Thanks to all the walk leaders and helpers, to Scott for arranging the hotel booking and all nineteen members who either stayed at the hotel or joined us on the day for some magnificent walks in glorious weather.
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| Peverill of the Peak Hotel |
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| Hotel gardens |
Sue's 7.2 mile walk took us up over Wetton and Ecton Hills to Ecton Mine buildings overlooking the Manifold valley for a lunch stop. We then followed the Manifold Trail past Wettonmill before climbimg back up to Wetton past Thor's Cave.
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| The start near the car park in Wetton |
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| Evidence of mine workings on Wetton Hill |
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| Manor House, formerly known as Pepper Inn, was once a button factory and also an isolation hospital during a smallpox outbreak among the workmen building the Manifold Railway |
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| Ecton Mine buildings - lunch stop |
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| Ecton Mine was almost unique in being a rich copper mine in an area of Derbyshire usually associated with lead mining. The ore was formed by hydrothermal fluids rising in vertical fissures in the rock 180 million years ago and is concentrated in a vertical quasi-cylindrical pipe which surfaces at the top of Ecton Hill and is approached horizontally along a tunnel cut into the hill from the mine buildings. |
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| Although it is thought that Ecton Hill was mined in the Bronze Age, it was not until 1760 that the it was developed seriously when the Duke of Devonshire assumed direct control and major investments were made. By 1767 the mine was 290m deep and 130m of this was below the Manifold and had to be artificially drained. Ecton was briefly the most prolific copper source in the world, and the Duke was able to use it to finance his construction of a new spa resort at Buxton. By the 1780’s Ecton’s 4000 tons per annum output was equivalent to 12% of the entire output of Cornwall’s many copper mines and the mine was the deepest in the world. Further reserves were made accessible by installing a Watt steam engine and by 1795 the Ecton Deep Shaft was 400m deep with 280m of this was below the Manifold. |
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| Ecton Mine Engine House - drawing of the Duke of Devonshire's Watt steam engine (1795) used to pump water from the Duke's 400m deep copper mine, 280m of which was below the Manifold River |
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| Ecton Mine buildings on the path down to the Manifold |
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| The Leek & Manifold Valley Light Railway track was converted to its present use as a footpath and cycleway by Staffordshire Council in 1937 |
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| Manifold - The Disappearing River, reappears near Ilam Park |
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| Bridge over the Manifold |
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| Palaeolithic hunters once lived under the great roof of Thor’s Cave and watched wolves, bears and woolly rhinoceros in the valley below |
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| Slightly off-route - entrance to Thor's Cave |
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| View from inside the cave. More photos can be found here when we last walked in this area in 2014 |