If we had kept on walking

We could have reached Stoodley Pike but stopped for our lunch at the Shepherd's Rest. As ever intrigued by this monument I wikied it, it commemorates peace, ironic isn't it.  It fell because of lightening strikes but was rebuilt, as our hopes must be for the future of Afghanistan.  Though reading the news this morning apparently the Chinese are moving in on the mineral reserves - history goes on.

                                                             

Wikipedia photograph 

                                                             A PEACE MONUMENT

ERECTED BY PUBLIC SUBSCRIPTION

COMMENCED IN 1814 TO COMMEMORATE

THE SURRENDER OF PARIS TO THE ALLIES

AND FINISHED AFTER THE BATTLE OF

WATERLOO WHEN PEACE WAS ESTABLISHED IN 1815.

BY A STRANGE COINCIDENCE

THE PIKE FELL ON THE DAY THE RUSSIAN

AMBASSADOR LEFT LONDON BEFORE THERE

WAS DECLARATION OF WAR WITH RUSSIA IN 1854.

 REBUILT WHEN PEACE WAS RESTORED IN

1856

RESTORED AND LIGHTNING CONDUCTOR FIXED

1889   

From the bottom of the valley we followed an old lane, now turned into a public footpath, through woods, up steep steps and slopes.  My breath held out though I did stop quite a few times but managed.  The area is rather intriguing, a row of old terraced houses, dark and thin on the slope at one point with the sloping field boundary almost up to the back door.  A small farm settlement of half a dozen houses in the fields just before the pub. I find the landscape rather brutal, but we had magnificent views, stretching across the Calder Vale,  two lots of wind turbines on the horizon.  Looking down on the town of Todmorden, and you realise how compact it is, following the line of the river and the steep slopes.

I had leek and mushroom stroganoff, a bit peppery but good, the pub was busy, either with walkers coming up or those that had driven.  The Shepherd's Rest pub sits two thirds up to the ridge but above is Gaddings Dam, a Victorian enterprise. No road up to it and no facilities when you get there, you just have to walk up to the ridge.  Many people come because of the draw of its small beach.  They cause terrible problems with parking on the road and are probably rather dismayed at the walk and badly prepared.

This is a problem the country faces at the moment, the flight of the urban population into the countryside, holidaymakers bringing in their wake rubbish and sanitary problems.

This little video shows the way up but their enthusiasm grates rather.