Around The Staffordshire Moorlands

Hi – thanks for dropping in.
A few bits and pieces from the archives for you…

It’s easy to miss the best of Cheddleton: the old hub of the village has been hidden away at the top of Hollow Lane since the days of the turnpikes when the main road was built as a bypass.
Near the ancient parish church, old gritstone and brick cottages stand high above the River Churnet and the Caldon Canal, with sweeping views across the valley to the moorland beyond.

Wetley Moor

Here, beneath a shroud of fog,
Lies all that’s left of Wetley Moor.
This frozen footpath, I last trod
Some forty years before.

But this was just The Common then,
An unrestricted open space –
Today, as cul-de-sacs encroach,
It feels a less exclusive place.

Where once, they hauled away the stone
And clawed for coal below the ground,
Now, my crackling footsteps make
The icy silence quite profound.

The trig point stands forlorn above
A filled-in quarry where we’d play
For hours by a rubbish dump –
There’s nothing much to see today.

Though after half-an-hour or so
I find myself beside the pond…
And there’s the stile that used to take us
Home by Bluebell Woods beyond.

At last, the morning sun breaks through
As voices float across the moor.
And, for a moment, I’m that boy
Of forty years before.

Abandoned

A cottage,
Old green door left open wide.
A stillness…
Something makes me step inside.
A picture,
Faded sepia groom and bride.

A dresser,
Letters in a loving hand.
A trophy,
Some forgotten marching band.
A postcard,
Soldiers in a foreign land.

A wireless,
Lifeless, on a wicker chair.
A bookcase
With The Book of Common Prayer.
A hairbrush
In a veil of silver hair.

A curtain
Billows gently in the breeze,
A window
Frames a view of summer trees,
A garden,
Just for butterflies and bees…
Abandoned.

Wetley Rocks

Basford Bridge

At Oakmeadow Ford lock the canal joins the waters of the river to form one waterway for the next mile to the hamlet of Consall Forge where they part company again - a remote and delightful stretch of the Churnet Valley.

Consall Forge

Oakmeadow Ford

Where the towpath meets the river, there’s a special place indeed –
Miles away from city life and all its endless greed.
Where the day is never troubled by the rush hour and the clock
And the only sign of traffic is a boat within the lock.

And when the sun decides to shine and no-one else is near
And Mother Nature’s whisper is the only thing you hear,
When half-an-hour of peace and quiet could be all you need,
The towpath meets the river at a special place, indeed.

The top of St Edward Street, Leek, looks quite different today than it did in 1985. By then, the George Hotel had already been demolished and the old forge, cottages and shop were removed a few years later.
Across the street – and still very much in business – the Wilkes’ Head Inn is thought to be the oldest pub in Leek, taking its name from the 18th Century radical MP and journalist
John Wilkes.

Ipstones

Leek

In October

The sharpest wind since Easter Sunday gathers up and lifts
Leaves of beech and sycamore, and sweeps them into drifts.
Another opportunity to revel in the gifts
of October.

Blazing reds and yellows by the wayside seem to try
To wrestle my attention from the splendour of the sky.
For me, no other month can captivate the eye
like October.

And though a sudden peal of bells does not appear to please
Complaining rooks above me in the uncomplaining trees,
Thank goodness – just to be alive, for reasons such as these,
in October.

Upper Hulme

Winkhill

Whenever I arrive in Cheadle, my eyes are drawn upwards to the magnificent spire of St Giles’ Roman Catholic Church. The building is a constant reminder of the genius of Augustus Pugin, the renowned Victorian architect and designer, whose bicentenary is being celebrated in the town this year.
This part of Staffordshire is well blessed with examples of Pugin’s work, thanks to the patronage of John Talbot, the Earl of Shrewsbury, of Alton Towers.

Cheadle