The slight ease of the lockdown here in England has seen us go on a variety of walks to new local places along with one or two of our favourite ones over the past week. From flat 3 milers to rather un-flat milers.

It has felt so good to be back in nature and doing the thing I love most – walking. I must admit, I have been pretty mardy some of the days at myself for not being able to do some of the climbs as easy as before. I have to remember that this rehab for my lungs and entire body is going to take a long time. Never the less, our walks ranging from 3-9miles were certainly a great starting point.

Here are some snaps from the past week:

Canals: The nicest area near us is a long stretch of canal that goes past our town through Warrington and towards Liverpool. The wildlife is so lovely down there. Lots of baby ducks, swans, coots along with so many other birds. I’ve been going on a few 3mile walks on my lunches down there and also been lucky to meet so many lovely dogs. Flat but very pretty and can rake up the miles if needed down there.

Dovestones: Our favourite place. A walk down past the 2nd and 3rd reservoirs and up the hill towards the waterfall. A scramble up the boulders of the waterfall then a ‘hands and knees’ climb up the steep slope on the other side to make it to the top of the moorland. Then came the views which we enjoyed as we walked along the top of the moors for a few miles. I couldn’t manage our usual 16mile route so we cut back down to the second reservoir and then did a final circle of the 1st main reservoir then back up the hill to the car.

Mam Tor: We decided to climb the steeper rout to the top of Mam Tor to avoid the crowds of people. This meant ascending as soon as you parked to even get to the mountain. I struggled a lot here with my breathing. I took a few puffs of my inhaler which helped a lot but then it was my general unfitness that got me. It was slow but we still made it to the top. We then went along the ridge of Shivering Mountain but cut the route short because of the amount of people. We didn’t mind though, the downward path let us meet some friendly cows, lambs and chickens on the way down to Castleton. Then a long trudge back up the hill to the car.

Rivington Pike: Somewhere new where we have never been. I would say we went the wrong way but there seemed to be so many different paths that you could take to get there that I don’t think we did. Either way, we climbed up through the woodland, up through the farmers hilly fields (full of sheep and lambs) then up the paths and round to the stairway up to the monument. As you can tell it was very UP! I wasn’t expecting the climb to be as hard as it was but it was definitely worth it. Stunning views across the north west Merseyside. The wind was crazy so we didn’t stay too long at the top as it was hard to stand upright so we headed down past a cute tower house places and down through some more woodland. We didn’t have a route planned we just knew what direction the car was in. Along the way we say some cute little buildings but unfortunately not the famous bridges. Maybe next time.