Two years ago yesterday ... I was in Ilam

Monday, the 4th April 2011, and I was down at Ilam for a walk that started off in Staffordshire before crossing the River Dove into Derbyshire and heading back to the National Trust property of Ilam Hall.

I was working just three days a week by this date and making the most of the remaining four days ...

How many times have I posted a photo of the church at Ilam with Thorpe Cloud looming up behind ? Well add one more ...

  From the garden of Ilam Hall, you can see St. Bertram's Bridge over the River Manifold ...



 Oh dear, here's another photo of the Church of the Holy Cross ... with Thorpe Cloud ...



 Talking of St. Bertram, here's his tomb inside the church ...



Bertram was a King of Mercia in the 9th century ~ click here to learn a lot more about him. You can see some requests for prayers from visitors on the tomb above.

Also in the church is a memorial to Robert Meverell and his wife Elizabeth ...



Above their memorial is one to their daughter Elizabeth and her four children ...



The most striking memorial is the one in respect of David Pike Watts who died in 1816. Francis Chantrey was commissioned to complete the memorial at a cost of £6000. An octagonal chapel had to be added to the old church to incorporate the memorial. Some think the memorial is excessive ...



  Back to mundane matters ... and you can't get more mundane than the problems some dog owners cause in the countryside (here I go again). Here's a sign the National Trust were putting up at the time ...



 I crossed the River Manifold and went down to the water's edge ...

 

I walked downstream until the Manifold joined the Dove ...

Across the far side of the River Dove, Thorpe Cloud rises above the surrounding countryside ...






   

 The sheep are very friendly in these parts. I think they thought I'd got some food. They were disappointed ...



They're good looking sheep though.

I crossed the early 18th century Coldwall Bridge into Derbyshire ...



Once I was in Derbyshire I looked back into Staffordshire ...



I was getting nearer to Thorpe Cloud ...






  In Dovedale, another notice for dog owners. Why do they pick up their dog's mess, put it in a plastic bag and then sling it ?



 I walked a few hundred yards upstream between the River Dove on my left and Thorpe Cloud looming above me on my right. 

I reached the stepping stones ... and stepped across them ...



From the other side of the Dove, whilst now walking downstream, Thorpe Cloud, no longer flat on top, rises steeply above the river ...



 I'm not sure whether it's the river washing the grass away or people scree walking ... but there's some erosion ...



  I passed the first two of three Peak & Northern footpath signs ...






  I'd left the river behind by now and was walking across the fields behind the Izaak Walton Hotel ... but did sneak a peek back towards Thorpe Cloud ... and do you know what, it was flat on top again ...



I was nearly back in Ilam ... and what a picture it was ...



The bench on the right in the photo above reads ...



Just in case you can't read it ~  "IN MEMORY OF BILL HUDSON WHO FARMED THIS LAND FOR ALMOST FIFTY YEARS".

The third and final Peak & Northern footpath sign is the oldest of the three and nearly as old as me ...



Back then the society was known as the Peak District and Northern Counties Footpaths Preservation Society ~ a bit of a mouthful. I used to be a footpath inspector for them. 

I was now back to the bridge in Ilam that crosses the River Manifold ...



 Look ! Two years ago the daffodils were flowering !

I passed the gatehouse to get back into the grounds of Ilam Hall and was back ...



This walk was followed on the 4th April 2011
 
Length of walk ~ 4.40 miles *
 
Total mileage walked so far in 2011 ~ 97.49 miles
 
Total mileage between the 1st September 2009 and the 4th April 2011 ~ 625.54 miles

  22 of 2011 [which means in 2011 I was averaging just 4.43 miles a walk.]
 
* distance calculated on Ordnance Survey's Getamap