Walking on Sunshine

Friday 25th May at 10 am. Liz Ingram, Liz Mellor, Jenny Lee, Jean Wilson, Barbara Robson and Anne Thatcher meet at the Boat Inn Penkridge, accompanied by three husbands, who prefer to remain anonymous for reasons of national security.The men are dispatched to Brewood to leave cars there; meanwhile the ladies sit outside the Boat, discussing quantum physics and other similar weighty topics.  Thankfully alcohol is not being served this early.

Also in the party are two white dogs that do not end the walk anything like as clean as at the start.  The walk commences with a stroll through the village of Penkridge, crossing the river Penk before heading west.  As we do this a heron, standing beside the river, takes to the air and sails gracefully right over our heads.  No one has a camera at the ready!

Our route initially leads us over metalled road and then wide dirt tracks as we head for the wild countryside.  We’ve not even left these before we hit our first “where do you think we are?” moment.

With a consensus arrived at we continue on the track.  There are no clouds to be seen and it’s starting to become very warm.  Soon we come to a stile with fields beyond, where we take a short rest.  Alongside is a tree that’s seen a bit of pollarding over the years.

It’s just here that we very nearly leave Jenny’s new camera in the long grass … but luckily don’t.  A field with many nettles is next and we all give thanks for the fine weather and our consequential choice of shorts!  At the far side of the field, we’re back on a wide farm track.

From the other side of the dense hedge we can hear fruit pickers conversing in the local dialect of these parts – Polish.  A chat with them (in English) reveals that we passed their dormitory a short while ago.

With just one more wobble (we realise the book we are following was published about fifteen years ago) our presence on the Staffordshire Way is confirmed by fingerposts and we continue to the tiny village of Mitton.   There are no other people on our walk, but we do come across some interested livestock.

There’s nothing of note to photograph in Mitton, though somebody spots a stone mounting block with a very gentle ramp and decides it must have been constructed for a very unfit horseman.  We find the path south, out of the village, through fields and into some idyllic and very verdant countryside.  We stop for a “banana break” and make a determined attempt to leave Jenny’s walking pole in the long grass.  Luckily this also fails, but we fear the next thing may be that we mislay Jenny herself.

Now confused only by the fact that somebody has created a large lake since our book was printed and then threatened by a herd of cows, who take an unhealthy interest in the dogs, we enter the churchyard at Lapley from the fields, silently and unseen by the villagers.

The observant amongst you will have spotted it’s now ten past one, so we take our lunch sitting on the churchyard wall.  Fully refreshed, full of renewed enthusiasm, we stride off once more ……. in completely the wrong direction.  Does this faze us?  Not a bit.  We reset our gyroscopes, walk back past the Vaughn Arms (which is sadly boarded up) and find the correct path in the direction of the Shropshire Union Canal.  This we eventually reach, joining the towpath at bridge number seventeen.

The canal is very straight here and the towpath is broad … and very unusually, it’s quite dry.  We pass some narrowboats, moored alongside the bank.  A pair of white ducks stand beside one ~ they appear to be pets.  They foolishly mistake the dogs for friends and one narrowly escapes the jaws of death.  We come to a canal bridge over the A5, courtesy of Thomas Telford, and stop there for a group photo.

We’re just a mile from our destination now and one can almost smell the Jennings Lakeside beer, as carefully nurtured at the Bridge Inn.  For completeness, and purity of spirit, we have to walk past a set of steps where a notice invites us to the garden.  We pass under a bridge to finish the walk properly, climbing  an incline to the road.  But now the end is truly in our sights …. a place to sit, a place to remove one’s boots and a delightful pint of shandy!

Submitted by Joe

Walk on the Wild Side

Four members of Stafford group set off last Thursday, 17th May to walk from Seisdon to Highgate Common.

At the start: Lois, Sarah, Sue and Maria

The first thing we discovered was that this corner of South Staffordshire is further from Stafford than we thought!  The lanes are very narrow and winding and Peter, Lois's husband did well to drop us in Seisdon village despite four opinionated backseat drivers!  The day was fine and we admired the pretty cottages in the village as we walked to the first Staffs Way sign.

At last! the first staffs Way sign

Luckily the directions for this stage were clear but Sarah's reading of the OS map was essential to reassure us we were on the right track.  The walk took us through farmland and on this weekday we met no-one except a fox who looked put out at having to share his field with us.  A highlight was the bridle path along the ridge where we stopped in a beech wood for a snack.

A lovely beech tree

We could even see the high-rise buildings of Wolverhampton in the distance.

Descending from the ridge

We made good time and reached Highgate Common at the end of the walk at about 6.30.

Nearly there!

We were meeting Jeff Sim the Warden of the Staffs Wildlife Trust at Highgate Common Reserve at 7 but realised that we were some distance from the Community Centre and were not sure how to get there!  We sat on a bench, ate our sandwiches and rang him.  Jeff told us to keep on the Staffs Way till we reached a road where he would collect us.  We followed the instructions and had the treat of a ride in a pick-up truck to the Community Centre where we met our members Trish and Jane.

Rescued by the Wildlife Trust Warden

Jeff made us very welcome and told us about the history and development of the Highgate Common Reserve.

A chat from Jeff the Warden

He then took us for a guided walk.  Highgate Common is a small remnant of an ancient lowland heath and as such is home to rare insects and birds.

A walk around Highgate Common reserve

Jeff was a very enthusiastic guide and showed us the holes made by the mining bees and told us about the beetles  and birds that are thriving in the Reserve. We also walked by the pool which is home to crested newts.

Walking by the crested newt pond

We had a wonderful day and would like to thank Peter, Trish and Jane for the lifts and particularly Jeff who inspired us all with his enthusiasm.

Submitted by Lois

Fields of Gold

Twelve  walkers from Shenstone group plus Poppy the dog did the first section of our walk (4.1 miles) from Hobbs Lane to Abbots Bromley on 16 May. We were incredibly lucky with the weather as it was the only dry day of the week. Not only was it dry, but sunny and warm too, so it's true that the sun shines on the righteous!!

Setting off

This walk is very much across country so there weren't many landmarks or points of interest, but some stunning views across fields of rape.



Rape field

We found the route easy to follow, apart from a few stiles that had been removed and a brief moment of confusion:


Private road



Just to prove we made it, here we are in front of the Butter Cross in Abbots Bromley, with the Goat's Head Inn on the right and the church at the back which displays the horns used in the annual Abbots Bromley Horn Dance




We had a very nice lunch at the Goat's Head Inn before catching the bus back to Lichfield. This turned out to be something of a white knuckle ride very fast along single track lanes while the driver made up 10 minutes but we all survived!!

Submitted by Jo

Keep Right on to the end of the Road

Long Walkers Continue To Warm Up On The Way For The Millennium

On Friday 4th May, Long Walkers caught the 481 Newport bus from Stafford, and alighted at Outwoods to join The Way For The Millennium. This is a 40 mile walk from Outwoods, near Newport, to Shobnall, on the edge of Burton, designed to be accessible to all, in that it is easily reached by public transport and offers easy walking, largely along a disused railway and canal towpaths. The three Stafford members had decided to walk along the Greenway back to Stafford. The first part of the Greenway, to Gnosall, was bordered with spring flowers, such as primroses, cowslips, bluebells, stitchwort and Jack-in-the-hedge.

Straight ahead on The Greenway

After Gnosall, there were few flowers to enliven the long straight route. There is a pub, the Red Lion, right on the Way, at Derrington, but alas it no longer opens at lunchtime during the week. However, the apple blossom was pretty on Millennium Green, and we achieved our aim of walking a brisk 10 miles!
If you would like to try this route, a guidebook is available from the County Council.

At Millennium Green

(Post submitted by Sarah)

Mud, Mud, Glorious Mud...

Seven members of Trentham NWR [Sarah, Pat, Chris, Anne, Alison, Jan and Marilyn] walked the second section of their Staffs Way stage on Sunday 6 May.  This was from Rocester to Uttoxeter, a distance of 5 miles.  After a pretty wet week, with some concerns about flooding, we set off in bright sunshine.

First stop was Richard Arkwright's Tutbury Cotton Mill built in 1781 and now an Academy for workers from the nearby JCB factory.

Already lost! All maps required to locate the beginning of the walk.

This looks like it...we are on our way on The Way!

When all at once we saw a crowd, a host, of golden dandelions...

We seem to have strayed over the border into Derbyshire!

Along the banks of the River Dove, no flooding here.

Handsome sheep with crinkly fleece.  Lincolnshire Longwools?

Crack Willow?

We're definitely on the right track, but are we coming or going?

The next section of the walk was punctuated by the loud retorts of clay pigeon shooting, but luckily  clay fragments did not keep falling on our heads.

Dandelion clock telling us it's time for lunch.

Picnic time.

Off again with our knapsacks on our backs.

It was all going so well, when we encountered a boggy bit.  One member, who shall be nameless, missed her footing and fell full length into the mire and emerged like the creature from the Black Lagoon. We formed a human shield while she stripped to the waist and dressed in various borrowed tops, but she had to soldier on for the last couple of miles with drenched jeans.  Alison rang her husband to bring fresh clothes to Uttoxeter and meet us at Tescos.

A satyrical statue in Uttoxeter?

We've reached our destination, but need to check the map to find our way back to the car.

Sunny weather, lovely country side, good conversation and the Creature from the Black Lagoon...what more could you want from a walk?

No parrots in Parrot's Drumble!

I visited the evocatively named Parrot's Drumble today.  It is one of the Staffs Wildlife Trust Reserves, located at Talke, just off the A500 in North Staffs.  There were no parrots to be seen but there were plenty of wooded slopes sporting hazy carpets of bluebells.  It's not on the Staffs Way, but it is well worth a visit and the bluebells should be around for another couple of weeks.