When I was a kid at school, we had a school trip to Dovedale, I was about 8 or 9 years old when we visited and it had a big impact on me, it was a place I loved when we were there and always wanted to go back.
Well, today I did just that, it's only taken me 40 years...
Walking down from the carpark you are presented with two routes, one over the bridge further down stream, or over these famous stepping stones, we opted for the stepping stones.
Dovedale is a very interesting place, a lovely stroll along the river cutting through a deep gorge within the light peak part of the peak district, with pinnacles of rocks and caves to explore.
The pinnacles are really high, the pictures really don't do them justice, it's a lovely walk, abundant in wildlife of all types.
(Can you see the rock climber at the top?)
As we were walking down, I notice a lot of different activities happening, some people were fly fishing, and then some were rock climbing up the pinnacles on the other side of the river.
I really wanted to get to some caves called "Doveholes", they were much further down the river than we thought they would be, but we finally got there.
The above shot is 11 shot panoramic of Doveholes, you can't really see the size of these caves on this photo, but keep reading.
Here's a shot from my phone from inside one of the caves. It was massive.
We continued out walk and ended up at a place called Milldale, a picture postcard village, with not much there but a little shop and lovely little houses.
We bought a cheese and pickle sandwich and a bakewell tart, both were lovely, however we had company as we started to eat them.
Altogether there was around 6 ducks, I saved them the crust off my bread and they must have been used to seeing people as they let me hand feed them, which was a first from me as I've never hand fed a duck before in my life.
As we were walking back to Dovedale the sun decided to come out, this added a whole new dimension to the area, the crystal clear waters reflecting rays of light and shadows casting over the landscape from the trees and cliffs in the area, it was lovely, but by this time I'd had enough of carrying my camera around my neck as it started to get rather heavy.
The last place on my list was Raynard's Cave, it's up quite a steep path with loose gravel on it which makes it quite difficult if you don't have the correct footware on.
As you get up there you are presented with a massive natural archway and just through the arch is the cave, I didn't go to the cave as I was knackered scrambling up there, but I was more interested in the archway rather than the cave itself, it was a fantastic sight, but I said to my GF that I'm not sure when I will return so I wanted to see the archway today as it might be another 40 years before I go back lol.
As we clambered up lovers leap and down the other side, following the river, we had our end goal in sight, Thorpe Cloud, knowing that just through that gate we are near the stepping stones and then another 5 to 10 minutes and we'd be back at the car.
Overall we walked around 7 miles, which for an out of shape bloke with plenty of girth around the waist I was pleasantly surprised we'd walked that far.
Thoroughly enjoyable, especially the cave exploring.
All shots done on my Sony A7iii with Canon 24-105mm F4.0 L lens & Samyang 14mm F2.8 wide angle, sunny shots done using my Samsung S21 phone.
I hope you've enjoyed this post and thanks for reading.
All the best...
What an amazing place. It looks like you enjoyed your return after 40 years. The caves and arches and rivers... all of it is spectacular. Thank you for sharing it with us. If I ever visit the area, I'll put this on the list for sure!
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