Local walks

The barge we saw on the canal, at the Ellesmere Port Barge Boat Museum, Photograph from their website.Beeston Castle from the English Heritage websiteFootpath route in red.

With the good weather and dry country side this is the time to explore our local walks in and around Tattenhall.

We did a delightful walk along the canal path from near Crimes Lane to Wharton Lock, then up to Beeston Castle and across the fields to skirt the edge of the Peckforton hills then back to Crimes Lane across footpaths on farm fields,then through a small wood full of wild garlic.

This walk was full of history- the railway line has to be crossed first( carefully) then you reach the canal- canals were being built all around the country in the mid 1700s this part of the Shropshire Union canal was finished in 1770, but by 1850 rail was taking over, it became the quicker way to transport goods around the country. ( Now of course it is the huge lorries that dominate our motorways that do this work..) We had a great encounter with a barge and crew who were returning from a barge boat show at Ellesmere Port Barge museum. This was a 1912 barge propelled by an original ( if temperamental) Bollinger engine. Those on the barge were all descended from barge folk- grandparents having been born on barges and they still live on barges now.

We walked past the Shady, the pub at Bates Mill(a mid 1800’s water mill grinding wheat for flour) then on to Wharton Lock where we saw the barge going through the lock.

From there we joined the Sandstone Trail up to and around the base of Beeston Castle and the very useful little cafe, just outside the castle, provided us with refreshments From there the path wound down through a conifer wood, out into fields full of cattle who seemed completely un-phased by people walking through their Domain. Looking back there is a great view of the castle. We reached the lane going towards the footpath that leads up to the Pheasant Pub, and just missed the immediate turning to our next footpath. However having walked down this lane to its end, we discovered a number of lovely old houses – one ‘of which was dated 1647. Such a small hamlet has a lot of listed buildings,many of which were built long before Peckforton castle. This tiny village appeared in the Domesday book in 1086, presumably because of its close proximity to Beeston Castle.

.Retracing our steps we easily found the right footpath and walked back through the fields to the road and to our car parked at Crimes lane. It worked out at 4 miles with the slight diversion so would be less without that, but on fairly easy flat terrain for the most part. There is however quite a tricky stile to reach the canal, and a number of other stiles along the way.

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