On such a nice evening Sue and I felt obliged to attend Stockport Walking & Outdoors Group’s (SWOG) evening walk to Happy Valley, which we visited on 11 April with Paul and Jeanette. It was a lot greener and completely mud free on this occasion.
Our route was much shorter this time, with plentiful parking in a large lay-by at SJ 912 857 (SK7 5JY), from where 23 ‘Swoggers’ strode off, led by Louise, at 7.30 prompt.
A steep path past Norbury House Farm led very quickly to the well manicured footpaths of Happy Valley Nature Reserve. Lady Brook was benign and shaded in the evening light.
Thanks to a virtual absence of stiles, the group made good progress, though the stalwart vanguard pictured below did have to pause occasionally to allow re-grouping. It’s difficult to get 23 people to walk at the same pace; Louise did well to keep them together.
We stopped at SJ 900 859, where our path started the top of the clockwise ‘lollipop’ route (see map below).
There’s a choice of several paths to Bramhall Park, tonight’s being the direct one, whereas you could choose an alternative to the south. There were some lovely Copper Beeches in the park next to the golf course.
After passing an active running club training in the grounds of Bramhall Hall, we endured a short section of busy roads before re-entering the Nature Reserve at the point where Sue is shown at the head of this posting. Then past mallards and small weirs as we proceeded alongside Lady Brook, with magnificent residencies to our left, before crossing the brook at the bridge at the base of our ‘lollipop’.
Returning along the excellent path we’d come down earlier, there were many glances back to the sunset, and up to the tree tops to vociferous thrushes.
Here’s our route – 6 km with about 40 metres ascent, taking a leisurely hour and a half.
A lovely outing on excellent paths.
Once the paths have dried out I enjoy an 18.7km circuit on the bike along the Bridgewater Canal to Stretford, then along the Trans Pennine Trail (TPT) to the Bay Malton pub, before re-joining the canal towpath to get home in a shade under an hour.
I reported on the same ride on 3 April 2017, but it has taken until now for me to get back on this route this year. It’s muddy in winter and I don’t like having to clean the bike after such a short outing.
On this visit the towpath was justifiably very busy, but the TPT was empty apart from a couple of horse riders.
Here’s the route, which includes about three km of tarmac but which is otherwise pleasantly off-road and provides an hour’s good quality exercise.
Afterwards some hangers-on appeared with their mum, who promptly abandoned them and went for a run. Wasn’t Jessica looking smart in her Princess outfit, trying to outdo Jacob in some sort of primeval contest?
The pictures above and below this text were taken after 11 o’clock this morning, when most of the runners had left the post run sanctuary known as the Courtyard Tea Room. I’d just not taken any pictures until then, having been distracted by the sudden realisation, after I’d finished, that I’d left my barcode at home. There’s a strict policy of ‘no barcode, no time’, so I pedalled as fast as I could back home to fetch said item before Jenn started to process the results.
“Is that sweat, or has someone thrown a bucket of water over you?” one jester whose name could only be Andy asked on my return.
It was all worthwhile, as having tried and failed for many months to get under 25 minutes for the 5 km, and consistently failed to reach my age related target of 70%, today I managed both, with 22.51 and 76%. The four week break I’ve had from running must have healed my injuries!
Or were these ‘hut slippers’ the reason for my quicker than usual time? – they weigh 245 grams (about 4 ounces each) and make me feel very light on my feet.
Full results for the 279 participants are here.
Whilst our swifts are rustling to the sound of Radio 2’s non-stop oldies in their cosy incubatory nest under the eaves, the local lady mallards are busy looking after their first broods. Rather ominous as these birds were positioned just where a heron often stands, alert for tasty morsels….
I’m not getting out much. It feels a bit odd to be staying at home when all the TGO Challengers are flocking up to their starting points on the west coast of Scotland. Good luck to all our friends who are on this year’s Challenge. I’ve been in touch with one of the Timperley contingent this evening – JJ, who seems to have overshot his official start point and landed in Tobermory. An excellent choice.
Living conveniently close to the airport gave us the pleasure of providing a light lunch today to two of the Austrian TGO contingent, Markus and Silke, en route from Vienna to Strathcarron, via a brief pause in Manchester. It was good to see them looking all kitted out and in good form. It was quite important for us to meet up with them as the maps I sent to Austria got lost in the post, so their maps were printed yesterday and handed over today. Phew!
We also have the company of ‘Family Swift’, who arrived on 8 May, as they did last year, and probably on the same day for many years before that. They are initially quiet, perhaps resting from a long journey, laying, and incubating, before getting noisier in July and August. They live less than two metres away from us when we are in our study, where currently we just hear rustling sounds, presumably from their spring cleaning and getting comfortable.
In other news, we had an enjoyable visit to Dot, my mum, who is fit and well apart from an eye problem, but was somewhat distressed to be beaten at cards (nomination whist) by Sue, who had to admit that she had been secretly practicing in Mallorca.
Our local LEJOGger, Cary, who has been blogging brilliantly from his Lizard Point to Dunnet Head walk, see ‘From the Bottom to the Top’, turned up earlier this week with a damaged foot, so having managed to get as far as Marsden he has decided on a pause. At least that will give readers a chance to catch up with reading his first 40 instalments of this long walk, and it gives me another crocked person with whom to commiserate.
That’s all for now, Sue and I are both reading Matthew Walker’s book – ‘Why We Sleep: The New Science of Sleep and Dreams’, and apparently we all need to get eight hours sleep a night. So it’s bedtime.
Goodnight
Sue and I hadn’t seen Mike Lovell’s ‘Six in a Bar’ band before, so it was a great pleasure to get to this gig, despite the police shutting the A666 for twenty minutes last night. Rather frustrating as we were fifth in the queue – another few seconds and we’d have got through. Anyway, we squeezed in at the back next to Andy at the well attended function.
In fact, I think it must have been ‘Five in a Bar, Plus One’ as there was a stand-in for Phil Lucas, unless he’s aged a lot recently.
The highlight for me was Colin Turner’s bass saxophone, which seemed to me to be a more versatile instrument than the traditional double bass.
All in all, another great evening at Eagley Jazz Club, at which the next gigs are shown below.
Monday 21st May
THE SPIRIT OF NEW ORLEANS
Monday 4th June
THE TAME VALLEY STOMPERS
Six in a Bar feature regularly at the North Euston Hotel in Fleetwood, often in the afternoon. We may combine one of these with a walk…
We made it back from Mallorca sometime after midnight, the delay and the flight enabling me to enjoy Gail Honeyman’s most captivating read – ‘Eleanor Olivant is Completely Fine’.
After enduring perhaps the wettest day I’ve encountered in many visits to Mallorca, the return to ‘Summer in Timperley’ was an absolute delight, today’s weather being rather more clement than that in Spain.
