More from our recent weekend away in the Peak District. Cast your minds back and you may remember that storm Abigail was due to hit us (oh, that weekend) and so I kept a close eye on the forecast. It appeared, that day, as though the morning would start dry and the heavy rain would start mid morning. My plan was to head out walking as early as we could and turn back when the rain started and therefore we would have reached the furthest point dry and only got wet on the return leg. Considering we left the cottage at 9:15am (which is impressive on holiday) and the forecast strongly suggested heavy rain from 10am I assumed we'd be back for an early lunch.

We walked from Cressbrook mill towards Litton Mill. As it turned out it stayed dry as a bone until 11:57am by which time we had joined the Monsal Trail and almost reached the Chee Dale end when the first drops were felt. I popped up my hood and marched for home. We'd walked much further than anticipated so even a military pace on the way back meant it took quite a while.

The walk itself is flat as it's through a dale; much of the path was quite muddy by the river and it sounds like it often becomes unwalkable after heavy rain, we saw a path to Cressbrook to avoid this stretch when the path is flooded.

Thankfully, the rain never reached the 'torrential downpour' stage until we were safely indoors when I no longer cared what it wanted to do. We ate a lunch (my stomach had been growling for well over an hour), changed out of wet clothes and lit a fire.

I'll share my pictures of the Monsal Trail separately as I have more to say on that.

Sophie