Stoke Bardolph

I was up and out by 8:00 am to try and avoid walking in the hottest part of the day. I headed out of the City via the Sneinton Greenway - a footpath that follows the railway line out to Colwick Racecourse and the Colwick Country Park.

The Racecourse

 Paddling in the Colwick Lakes

 The Ferryboat Inn at Stoke Bardolph, a nice spot for a riverside pint, unfortunately it was a bit early for a drink:-

 The Millenium Sun dial at Burton Joyce, makes a good dog hitching post:-

 1,2,3 smile:-

 I walked through the farmland between Burton Joyce and Gedling:-

 After the Gedling House Woods and Meadow Nature Reserve, it was back into the City to Carlton, where I stopped at Tesco to get some lunch and water the dogs. When I came out of the shop there were three women clucking around the dogs, refilling their water bowl (for the third time).

I noticed a theme at all of the petrol stations that I passed; queues out onto the street, in anticipation of a tanker drivers strike:-

The dogs and I started to flag on the long walk up Carlton Hill and my muscles were aching on the descent down the other side. We did 8 hours of walking - I went straight into a Radox bath when I got home.

Elvaston Castle Country Park

It has been a beautiful day without a single cloud. I parked up in Breaston and followed the national cycle route for about 3 miles, to the country park. The cycle route follows the path of a disused canal. Most of the canal has disappeared, but there are plans to reopen a 12.5 mile stretch of disused canal, including the stretch that I walked along today, in order to join up the Nottingham and Derby canal systems.

There are extensive gounds surrounding the Castle, a mixture of woodland and formal gardens:-

The "castle" is a stately home built in the early 1800's. It is owned by the local council (Derbyshire County Council) now. Until last year, they used the building as a museum, but it has now closed and doesn't look likely to re-open anytime soon, as the building needs a lot of repair works, which the Council cannot afford.

I bumped into an ex colleague in the Castle grounds. We chewed the fat for a bit, yakking about this and that, and she told me that she had heard that the Council had considered closing the grounds, recently, due to the cost of maintaining them.


I did a circuit of the grounds, which have a lake and topiary garden:-
I was out for just over 5 hours so estimate that I walked about 10 miles.

Regression

I saw a few of these for pennies on ebay so thought I'd add them to the collection:-

Pub Poker National Final

I spent the day at the Dusk til Dawn poker club, venue for the Redtooth poker finals.

The wall of fame:-
The prize table with the 9 tickets to Vegas:-

Unfortunately, my luck didn't hold, my pocket jacks didn't hold up against my opponents pocket aces, and I crashed out in about 270th position (out of 370 or so players).

Mark "the Beast" Labbett:-

West Bridgford

I did a 5 hour, circular walk around West Bridgford and Gamston this morning. I followed the canal out to Trent Bridge and across into West Bridgford. The Southreef development, down by the canal hasn't progressed at all since I mentioned it last August. Here's a photo that I took then:-
And today:-
I followed a stretch of the disused Grantham canal out towards Gamston
I had to backtrack and make a detour along the main road as these swans refused to let us pass, I tried several times but think that they would have broken my arms with their wings, or pecked the dogs to pieces if I'd tried to push past them, they must have a nest nearby:-
I stopped for lunch in the park at West Bridgford on my way back home:-

Return to Chilwell

I did the return journey to pick up my car this morning. I followed the canal most of the way, then cut through the Attenborough Nature Reserve and through Chilwell . As it was flat towpath, I buried my head in my book as I walked, with the dogs on the leash to prevent them from getting into mischief while I read.

I'm reading War by Sebastian Junger. The author spent a year following a platoon of American soldiers, fighting in the Korenghal Valley, Afghanistan. The author also directed the documentary "Restrepo", which I haven't seen yet, covering the same subject.
The canal had been dredged recently and there were various items of scrap metal on the bank, awaiting collection.

Chilwell

I parked the car in Chilwell and walked back home - thats a distance of about 7 miles. I intended to start the walk with a circuit of Hobgoblin Wood. When I got there, however, I discovered that it is inaccessible, it forms part of the Chilwell barracks complex.

My walk through Chilwell followed the route of the new tram line which has just started construction. Quite a lot of green space will be lost to the tram. All this will go:-
Another area of trees that have been cleared:-
A big chunk of Chilwell High Road will go too:-
The rest of the walk was familiar to me, through Beeston, where I used to live, and then through the University of Nottingham Campus.

The dogs in the small botanical garden on the Campus:-
I will do a different route back to Chilwell tomorrow to retrieve my car.

Dale Abbey

I drove out to Kirk Hallam bright and early this morning and parked up by the Pioneer Meadows Local Nature Reserve. I walked through the park and then across fields to Hermit's Wood.

Approaching Hermit's Wood - the ruins of the Abbey can be seen in the distance:-
The woods are believed to have been part of the original Sherwood Forest, they run along a steep sandstone cliff. The dogs on the cliff top:-
At the bottom of the cliff is the Hermit's cave. It was made by a baker from Derby in the 12th century, acting on a dream he had that the Virgin Mary told him to go there and live a life of solitude and prayer. Just a couple of cave dogs there now:-

Subsequently, an Abbey was built nearby, this is all that remains:-
The village pub, the ivy was swarming with nesting sparrows:-
I continued on, across farmland, to Locko Park, a statelt home set in a large park. The park is privately owned and access for visitor's is limited to a few footpaths that are, for the most part, fenced on either side. The grounds were large enough that I didn't catch a glimpse of the house.

I took a path that led North out of the park to the village of Stanley.

Approaching Stanley:-
I walked through Stanley and then took a footpath back, across fields to Dale Abbey and then retraced my route through Hermit's wood and back to Kirk Hallam.

It was great walking weather, I was out for just over 5 hours.

Ratcliffe on Soar

I've not ventured far this week as the weather turned cold and foggy and as I took home a cold as well as my winnings at the poker tournament last weekend. This morning I drove out to Sawley Marina and set out on a walk through the farmland that surrounds the Ratcliffe on Soar Power Station. The Marina:-
The dogs posing in front of the Power Station's cooling towers:-

There were plenty of ditches for the dogs to splash in:-


I walked for a couple of hours, I had intended to go further but either my navigation skills failed me, or the farmer has put a barbed wire fence across the footpath I was following. I still felt a bit bunged up with my cold and so I took a route back to the car through some more fields.