Day 63 – Derbyshire (Friday 14th June 2024)

Our last full day in Manchester began with a drive out to Denton, and outer eastern suburb of Manchester. Emily had been looking for a comfy chair for her room and had found one of Facebook Marketplace. She had to get out there to pick it up though and luckily we had a car to help her to do that. Kerry stayed behind at Sale as we figured we’d likely struggle to fit the chair in then little Clio – which proved to be a very good call. We’d packed our cases the night before so I dropped them at Emily’s to save us having to drag them up and down the Sale and Chorlton streets tomorrow.

It was no surprise that the chair didn’t fit, because chairs are awkward things to fit in cars at the best of times, but with the help of the mighty Allan key we made it fit, took it back to Emily’s and re-assembled it. I left Emily to her day’s work and went back to pick-up Kerry and head for Derbyshire to the south-east of Manchester. This near part of Derbyshire, only 40-50kms or so from central Manchester is like another world. The Peak District NP is the backdrop against which this beautiful part of England is set. Like the Yorkshire Dales massive rolling hills bereft of any trees dominate the landscape. Wonderful stone villages dot the landscape. Streams flow through dark woods nestled on the valley floors. Dry-stone walls create a wonderful patchwork across the green hillsides that just just seem to go on forever. There is a sense of greater affluence throughout this region.

 

 

At the start of our drive through the Peak District we stopped at the town of Buxton. Large enough to have a University and an Opera House it has a lovely main street with many stately homes and a central park called The Slopes. Despite the rain the town really took our fancy. A long pedestrian mall sits at the bottom of The Slopes. Kerry found a wool shop where she jumped on a couple of pattern books that would have cost double plus postage if she’d bought them in Australia. It pays to know your merchandise when you’re looking for a bargain. Further along the Buxton Trading Post was selling hot sausage rolls. We’d been searching for something like that since we’d arrived in the UK without success. So, lunch was a no-brainer! The sun appeared as we sat outside at the single table provided and watched the world go by. A really good coffee at Coffee #1 just down the mall topped it all off.

 

While at Coffee #1 we got chatting to a Scotsman and his wife who declared that in his opinion Derbyshire was the most pretty county in the whole of England. With what we’d seen to date we had to agree. The wool shop proprietor had told Kerry of a nearby Patchwork shop in the village of Chapel-en-le-Frith so we set our sights for that via the tiny village of Ashford-in-the-Water – a pretty village for sure with yet another arched bridge over a shallow stream and an old church by the green but we only stayed long enough to walk to bridge to hunt for trout – well, that’s why I went their!

 

 

 

In Chapel-en-le-Frith I dropped Kerry off at the Patchwork shop and I went to fill the car which was down below 25% full. After searching for a park and eventually finding one I walked back towards the Patchwork shop to find Kerry just exiting with a few goodies in her little bag! It was just mid-afternoon but we had to get the car back to Salford by 5:00pm so we hit the road. Having seen even more of Derbyshire since our lunchtime chat with the Scotsman in Buxton we now both unequivocally agree with him – Derbyshire is the best we;ve seen in all out travels in England over the years. We’ll be back again on next visit to Emily with the intention of staying in the area and walking some of the trails and forest paths it’s famous for.

 

 

 

About 20kms from Manchester we started to get into the peak-hour traffic again. The outer ring road was going absolutely nowhere and I was getting more and more frustrated. A mi-interpreted instruction from GPS-girl (I maintain that there was actually no instruction) saw me take a turn off the motorway I shouldn’t have which only served to exacerbate the problem. When I saw that her way to resolve the problem was to go back to almost wher we’d joined the motorway I took control and just turned off down the first A road that pointed in then general direction of Manchester central that I came across. At least we were moving. Aside for one lengthy slow-down at a cross road we did alright and made it to Sixt at Salford with twenty minutes to spare. Again! Phew!

 

A gentleman at the bus stop told us that the No. 33 was running twenty minutes late, no doubt due to the heavy traffic I’d just fought and beaten, so we opted for the 25 minutes walk in the sunshine and warm weather back to Deansgate-Castlefield with time for a beer before we got there. The tram came promptly and before we knew it we were back at Emily’s on Chorlton. Tonight she shouted us dinner at a fine dining pub called Jane-Eyre. Small shared plates where it’s all about the flavours is what this place is about and the flavours certainly didn’t disappoint. Emily walked us to the Chorlton tram stop and we made our way home from there in the rapidly fading light.