A Peak District ramble to the Roaches and Lud's Church.

First bit of the hike/ramble/walk - through the heather to those rocks at the top of the hill.

Katherine and I snuck in a hike in the gorgeous Peak District (2.5 hours from the house) the day before she left to go back to the States for a couple weeks.   We’ve been trying to go on this specific ramble all summer.  It’s a popular one, and the actual walk was so much prettier than the name “The Roaches and Lud’s Church”.  Don’t be fooled:  there were no creepy crawlies (‘roaches’ is from the French word for rocks) and no old ruins (Lud’s Church is actually a deep ravine.)   

Very start of the walk - Katherine trying to get oriented on the OS Map.

We parked at the Roaches end of the figure-eight hike, and the first half-mile was a walk up a somewhat mucky path in the midst of gorgeous fields of heather (the purple stuff) to the ridge-line.   We had planned on doing the entire hike in about four hours but were waaaay off track almost immediately.  We were stopping every three or four feet for photos and then climbed up/over/under/on almost every one of the rocks at the top of the first hill.  An hour and a half in to the hike we were less than a mile in… oops. 



Am I taking in the scenery or just resting after a half mile of walking?

We left no stone un-explored! Isn't the scenery gorgeous? 

We had to get a move on, so picked up the pace for a good quarter mile… until we came across a farmer herding his sheep.  The farmer would shout commands and his border collie (who obviously thought this was the most fun game in the world) would immediately respond by moving in another direction or rounding up rogue animals.  Sheep are amazing rock climbers but that cute dog was tenacious.  Anyway, that mile took us the better part of an hour.  Now we were really behind schedule!  Bear in mind that Katherine was taking a train that very night to get to London for her flight the next morning and she hadn’t even begun to pack… LOL.

Watching the farmer and his border collie herd sheep. 

The next section of the walk was along the ridge of the roaches.  It was also incredibly pretty but we kept a good pace until getting to some amazingly cool rocks that had been worn into crazy patterns by ice and wind.

Crazy patterns.

Don't let the pose fool you - we were not moving Bolt-speed along this trail!

 After a few miles along the ridgeline, we crossed a small road into a pasture and walked alongside a stone wall until it entered a large wood.  As we weren’t moving as fast as initially budgeted, we took a bit of a short cut to the chasm of Lud’s Church.  Not sure why it’s called that, actually!  Lud’s church is steep crack in the earth more than 300 feet long and about 50 feet deep (Wikipedia). There are natural stone stairs on either end of it, the walls are damp and covered in moss, and parts of the floor are covered in deep, squishy mud.  It was so worth the walk!  We ate our lunch and admired its weirdness, then left to start our hike back. 

Walking into Lud's Church.

Looking up at the sky over the crevice.

This guy was calf-deep in mud!  We took the less gross route along the stones on the other side. 

The OS map and a compass were both essential tools. I'm quite proud that we didn't get lost even once! 

Overall, we thought it was an amazing walk and were really pleased to have finally have been able to do it.  Anyone with advice on other such walks in England/Scotland/Wales please let me know!