra Chamber and several tiny stalactites before reaching a passage way known as Five

Arches. This as far as we were concerned marked the end of the tour. Five Arches is about half a

mile from the entrance. For the more experienced pot holer it is the starting point for the ten miles

of passages and caves, some only accessible through water, which eventually lead back to the same

place.

Rebecca always enjoys looking in the many little gift and craft shops that are usually

to be found in popular touring areas. Castleton was no exception so having left the Peak cavern,

we walked the short distance to the village centre, in search of jeweller's selling Blue John gem

stones. Blue John is a semi precious stone found in veins of limestone and dug from the hillsides

around Castleton. After a skillful cutting and polishing process, it is made into pendants, earrings

and rings then sold in shops throughout the Peak District. For the next hour and a half we walked

in and out of the various gift shops, until Chris found a small pair of earring and Rebecca had

bought a pendent of similar design, so now they can borrow from each other to make a matching

set. Having spent all their pocket money it was time for afternoon tea, to be taken in a small cafe

on the way to Winnats Pass. At the foot of this pass was our next underground exploration. It

might not have been, had we known when joining the small queue at Speedwell Cavern entrance,

one mile west of Castleton village, that an hour later we would still be waiting. Reasons for all this

delay became apparent when we finally entered the cavern at five o'clock. We walked down four

hundred steps with a party of twenty other people, them climbed onto a long punt type boat,

moored in a passage at the bottom of the steps. Three people were just able to sit side by side in

rows, there heads a few inches below the passage roof. By pushing with his hands our guide

propelled us slowly along 750 feet of an underground canal. During our ride he told us how the

canal was blasted and dug by miners searching for lead, two hundred years ago. As a business

it proved to be futile for the mine owners, it took eleven years and £14,000 to complete, with very

little lead ever found. These days it is a very profitable mine during holiday times with the present

owners taking £50 per boat load every twenty minutes at busy periods. Certainly better deal than

the poor men who mined down there for two shillings a month, with all the dangers that this type

of work involves. Halfway along the passage at a place where it opened up into a larger cavern,

we moved over to one side allowing a returning boat to pass. Soon we reached another large

cavern, we were all asked to get out of the boat which straight away filled with twenty more

people who had been waiting there for the return trip. Our guide stayed to show the bottomless

lake that is fenced off within the cavern. When the passage was made all the waste was tipped

into the bottomless lake making it now thirty feet deep. There were several other things of interest

to see and ten minutes quickly past before another boat arrived to take us back. Our guide placed a

hat to collect his tips on the first of the four hundred steps, as we left the mine after a forty five

minute trip.

By the time we had settled into Castleton Hostel it was too late to order an evening

meal so we bought food from the hostel store and cooked our own in the members kitchen. While

we were clearing up after our meal Rebecca and Daniel became fascinated with three other ladies

who had produced three very large goose eggs from their bags and set about decorating them with

crayons in preparation for breakfast on Easter Sunday morning. One of the ladies delighted the

children when she gave them their own chicken egg to crayon, which kept them all occupied for

the rest of the evening.

Having eaten all their Easter eggs both the chicken and chocolate types, the kids took

photos of the new friends they had made the previous night. We then left Castleton on Easter

Sunday morning heading first for Eyam, a village that in 1666 had the unfortunate experience of

falling victim to the same plague that was raging through London at that time. At about eleven

o'clock it was time for bite to eat, which we did sitting on seats in the village centre, we were soon

joined by four young ladies from Derby, who were on a walking tour of the area. The progress of

the plague can be followed through the village by observing small notices fixed on the walls of

each cottage where a victim died. These state the person's name, age and date of death, a total of

265 people were killed by the epidemic first bought into Eyam by a traveller from London in

September 1666.

We dropped down through the hills to join the river Derwent which we had decided to

follow to Chatsworth House. Stops were made on the way first for a look round a camping

exhibition in Calver village, then again for lunch in a pub little further along the road. Chatsworth

Park extends out over the river Derwent it also crosses the secondary road that runs close by and

takes in the village of Edensor. Every one of the small houses in this village was built to a different

design during the life of the Sixth Duke of Devonshire, owner of Chatsworth House, who could

not make up his mind which design he liked best. The original village had been pulled down by the

Fourth Duke in order to improve the view from his house. He also employed Capability Brown to

to create Chatsworth Park and alter the course of the Derwent to suit the new landscape. Indeed

the Fourth and Sixth Dukes were mainly responsible for the stately home as it was at the height

of it's aristocratic splendor.

Daniel and the Easter egg girl

Chatsworth cascade

Inside the house are many art treasures, there are murals by the Old Masters painted on

on the walls and ceilings, rooms with ornate carvings in the wooden panels, corridors and

stairways, with paintings and sculptures on every square foot of available space. There was so

much to see that we would have needed a week to study the Devonshire Dynasty heirlooms in

detail. As it was we had about three hours to look around the house and gardens. Another week

could have easily been spent walking around the garden and park, where the main attraction is a

cascade. It starts high up on the hill as a waterfall, is then formed into a fountain halfway down

and continues on its course to the River Derwent, down a stepped bed for 220 yards to the house.

Here it disappears through an underground channel into the main river.

There are acres of parkland to ride through, with lakes and fountains to see,

glasshouses to look through and a farmyard complete with farm animals. As with all these houses

they are better when visited during low season or weekdays, for during peak holiday times and bank

holidays they get thousands of visitors and one seems to be floated past the exhibits by a sea of

people. When we had finished looking around, the Duke kindly allowed us to have afternoon tea in

the stable that he had converted into a tea room. Sitting drinking my twenty pence cup of tea and

twenty five pence piece of cake underneath a horses hay basket. I could not help but wonder what

the last century aristocrats would have made of today's turnout. The wealth and power that these

men enjoyed has never ceased to amaze me. I am sure they would not have tolerated the

commercial tourism on their estates, as is practiced today. It would not be hard to imagine these

lofty aristocrats leading a large party of armed and mounted, locally recruited millitia men with

blood hounds running in front, chasing all the touring marauders off there land. Then posting their

security guards at the main entrances with muzzle loading muskets to ensure that no one returned

Thoughts of such violent happenings passing through my mind, made me decide it that it

was time to leave. I can only believe that the ten thousand parked car and coach drivers had been

able read my mind. Because they all left at the same time, just as we were riding over the hump

bridge along the road to Edensor. To avoid any chance of the whole Byers family, being

completely flattened by such an onslaught of traffic, we turned into the village to take a rough

road thankfully marked unsuitable for motor vehicles. As always in life, it is never possible to

obtain something for nothing. The peace and quiet of this rough track was paid for by a long climb

for some two miles which the majority of our party had to walk up. At the top of this hill we were

able to look back at Chatsworth House in a valley on one side, then on the opposite side to the

small town of Bakewell. The hostel at Bakewell was the last one visited during our four day

Easter tour, our late arrival meant that we had to cook supper for ourselves again. Then Rebecca

and Daniel made friends with some other young girls in the hostel, while Chris and I sat and read

in the common room. The final day of the tour was spent riding back to Illam Hall through

deteriorating weather, on our way we stopped in Youlgreave and sat opposite the old Co-op

which is now a youth hostel to eat a picnic elevenses recently bought in a local shop. Another stop

was made at Loncliffe for lunch in a cafe before the final stretch through Tissington, here it started

to rain and snow quite heavily, we battled on to Illam where we arrived at the car park soaked and

very cold.

The total distance of this trip was about eighty six miles through some very hilly country

and I thank Chris and the kids for coming and making a very enjoyable Easter weekend.

(Richard Byers)