Derbyshire Area News - Derby and South Derbyshire Ramblers

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- Ramblers has published statistics on cuts to Council's ROW funding, showing that70% of Councils have cut their ROW budgets over the past 3 years, with 11% cuttingby more than 50%.- Ramblers' walking festivals dates: Festival of Winter Walks 22/12/12 - 6/1/13, andGet Walking Week 4/5/13 - 11/5/13.- Ramblers has produced a new booklet "The Heart of Walking" for use in promotingthe Association.I hope these news items give you confidence that the Ramblers remains active incampaigning on matters of importance to walkers.Work partiesErewash Group already has a team that are carrying out path maintenance tasks, andAmber Valley Group are setting up a similar team. The County Council is keen toencourage and support volunteers for maintenance work and they have appointed aVolunteers' Co-ordinator, Steve Cresswell. If you may be able take part in pathmaintenance work, even if only for a day or two per year, would you please contactKeith Shiers if you are in Erewash Group, John Morrissey if you are in Amber ValleyGroup, Chris Vaughan if you are in Derby & South Derbyshire Group or myself if youare in Derbyshire Dales Group. It would be useful to know whether you would beavailable for weekday work parties as well as at weekends.Officer vacanciesBy the time you read this newsletter, most of our Group AGMs will have taken place.I make my usual plea for members to consider whether they might be able to fill vacancieson Area Council or Group Committees. The more that tasks can be sharedbetween Council members and between Committee members, the more we canachieve and the less risk there is of incumbents finding their roles too demanding. AtArea Council we have been lacking a Chair, Countryside Secretary and Publicity Secretary.If you may be able to consider taking on any of these roles (or my role as Secretarywhich could enable me to move on to another role), please let me know.Thank you again for your continuing support of the Ramblers.Martin PapeArea Access OfficerAdventures in Access LandDerbyshire Area News—Winter 2012/13I have been doing some walking in the Wetton Mill area recently and exploring theaccess land round there. Ecton Hill and Wetton Hill are the obvious targets and the16
Derbyshire Area News—Winter 2012/13summits of both these hills can easily be reached from the footpaths that skirt theslopes.The summit of Ecton Hill is a complex area with an interesting history of mining andthere are traces of this seen all over the hill summit and slopes. There is good accessto the summit from all directions and additional access maps at GR 103575 and100582. Also there is a concession path up from Ecton which takes a better line thanthe zigzag route up the steep hillside. This path starts at GR 097584 and takes a gentleascending line round the hill side to join other paths by some of the old mine workingsat GR 099585.The best route over the access land south of Ecton Hill and on the east side of theManifold valley is to start at GR 096576 and follow the edge of the access land alongto GR 095565 where the track into the valley between Dale Farm and Sugarloaf canbe followed down to join the footpath at GR 097566.From this point you can see Sugarloaf ahead. Follow the valley up towards this andthen go right to the corner of a fence. There is a stile here, at GR 098567, which isquite well hidden by bushes. Once over the stile you can follow round the base ofSugarloaf and then climb up the hillside to the south east. The ridge at the top of theslope gives good views of the Manifold Valley and lovely flowers in the summer andyou can follow it along towards Wetton Mill. You can join the footpath from ManorHouse by descending south eastwards, it is a lovely little ridge but if you go too fardown there are some thick bushes to get round.Wetton Hill has two summits, the highest tops out at 371m and can easily be reachedby the paths that surround the hill. The other summit reaches 358m and there is anaccess point at GR107563, once reached there are lovely views if you descend to thetop of the steep slopes above the Manifold valley. To drop back down to Wetton Mill itis best to skirt the steepest slopes and join the path down from Manor House. If youlook carefully at the map you will see there is a steep valley which drops down to theroad at GR 099556. You can reach the bottom of this from the path which joins theroad a 100m or so to the west at GR 098556. It is a steep climb up through the valleyand might almost be described as a scramble, you will need to use hands as well asfeet at least once, however for the intrepid explorer it gives an interesting ascent,good views from the top and in the summer some lovely limestone flowers.Sue Weatherley Area Access Officer17
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Derbyshire Area News - Derby and South Derbyshire Ramblers

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