Meeting Robin Hood

Over the next three days we explored Nottingham and Sherwood Forest.

To start things off, my human went on a walking tour trough the city with Robin Hood. Or so he says. His other Alias is Ezekiel Bone and when he let's his guard down, he simply is Ade. From Scotland. So much for an English folk hero...

                                                            Carmelo was a bit star-struck

Underneath a pub for rockers and bikers

Underneath the city lies a network of more than 500 man-made caves, carved into the soft sandstone over centuries, starting as early as the 12th Century. These caves were used for all sorts of things, from secret hiding places, breweries, tanneries, living quarters and stables to bomb shelters during the world wars.

To this day, a lot of pubs still use the caves underneath them to store their beer. Some will let you have a look down there, if you ask nicely.

A tannery from the 16th Century

Kitchen and living room, comfy, isn't it?

Of course it was also the last match day of the Premier League on Saturday. Oh, it was so close for Liverpool. A real shame, the Quadruple can't be done anymore now, but the Triple is still achievable. And we will be in Liverpool to watch it there with the locals, they will go apeshit if they win!

Nottingham is quite a nice little city, really. It has one of the largest open squares in the UK, a state of the art contemporary museum (no, we did not visit) and an Arboretum, which is just a fancy word for - park.

An arts and crafts market in a church! 

THIS is how you get people into church!

One of the largest open squares in the UK

It's art, it's called the "Sky light"

"Ye olde trip to Jerusalem"; one of the many pubs to claim to be the oldest in England

As all over this area, there are lots of canals one can wander or cycle along, a really nice way of getting around. It's all part of the National Cycle Network, which spans over 20.000km.

Sherwood Forest nowadays is only a fraction of what it used to be when it was still royal hunting ground. Back then it spanned a mindboggling 100.000 acres. Today it's a bare 1000.

There are a few hiking and biking trails and all in all it's all very orderly and manicured. Hard to imagine Robin Hood and his men (and women, no doubt) hiding in these woods while watching a kindergarten group of 25 skipping down the path.

The Major Oak, some thousand+ years old

The church in the adjacent town of Edwinstove is where, according to legend, Robin and Maid Marian were married. 

Halfway between Sherwood Forest and our next destination, the Peak District, we stopped at a little farm to spend the night, surrounded by sheep. Many, many sheep! I know there are more sheep in New Zealand than people, but I didn't know there were quite so many in England.

The Peak District, not named for it's peaks, because there are none, was the first National Park of England, established in 1951. Today it measures 1.440 square kilometers and sees some 13 million visitors every year. A good thing the high season hasn't started yet. We wouldn't want to be in the midst of that.

But considering the weather forecast for the coming days, there wouldn't be much traffic anyway. 

Bakewell is one of the larger towns in the area and we found an ideal parking spot down a dead end street under an old railway bridge. By pure chance this is also where a 13.5km trail, called the Monsal trail starts. It runs along the train line that has once been here but was discontinued in 1968. There are six tunnels on the way, which are a bit eerie to walk through.

One of the old train stations along the way

Who has read " The Stand" by Stephen King?

Because she didn't want to wait for the bus at the other end, and because the weather was a lot better than expected, she decided to just walk back instead. This trail is better done by bike, though. It's a flat, straight, wide path, rather boring on foot, really, because you are so slow.

The following day started out grey but dry. Only until she was about half an hour out on another trail, though. Let's just say she had a rather wet and cold three hours and came back dripping, dirty and only slightly amused.

An old mining site

But help was near. In the form of a campground with hot showers, a lemon tart and coffee and a cozy afternoon with a book.

The next morning walk to Mam Tor, the highest point in the area (just over 500m) with exceptional views, was cancelled. With a visibility of about a hundred meters and constant rain neither the mood nor the view would have been any good. 

So we didn't move till the early afternoon when we headed to a spot about halfway between Manchester and Liverpool. From here my human could easily reach both cities by train, so I wouldn't have to go right into the city traffic.

A lot of pubs here offer you to stay in their car park for a night or two, if you eat and drink there. Seems like a fair deal to me.
So we took up this offer and positioned ourselves strategically at the Crooke Hall Inn.

After some time spent in nature, the next couple of days will be extreme city-ing!