Hills — things to do with a single ticket

From Gibb Lane, Mellor looking towards St.Thomas' Church

The weather looked like it wasn't sure what it was doing so I decided to do a bit of exploring. I had a free single journey on Northern trains to use up with not a lot of prospect of getting another to turn it into a return journey (these days I'm mostly either using my Greater Manchester travel card or an over 55s' North West Explorer ticket to get about and both of these are excluded from the delay compensation scheme). The problem with a free single ticket is that the cost getting back is often not much less (or sometimes more) than buying a return in the first place. So I had a think and a nosey round on Google Maps and decided that I'd go out to Glossop, get the X57 bus through the Snake Pass to Sheffield then see how the spirit bade me, the idea being to come back on the single ticket.

The trip out on the train to Glossop was pleasant enough, as always. The sun came out while I was waiting for the bus and the journey over to Sheffield afforded excellent views of the scenery. 

Birdwatching from a bus is always more difficult than birdwatching from a train. Even so I was struck by how few birds I was seeing as we went through the Peak District. We soon left behind the swifts and swallows hawking over the lower hills and it was a long time before I saw the next bird, a lone carrion crow sitting on a fence post. A kestrel hovered over a field near Ladybower Reservoir. I like to think there were hordes of meadow pipits and linnets hiding in the undergrowth that I would have seen had I been walking, though that may be wishful thinking.

As we passed through Rivelin and entered the outskirts of Sheffield I was struck even more forcibly by the lack of birdlife. Passing through streets like these at this time of day West of the Pennines I'd at least be seeing jackdaws, woodpigeons and a few carrion crows and/or collared doves. Here nothing. A couple of lesser black-backs at Weston Park came as a relief and a dozen pigeons at Sheffield Station made up numbers.

I had considered moving on to see if the pectoral sandpiper was still about at Adwick Washlands but I'd just missed the train to Bolton on Dearne. None of the other available options over the next hour particularly inspired me, particularly once I'd looked at the price of tickets. A trip out to Bempton to try and catch the albatross was just about logistically feasible so long as it made itself available for viewing within a forty minute window and I didn't mind paying the gross domestic product of a small emergent nation to get out there. So I got the stopping train back through the Hope Valley without any further detours.

Oddly enough, once we'd left South Yorkshire and were back into Derbyshire the fields started to have crows and rooks and jackdaws and woodpigeons sat on telegraph wires. I have no explanation for this that doesn't leave me open to accusations of Lancastrian bias.

On a whim I got off at Marple Station and got the bus from there to Mellor, something I've kept meaning to do as a detour after a wander round Etherow Country Park and either lacked the time or energy to get round to. Mellor turned out to be a village that's pretty much becoming a suburb of Marple. A wander round gave me all the usual park and hedgerow suspects, with the greenfinches and goldfinches being particularly conspicuous. I walked down Gibb Lane which gave nice views over to the city centre with its blue haze of traffic pollution. A quick look at the map showed it was a forty minute or so walk down to Strines Station, giving me plenty of time for the train back to Manchester. I gave up after half a mile: the lane's not much wider than a Transit van and it was busier than the main street with the cars coming along in threes and fours not singly. So I wandered back, had a poke round for a bit and got the bus to Stockport.

One of those inconsequential mooching about days which is no bad thing on a sunny day.