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Winter Hill Sunset |
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25th February 2024 |
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| I found myself with a spare afternoon so I checked the forecast for Winter Hill and hey-presto sunshine had been forecast. I had already taken Holly and Brad on a three mile walk just after lunch so they stayed at home and watched me leave the home without them, god forbid how dare dad leave home without us. |
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Overview |
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| Ascent: |
576 Feet - 176 Metres |
| Summits: |
Winter Hill |
| Weather: |
Spells of Sunshine, Windy Where Exposed Highs of 8°C Lows of 5°C Feels Like -2°C |
| Parking: |
Roadside Parking, Wilderswood |
| Area: |
West Pennine Moors |
| Miles: |
3.9 |
| Walking With: |
On My Own |
| Ordnance Survey: |
Explorer 287 |
| Time Taken: |
1 Hour 30 Minutes |
| Route: |
Wilderswood - Wilder's Moor - Rotary Way - Winter Hill - Rotary Way - Crooked Edge Hill - Pike Cottage - Belmont Road (track) - Wilderswood |
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Map and Photo Gallery |
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| Views towards Two Lads and the Winter Hill Transmitter from Wilder's Moor 16:00pm 8°C |
| A couple of months ago it was going dark by three thirty but ever so slowly we're gaining more light day by day which means I'm having to leave home that bit later if I want to end my walk around sunset. Despite the sunshine it's a fairly chilly afternoon with exposed skin soon feeling the raw brought on by a fresh westerly wind. |
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| Whats happening here then? |
| This is an area of the moor known as Hole Bottom where until 1845 Winter Hill Brick and Tile works once stood alongside a row of cottages known as five houses. Being new to this amazing fact I'm yet to explore the area but I've read if you look close enough you can still see the ruined kiln alongside an old tramway where the path leads off across the moorland in the centre of the photo. It appears a new path is going to be laid across the moor using reclaimed stone slabs. |
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| Looking back on Two Lads. |
| From Rotary Way. |
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| If you had a time machine... |
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| Views towards Winter Hill summit. |
| With around forty five minutes until sunset I made my way towards the Winter Hill's summit shortly after passing below the main transmitter which was making a racket like an old rusty drum was spinning inside, it's not the first time I've heard it today being my third visit this year I'm guessing the noise is a right pain in the backside for the engineers who work here day in day out, views more than make up for it mind. |
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| Winter Hill summit. |
| Although it hasn't rained for a few days the summit area was as boggy as I'd left it a few weeks earlier. I come here so often I have my own 'way' of making it to the trig point without getting my boots wet. |
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| About thirty minutes until sunset. |
| So I best get a shift on. |
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| Sunset cloud drama over Rivington Pike. |
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| Where'd it go? |
| Clinching fist whilst trying to keep my hands warm I made my way back down Rotary Way passing a large family and their German Sheppard who sniffed my hand before using his nose to flip my hand onto its head, clever dog I thought. The family passed with the youngest of the kids complaining she was 'ill' because it was that cold, the kid had a point as the windchill brought the feels like temperature down to -2°C |
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| Horwich at Dusk. |
| Taken from Georges Lane. |
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| Dusk and the end to another weekend. |
| Blowing warm air into cupped fist I chose not to summit Two Lads instead I flanked it and crossed over Crooked Edge Hill while peering over to Rivington Pike where the small crowds were dwindling into single figures. The sunset left an afterglow in the form of a phoenix as the final embers of daylight grew weaker soon overcome by dusk. |
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