Wednesday 23rd October 2024

Wednesday 23^rd October 2024

Monthly Long Walk: Owd Betts, Knowl Hill, Naden Valley and Ashworth Valley

This month’s mid-week, long walk started from the car park opposite Owd Betts pub along side Ashworth Reservoir. The original idea was to start the walk by climbing up the steep slope to the summit of Know Hill, but as we could not see the top of the hill due to the low mist, we decided to walk the route the opposite way around. Eighteen walkers began the walk by heading down Rochdale Road to the first stile on our left and walked down to the ruins of Higher Cheesden Mill. Once at the mill we turned right, through a kissing gate, and climbed up to Croston Close Road where we turned left and headed down to Buckhurst.

Continuing along the track we joined a narrow footpath, at Cob House Nab, which took us up to the bottom of Scotland Lane, where we turned left and after passing through Dunham Farm, we arrived at Birtle Edge. By this time the mist had started to lift, and we were able to see down into Deeply Vale and Cheesden Valley. The ruined chimney of Washweel Mill could be seen, this being just one of the fifteen mills in Cheeseden Valley. We continued along the narrow path until we reached a footpath on our right, that led to the access road to New Birtle Farm. Once through the farm we made use of a collapsed stone wall to have our morning coffee break.

Continuing through the fields we soon reached a track which led back down into the valley, passing the site of Nab’s Wife Tearooms, and eventually reaching a bridge over Cheesden Brook.

Once over the brook we climbed out of the valley and headed towards Black Dad Farm and on to Ashworth Fold. After crossing the road, we walked through the woods, which looked glorious in their autumn colours, to Waterloo Farm and continued to follow Naden Brook through the valley. At the head of the valley, we walked through Wolstenholme Fold and into Norden.

After crossing Edenfield Road we walked along Over Town Lane for a short distance before turning right onto a footpath leading to Naden Reservoirs.The three Naden reservoirs were built by the Heywood and Middleton Water Company in the middle of the nineteenth century. The final and largest reservoir, the Greenbooth, was completed in 1961 and it entailed flooding the village of Greenbooth.

As the sun was now shining, we decided to eat our lunch overlooking the reservoirs before starting our climb up to the trig point on Knowl Hill (419m).

Once at the summit we had misty views over the West Pennines and Greater Manchester which we enjoyed before making our decent back to the car park, having covered nine misty miles.