In 2024 the Easter Bank Holiday weekend falls early occuring in March.
To mark this all of the new walks this month are relatively short, relatively gentle, walks to National Trust properties across the region. Ideal for a long weekend in spring.
This theme is doubly fitting seeing as when Walk Midlands was launched almost exactly two years ago one of the key objectives was to create an share straightforward waysof accessing key attractions across the English Midlands on foot. Historically many National Trust properties have not been especially accessible by foot even if you can reach them, so it is encouraging that the trust now appear to be taking steps to change this.
However, there is far more to the Midlands than the kind of history and heritage the National Trust generally maintains and connotes (though here too there is also change occuring). So, all of the history and heritage focused walks and days out below are non-National Trust, mostly associated with working class and/or radical history, and are generally free to access.
NB. public transport can be scant on bank holidays especially in the more remote parts of the region, so be sure to check bus and train times before setting off.
Smethick: No. 1 for Industrial and Migration History
Birmingham – Smethwick
Smethwick: the bridge between Birmingham and the Black Country. Birthplace of the modern steam engine, key contributor to the birth of the factory system and one of the first places where Black and South Asian migrants settled in large numbers after World War II and successfully fought for their rights, building today’s vibrant community. Read more
North Staffordshire’s “Big Pit“
Chatterley Whitfield
Sitting just north of Stoke-on-Trent Cahtterley Whitfield, whilst incredibly at risk due to lack of funding for ongoing repairs, is the most complete example of a large late 19th and 20th Century deep colliery anywhere in the UK. Read more
Pentrich Revolution
Ambergate – Alfreton
Walk in Derbyshire – Nottingham boundary country, one of the cradles of the industrial revolution and the heartland of Luddism. Passes through Pentrich, the starting point for the quixiotic, doomed and partly government spy provoked, Pentrich Revolution of 1817. The last armed uprising on British soil. Read more
Hanging Out On Gibbet Hill
Warwick – Gibbet Hill
Retrace the 10 mile final journey of some condemed prisoners in Warwickshire to Gibbet Hill on the edge of Coventry from the centre of Warwick where they were put to death by hanging. Read more
Roman Leeds?
The Little Railway Which Does
Chasewater Railway
Created from the colliery railway lines which once snaked all around the Chasewater Canal reservoir near Cannock Chase, Chasewater Railway is a short lakeside heritage railway, devoted to preserving and sharing the history of the Midland’s former industrial railways. Read more
Commoning on High
Long Mynd
Circular walk from Church Stretton Railway Station up and along the Long Mynd plateau. Notable a. for its outstanding natural beauty b. for being one of the larger surviving chunks of common land in the Midlands, still communally managed by the commoners as it has been for centuries. Read more
Water Under the Mill
Ambergate – Cromford
Walk along a preserved section of the Cromford Canal to Cromford Wharf, adjacent to Arkwright’s Mill the first modern factory spinning cotton opened in 1770 and powered by gignatic waterwheels. Read more
Guy of Warwick’s Gaff
Guy’s Cliffe
Short walk, partially along canal towpaths, in the suburbs of Leamington Spa and Warwick, to the atmospheric and deeply historic ruins of Guy’s Cliffe House. Read more
Palace of Power
Willington Power Station
Short circular walk starting and ending at Willington Railway Station heading out to the site of the former Willington Power Station with its five distinctive cooling towers. Read more
Erewash Valley’s “Iron Giant”
Bennerley Viaduct
Spanning the Erewash Valley, connecting Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, the nearly 500 metre long Bennerley Viaduct is a remarkable survivival. A relic of the growth of coal traffic on the Midlands Railway in the 1870s, the structure amazingly survived disused for over 50 years until it was reopened in 2022 as a walking and cycling route. Read more
The Once (and Future?) Pub in the Park
Moseley – Golden Lion
Short walk from Moseley centre via the River Rea Path to Cannon Hill Park location of the Golden Lion a wooden framed 16th Century pub, currently disused and derelict, but deeply historic. Read more
Robin of Sherwood
Mansfield – Edwinstowe
Walk from Mansfield town centre out into the countryside of both the former Nottingham coalfield and Sherwood Forest. Ends up at the village of Edwinstowe with its connections to the Robin Hood legend including the Major Oak. Read more
Peak Class Warfare
Retrace the Kinder Scout Mass Trespass
Starting from Hayfield this circular walk retrade the route up and around the edge of the Kinder Scout plateau taken by several hundred overwhelmingly young people who in definance of the Duke of Devonshire’s gamekeepers trespassed on the summit of Kinderr Scout (the highest in the Peak District) in April 1932. Read more
The Black Country’s Fitzcarraldo?
The Lost Lapal Canal
Follow the route of the southern end of the Dudley No. 2 Canal (insofar as possible) from Selly Oak to Halesowen. Includes the site of the long lost Lapal Tunnel (three miles long and geologically unstable) which now mostly lies beneath Woodgate Valley Park and the M5 motorway. Read more
Chartist Suburban Dream
Bromsgrove – Dodford
Circular walk from Bromsgrove Railway Station to Dodford the “Chartist village” founded in 1848 situated just the other side of the M5 home of the National Trust’s Rosedene preserved Chartist cottage. Read more
Lord Byron’s Country Pile
Newstead Abbey
Lord Byron, romantic poet, rakehell, radical member of the House of Lords, Luddite sympathiser and Hero of the Greek War of Independence was from Nottinghamshire. Newstead Abbey – now owned and managed by Nottingham City Council – was his ancestral seat. Read more
Ned Ludd’s Home Town
Leicester – Anstey
Walk from central Leicester to the outlying village of Anstey. The village is supposedly the home of Ned Ludd the inspiration and guiding lodestar of the Luddite movement of machine wreckers in the early to mid-1810s. Read more
The “Midland’s David Hartley”?
Booth’s Farm Ruins
Short walk through the north west Birmingham suburbs of Hamstead and Perry Beeches to the preserved foundations of Booth’s Farm, once owned by infamous counterfitting gang leader and erstwhile Staffordshire gentleman farmer William Booth, executed in 1812. Read more