Distance: 11.7 miles
Difficulty of the terrain: hard
Get the route via: Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox
Walk from Buxton in Derbyshire, across Goyt’s Moss in the western Peak District, up to Shining Tor Cheshire’s highest hill, and then steadily down to Macclesfield on the edge of the Cheshire Plain.
The Story
Route Notes
Getting Back
Western Peaks
Buxton and Macclesfield are two rather different towns, albeit with a similar vibe, that sit on opposite sides of the westernmost spur of the Peak District.
Where Buxton is new Macclesfield is old. Where Buxton was founded as a leisure resort, Macclesfield has a long industrial history. While contemporary Buxton is surrounded by some of the UK’s most significant quarries and these days thanks to the West Coast Mainline Macclesfield sits squarely within the modern commuter belts of Manchester and London alike. Of the two Macclesfield with a population of nearly 55,000 is well over twice the size of Buxton which is home to a little over 20,000 people. Both towns are currently growing rapidly as new housing estates grow up on their outskirts.
Purportedly Buxton, which developed as a fashionable spa in the 18th and 19th Centuries, when most of its grandest buildings were constructed, was constructed like Chatsworth House to the east, using the profits extracted from the Dukes of Devonshire’s copper mines at Ecton Hill. Macclesfield is also an aristocratic foundation, albeit of a far earlier stripe and more lowly stripe having been granted a borough charter entitling it to host a market during the great wave of market foundations in the 13th Century.
Lying between the two towns is the western flank of the Peak District National Park. A wild landscape of deep valleys and gritstone peaks, studded with peat bogs and pine forests, that is quite distinct from the rest of the national park. A fact compounded by the area being detached from the rest of the protected landscape, connected only by a tiny slither around the village of Flash, Lud’s Church and The Roaches just north of Leek. The reason for this detached status is the limestone quarries around Buxton and Chapel-en-le-Frith which continue to be extensively worked and for this reason are detached from the national park’s protected area.
Traversing the peaty landscape, long ridges and deep valleys, flanked with pine trees, is reminiscent of parts of Scotland, and possibly parts of Germany’s Hartz, more than other parts of the pennines let alone the Peak District. Cheshire’s modern county top, Shining Tor is a key peak in the range which gradually slopes down to where Macclesfield sits at the base of the Peak District where the Cheshire Plain begins. Shining Tor stands 559 metres above sea level, one of a number of relatively tall hills in the area including Axe Edge Moor, Staffordsire’s highest point, and the famed Shutlingsloe, notable from Alan Garner’s fiction.
The most prominent part of the area’s human geography is undoubtedly the Cat and Fiddle Inn sat 519 metres above sea level. Which while it is no longer open as a pub, does remain as a restaurant and distillery. When it was a pub the Cat and Fiddle was famed like other high sited Pennine inns for its snowed in lock-ins at times of the year when the road between Macclesfield and Buxton that it sits on became impassable due to snow.
The Walk
Get the route: via Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox
I create the Walk Midlands routes via Ordnance Survey Maps Explorer enabling me to take them on my phone. Subscribe yourself via the banner above.
This walk from Macclesfield to Buxton via Goyt’s Moss and Shining Tor begins from Buxton Railway Station.
Upon exiting the station turn right and follow the A53 out of Buxton. Passing a series of grand buildings from the town’s spa town heyday, as well as long rows of faded and crumbling boarding houses, before reaching comfortable seeming suburbia.
Reaching an area called Burbage, a village now incorporated into Buxton just past Christs Church, turn right down Macclesfield Old Road. This is lined with 1930s semis and runs steadily uphill.
At the top of the road continue along a gravel track uphill soon turning right and crossing a stile. Over the stile head left picking your way uphill across pasture.
Soon you clamber over a stile and enter the vast expanse of moorland known as Goyt’s Moss. It is here that the River Goyt rises and begins its journey north to join the fledgling Mersey.
Follow a well worn path downhill across the peaty moorland. Ahead of you the ridge atop which Shining Tor, modern Cheshire’s highest peak is situated, rises.
Having crossed one strand of the nascent River Goyt, and crossed a track running towards Errwood Reservoir, pick your way uphill above the remains of the Goytsclough Quarry.
Here you cross another tributary of the Goyt and follow a well worn path uphill through a pine plantation, steadily being allowed to revert to what seems more like natural forestry.
Leaving the woodland and advancing up an open hillside there are great views back west into the Derbyshire Peak District.
Continue up the hillside, presently coming out on the ridge which runs behind where Shining Tor stands.
Turn right and walk along the ridge a little way taking a path which broadly aligns with the county boundary between Derbyshire and Cheshire.
Soon you turn left following a steadily rising, well worn path across the peat towards the summit of Shining Tor.
Once on top of the ridge there is a gate through to the old Ordnance Survey trig point which stands at the very top of the hill. There are great views from here out across the Cheshire Plain. Jodrell Bank and the mountains of North Wales are visible from here on a good day.
Having admired the view, follow the path downhill a little way then turn left.
Now in Cheshire, out of the Midlands and into the North of England, follow the path as its winds steadily downhill and around the bowl of an impressive steadily sloping valley.
There are great views on both sides as you walk.
Presently as the path steadily takes you lower and lower down the hill Lamaload Reservoir comes into view beneath you.
Follow the path to the left as it descends towards the reservoir.
Right beside the water you pick up a surprisingly busy country road. Turn left and follow it for some distance heading uphill.
Presently on the right there is a track which leads past the slightly creepy looking, now derelict High Ballgreave Farm.
On the far side of the reservoir next to a disused barn, all boarded up, turn left and head uphill.
Once at the top of the hill, turn left walking across the high pasture, steadily nearing the busy A537 which runs between Macclesfield and Buxton.
Beside a farmhouse you pick up a farm track which runs uphill to the hamlet of Walker Barn where you cross the A537.
On the far side of the road you turn left along a road signposted for Tegg’s Nose Country Park.
There are spectacular views to the left as you walk out as far as Shutlingsloe, as well as an unusual little Methodist chapel on the edge of Walker Barn, seemingly still in use.
Just before you reach Tegg’s Nose turn right along a bridleway, taking in spectacular views of where the Peak District tapers down towards the Cheshire Plain and the roofs of Macclesfield beneath you.
At the bottom of the bridleway you take a right turn onto the road which takes you the final stretch of the way into the suburbs of Macclesfield. Take care walking along it as visibility for drivers is not great around some corners, there is initially no pavement and motorists travel fast.
Presently you reach the outer edge of Macclesfield, right on the edge of the Peak District, with the towers of inner Manchester visible miles to the north straight ahead of you.
Soon you come out beside the busy A537 which you follow all the way into Macclesfield town centre, crossing the Macclesfield Canal, to reach the town’s railway station.
This is where the walk ends.
Getting Back
Macclesfield is a major transport hub for north eastern Cheshire. There are buses available to locations elsewhere in the Peak District including back to Buxton and south to Leek throughout the day, as well as to locations across Cheshire and parts of Greater Manchester. The town has good service on the West Coast Mainline where it is served frequently by both Cross Country route services from Manchester and Stockport south to Birmingham and beyond, as well as West Coast Mainline services between Manchester and London. These trains call at Stoke-on-Trent, Stafford and Crewe on their way south. The town’s station is also served by frequent local trains between Manchester, Crewe and Stoke-on-Trent which call at local stations between these population centres.