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Monday 21st May 2012 Crowden to Diggle It was a hard day yesterday and another hard day today - I felt quite done in by the end of it. Maybe I needed a day off after this but I'd agreed to meet Andrew in Hebden Bridge on Wednesday morning so just had to bash on. I'd managed to get away from the Youth Hostel at 9.00, ahead of James and Keith and Vivian, the sandy-haired youth, but they were all to overtake me later on. The route followed a climb up to the top of Laddow Rocks, a great bank of cliffs, where the path wended its way along the top, quite close to the drop in places. It carried on through a gorge edged with peat bog but some neatly-laid paving stones kept the worst of this at bay, making the going quite easy albeit with the odd descent and ascent to cross a gully.
Unfortunately the camera battery expired halfway through the day depriving me of a full photographic record. I hoped to be able to get a replacement in Diggle before the shops closed. I got a cup of tea from a mobile snack bar on the A635 at Wessenden Head and hurried on a bit to try to get to the shops before 17:00. As it turned out Diggle doesn't have a camera shop so I ended up getting knackered for nothing. Never mind, I got accommodation for £30 at New Barn, a farm run by Alan and Dorothy. Alan told me he had lived there all his life - 77 years. The farm was a mile and a half downhill from the track of the Pennine Way but there was a bus service from right outside the B&B which should be able to take me back up the hill in the morning.
There was a beautiful view out across Diggle from the breakfast room next morning, made all the better, of course, by clear blue skies promising a fine day ahead. Distance: 14 miles (12 miles on the Way and the rest to and from B&B) Average speed: 2.4 mph Total ascent: 3576 feet Total Distance: 31.2 miles | |||
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