White Nancy and the Saddle of Kerridge.

A short walk to start my ten days off work...Oh how I love being a lazy workfree bugger. Todays walk started from the lovely,little,laidback town of Bollington in Cheshire. Tucked away in the folds of the hills just outside the western edge of the Peak district national park. Being outside the park doesn't seem to bother Bollington the beautiful countryside around these parts are as nice as anywhere..We parked up near the Crown public house and set off...Rubbing my hands I said "That little beauty will be open by the time we get back". We could see White Nancy peeping at us over the brow of the hill, but we turned left, we would visit her on our return...The sun was smiling down on us as we climbed away from the village.

We skirted along the Eastern edge of the ridge as far as the village of Rainow, Nothing much to report along here, apart from lovely views and the swooping Swallows...They will be off soon on their long trip south to Africa...Spoke to a chap who was walking to Congleton and back via the Gritstone trail and Macclesfield forest. Good luck with that I said as I wiped a bead of sweat from my brow...boy it's hot today...We climbed up to the southern part of the ridge and were instantly treated to views in every direction.

To the west we had The cloud, Macclesfield [pictured] and the Cheshire plain with the Peckforton hills and Welsh mountains away in the far distance.

And to the east we had the beautiful prospect across the River Dean valley to gentle rolling hills backed by the hills of the Peak district...A very pleasing scene..i enjoyed it up there along the crest of the  Kerridge ridge, the ridge gets its name from Key ridge from the old English Caeg hrycg..Standing at around the 900 ft mark every step is a pleasure....We also noticed footpath signs for a new walk that has recently been devised by the friends of the Peak district called The Boundary walk..a 190 mile route keeping to the perimeter of the Peak district...oh to be fit again, I suppose I could do it in short sections [very short sections]...Us old walkers never give up. we hobble on always....Back to the ridge I noticed it was alive with Knapweed and Harebells, so I spent several horizontal minutes trying to photograph them.

I spoke earlier of White Nancy peering down on us, well we eventually caught up with her at the northern extremity of the ridge...It was like entering a party uninvited as there were several folk up there having a whale of a time..lots of frolicking and picnicking...it was hamper to the left, blanket to the right...good to see people enjoying the countryside, especially children as these are the walkers of the future, they will be looking after all things rural long after we have pegged it...so if anyones reading this that has children, you must get them out there at every opportunity...it really is important. If we all turn into couch potatoes then that's it for the English countryside.

So what exactly is White Nancy..in short a folly, built in 1817 by a local man called John Gaskill, some say it was built to commemorate the Battle of Waterloo..In those days it was a hollow structure where folk could sit down to admire the view but it has long been filled in and rendered, standing at around 18ft high it is regularly given a fresh coat of  whitewash by the good people of Bollington...More often than not it is emblazoned with an eyecatching design such as poppies or the Olympic rings at the moment there is an outstanding Manchester Bee on it...with the words Hope,strength and peace to commemorate the terrible terrorist attack in Manchester..Back down in Bollington I was pleased to see that the doors of The Crown were flung open, for all us thirsty walkers. We ordered a sandwich to have with our pints...we witnessed some proper Northern hospitally as they also brought out chips for us saying they had fried them by mistake and that we could have them free of charge..lovely people, most places would have just thrown them out....