Wonders of the Peak

Buxton Museum & Art Gallery

Natural History

Alport Castles

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Alport Castles © Chris Morgan via Geograph (CC BY-SA 2.0)

This is one of the geological and scenic highlights of the Peak District National Park. Alport Castles is said to be the largest landslip in Britain, but it is rarely visited because of its remoteness.

View from top of Alport Castles © James Daniel via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

The Alport Valley is made up of weak Carboniferous shales (fine-grained rocks made of mud) overlain by harder Millstone Grit. The large cliff face we see here is the Birchin Hat escarpment. Alport Castles formed when the softer sandstones and shales of Birchin Hat slipped away from the rock-face. The Millstone Grit on the top broke up into blocks and tumbled down the valley side, creating a chaotic landscape of fallen boulders. With a little imagination, they can resemble castles – hence the name.

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The Aquarium

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Standing on the main street, look along the line of shops, arcades and attractions. The tranquility of our view from High Tor above may seem like a lifetime ago!

Imagine the hustle and bustle of this main thoroughfare when the railways first ferried visitors in droves. The sights prompted J. B. Firth in 1908 to describe

the bawling of the drivers of brakes and waggonettes, the attentions of the pushing salesmen“.

Today the bold blues, yellows and pinks of ice cream shops, fish and chip bars and arcades are hard to miss. And neither is the Aquarium. This building holds another clue to Matlock’s visitor appeal. Of the many spas and wells that first brought visitors to Matlock in their thousands, behind these walls is the only one that still works today – the Petrifying Well.

A ‘Petrifying Well’, as advertised on the board outside, was once a real feature of the town and drew in crowds of thrill seekers from the surrounding cities. But what is a ‘Petrifying Well’?

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View of High Tor

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Catch your breath at this vantage point. From here we can appreciate the natural beauty and grandeur of the landscape that the Derwent has carved out.

With your back to the high street below, face the aptly named High Tor. A ‘tor’ is a large, free-standing rock outcrop that rises abruptly from its surroundings, which this one looming over us certainly does!

In its Victorian heyday, Matlock Bath and its neighbouring countryside were often referred to as ‘little Switzerland’. From here we can get a sense of why, not least because of the climb up! The scene has inspired many writers and artists.

In Mary Shelley’s Gothic novel Frankenstein (written in 1818, the same year the toll road opened) the narrator describes a visit:

We … proceeded to Matlock… The country in the neighbourhood of this village resembles Switzerland; but everything is on a lower scale

A century earlier, Daniel Defoe had recorded

the prodigious height of this tor…was to me more a wonder than any of the rest in the Peak”.

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Sheepwash Bridge

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As its name suggests, the bridge spans a pool once used by local farmers to wash their sheep’s fleeces. Now it is a haven for ducks, water voles, dippers, grey wagtails and many other birds which come to drink among the boulders and aquatic plants like meadowsweet, watercress and watermint.  A bubbling and vibrant reminder of how precious water is to all forms of life.

In very dry years, the water is absent even at this point and young fish have to be rescued and moved further downstream.  Some of this is due to centuries-old mine workings, the drains from which have deprived the Lathkill River of much of its former flow.  Plans are now in place to block the biggest of these drains, to the great benefit of all this local wildlife.

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Head Cave

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You cannot fail to miss the large cave on your right.  In winter, or sometimes in a very wet summer, the River Lathkill emerges here, from its source at Head Cave. It can be a dramatic sight.  If it is in spate, explore very slowly along the river bank, and listen for the thrilling changes in pitch made by the tumbling water. The topscale tinkles are supported by some powerfully deep bass notes – clues there must be some large and resonant hollows hidden just beneath the stony riverbed.

Head Cave in winter

We are around one hundred metres below the level of Monyash’s meres and yet the likelihood is that this river bed is dry.  Any water that is flowing here may have fallen as rain a few days ago, as far away as the village of Flagg, some three miles away. Some of the subterranean channels transporting the water between Flagg and here are explored by cavers; don’t be surprised to meet a few squeezing their way out from the shadows at the back of the cave.

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Sycamore tree

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The large boulders just behind us are the spoil from a long disused quarry in Ricklow Dale above..  The quarry produced a highly prized form of limestone, known as black marble, full of interesting fossils.  Visit the Bull’s Head in Monyash to see a fine example serving as the pub’s threshold.

If dry, this moss-covered sycamore tree is a fun and easy climb for children, or the young at heart,  but its deep roots must be tapping water from somewhere below… Looking over the gap and stile in the dry-stone wall, the dale starts to open out once more, revealing lofty heights on either side, wheeling with jackdaws chattering overhead.  These and other birds such as peregrine falcons and ravens, find attractive nest holes and ledges in the eroding crags.

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