Distance: 5.2 miles

Difficulty of the terrain: medium

Get the route: via Ordnance Survey Maps or download the GPX. file from Dropbox

Walk from Kidsgrove to Biddulph via Mow Cop the village in two counties (Staffordshire and Cheshire) that stands high up on a gritstone ridge overlooked by the famed Mow Cop Castle folly.

The Story

Route Notes

Getting Back

Two Counties, Two Regions, Two Provinces

Mow Cop is a village in two counties (Staffordshire and Cheshire), two English regions (the Midlands and the North), and remarkably bisected by the boundary between the Church of England’s Provinces of Canterbury and York which dates back to the early middle ages. 

The village’s highest point stands 335 metres above sea level. It sits at the end of the long gritstone ridge that runs from Lyme Park in Cheshire, just below the northern Derbyshire town of New Mills. It is amongst the most westerly outcrops of this distinctive type of rock, and of the Pennine range which runs for over 250 miles up the middle of the northern part of England. From the summit looking west the view extends across a wide plain towards Wales, and as far north as the towers in central Great Manchester on a clear day. To the east lies the tall hills and ridges of the Peak District. 

Mow Cop’s craggy high point is crowned with Mow Cop Castle an artfully ruined folly, constructed on the instruction of Randle Wilbraham, the lord of nearby Rode Hall in 1754. Since 1937 the castle and the gritstone rocks it sits upon have been owned and managed by the National Trust. These days the site is a country park.

Beneath Mow Cop Castle it is very evident where gritstone was quarried over the centuries. These days the village appears a quietly affluent place, but historically quarrying meant that it was once industrial. Like its neighbour Biddluph Moor, which lies to the east across the valley where the town of Biddulph sprawls, Mow Cop has a similar feel of relative isolation to a hilltop village like Heptonstall in West Yorkshire far to the north.

In common with other upland regions, Mow Cops historical working class identity and relative isolation made it an early stronghold for Methodism. Indeed when the charismatic Primitive Methodist church emerged at the start of the 19th Century Mow Cop was where the church held their first revivalist camp. An event which has since been celebrated by Methodists ever since.

It is not just Christians who have been drawn to Mow Cop’s ethereal qualities. Alan Garner, a critical figure in the development of modern English folklore informed fictional writing set key scenes of his 1973 novel Red Shift in Mow Cop. The gritstone outcrop and the Mow Cop Castle folly forming especially vivid vignettes throughout the novel. 

Route Notes

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 Kidsgrove to Biddulph, via Mow Cop and the Mow Cop Castle folly, begins from Kidsgrove Railway Station.

Upon alighting the train walk across the station forecourt approaching the main road and head down a flight of steps onto the towpath of the Trent and Mersey Canal.

Once on the towpath turn left, and walk a short distance along the towpath until you reach a road bridge.

Upon reaching the bridge turn off the towpath and head to the right until you reach the main road.

Here cross over the road at a set of traffic lights on the western edge of Kidsgrove. On the far side of the main road walk straight ahead along a road which runs beneath a railway bridge heading into a residential area.

On the far side of the road, turn left along a track which runs alongside the railway past a storage shed. Soon this track turns into a footpath running through woodland besides a brook.

Leaving the woodland, walk straight along the path, which continues to follow the line of the brook, across a series of meadows. The end of the gritstone ridge where Mow Cop sits is now clearly visible ahead of you. 

Presently you cross the brook and then head to the right across a field coming out on a lane besides a dog kennels.

Here straight ahead on the far side of the lane there is a footpath lined with thick vegetation in front of you which you walk along, and then cross a field, coming out through a hedgerow to reach the lane running up into Mow Cop’s lower sibling village of Mount Pleasant.

Once on the lane turn right and begin ascending the ridge. 

In the centre of Mount Pleasant turn left and cross the village green, before turning right and heading steeply uphill.

Continue to follow the road as it curves around to the right, and still ascending, you continue until you reach a footpath on the right, which enables you to cut the corner and enter Mow Cop.

Upon emerging from the footpath into Mow Cop turn left, and begin following the road uphill through the village.

Almost at the summit of the village, now over 300 metres above sea level, with spectacular views in both directions, turn right onto a footpath which runs down past an old gritstone quarry.

Soon you reach a wider path where you turn left and begin to gently ascend towards Mow Cop Castle.

Upon reaching the castle there is a flight of steps which takes you up to the top of the gritstone outcrop.

Having climbed to the top of the outcrop to take in the views, descend by the same means and continue to follow the path, which now becomes an unpaved track, heading north.

Soon you reach a main road lined with houses. Here turn right and follow the road for some distance uphill, until you crest the ridge and begin to descend quite steeply.

On reaching a larger road turn left and taking care as cars travel fast along the road, start walking along it. There are superb views across to the Peak District on the right as you walk.

Soon you emerge at the very top of the ridge, and on good visibility days, Greater Manchester can be glimpsed to the north.

Continue along the road, along the top of the ridge for some distance. Part of this section of road comprises a stretch of the Gritstone Trail, a long distance walk down the eastern edge of Cheshire from Disley near New Mills to Kidsgrove, on or near the gritstone ridge.

Presently on the right you reach a footpath running down hill beside a car turning space. Turn right and head along this path heading downhill towards Biddulph.

After crossing a farm’s driveway you continue straight downhill across a series of fields.

Reaching the valley bottom, almost on the edge of Biddulph you reach a lane. Walk straight along this road for a short distance and then turn right along a track beside a farm.

Soon you emerge onto the side of a bridleway formed from the trackbed of the railway line that once served Biddulph. Here you walk straight across, crossing a small linear park type area to reach a modern housing estate.

Follow the cul-de-sac across this estate, and then follow a network of roads and short stretches of snickers, walking more or less straight to reach the side of the major A527 running across along the western edge of Biddulph town centre. 

Cross the A527 and walk across a small landscaped park, to reach a road where you turn right to head up to Biddulph high street.

This is where the walk ends.

Getting Back

Biddulph lacks train services but is not too far from the railway stations at Kidsgrove and Congleton as well as the major station where inter-city services stop at Stoke-on-Trent. At the time of writing in September 2025 was served by very frequent bus services to Hanley, in central Stoke-on-Trent, with some continuing to the city’s railway station. These bus finished just before 20:00. There were also less frequent, but still several services a day to Newcastle-under-Lyme, Kidsgrove and Congleton. Services to Kidsgrove enabling you to get back to where the walk began. Kidsgrove is served by train services north towards Crewe and Manchester, as well as south towards Stoke, Derby, Stafford and onwards towards the West Midlands conurbation.