MONTHLY LONG WALK
KNOWL HILL CIRCULAR
MONDAY 6TH NOVEMBER 2017
On a cold bright Monday morning ten walkers left Greenmount Old School to complete the monthly, Long Walk which would take us along both familiar and unfamiliar paths. We started by making our way to Summerseat along Vernon Road, crossing Longsight Road into Newcome Road where we turned right through the housing estate onto Hazel Hall Lane and encountered our first obstacle a very muddy footpath along the side of Hazel Hall Farm. We are so use to mud by now perhaps we should change the name of our group to “The Mudlarks”. The path eventually took us behind Summerseat Garden Centre to where we met our second obstacle, of the day, two very large highland cattle blocking the footpath. After a fair amount of gentle persuasion, the cattle moved to a clearing on the path so that we could continue with our walk.
Once in Summerseat we walked up Roland’s Road taking the first footpath on the left that took us behind the Priory Clinic onto the A56 which we crossed taking the footpath which passed Bass House and onto Bury Old Road, Nangreaves. Here we turned right and after a short distance we turned left onto a footpath that took us to the hamlet of Buckhurst, which is a small collection of old cottages, a farm house and a disused chapel.
The path them climbed steeply up to Ashworth Moor Reservoir where we enjoyed our coffee break taking in the views over the West Pennines. With renewed energy we climbed the steep embankment of the reservoir which is overlooked by the Owd Betts public house. Here we spent some time admiring the views of the perfect reflection of the sky on the surface of the reservoir.
Once across Edenfield Road we continued to climb up Scout Moor towards the wind turbines and to be amazed at their size when viewed close up. Knowl Hill is the highest point on Scout Moor at 419 meters above sea level and commanders 360 degree views across the Pennines.
This was the highest point of the walk so we enjoyed the descent down to the Naden Reservoirs after having spent most of the morning climbing.