Hyndburn Ramblers finished the year off in style with a local walk led by Judith Addison. 21 walkers enjoyed the mild, dry weather to meet up and enjoy a pleasant afternoons walk and still be home before it became dark.

The walkers met at Plantation Street car park and set off up Manchester Road towards Baxenden. After a short while they left the road and took the footpath through Laund Clough. This is part of the Baxenden Trail and a lot of much appreciated work has been carried out to make this a very pleasant path through the woodlands.

A short walk led the walkers up to the edge of Baxenden Golf Club and the path skirted the course. Some of the golfers on the walk commented that they had never been on the the course on such a calm day and tales were told of golfing uphill in gale force winds! However the clear skies gave views all round, towards the Coppice, Green Haworth and down towards the Ribble Valley. After a lunch stop - to finish the last of the turkey sandwiches - the walk crossed Manchester Road to the newly improved route along the disused railway line, now part of the Hyndburn Greenway. A final stop for a coffee at the lodges at the top of the Greenway and then an easy descent back to Accrington.

All agreed it had been a good finish to the years programme and we're all looking forward to 2008.

This is a transcript of an article submitted to Accrington Observer by Sue Baxendale.

Christmas on the Hills
	Date : 23rd December 2007		Leader : David Hill
	Report by : Phil Bedson		Photos © : Phil Bedson

	The Christmas Walkers

David Hill was joined by no less than fourteen hardy individuals when he led the annual Christmas Mince Pie Walk. He duly handed out everybody’s mince pie before starting out and declared that it could be eaten ‘whenever and wherever one chose’ (The author of this piece ate his immediately btw!) After this it was down to the business in hand. It was a bright and crisp winter’s morning when they set off from Broadley just south of Whitworth and after a short stretch of the A671 a small lane was taken up to Nar End. From here various field paths and lanes, encountering strangely constructed stiles and even stranger wildlife, took us through to the village of Wardle where our sighting of Santa was hopefully not a sign that no presents were being delivered two days later. The original village bearing this name is now submerged under Watergrove reservoir located just north of the present village.

		left: Artilliary Shell stile
		right: Poor Santa!!

After leaving Wardle we made our way up past the 16th century Shore Hall with it’s fine mullioned windows. Following a clear track we then proceeded to our lunch spot of the day at the Wildlife Centre on the northern bank of Watergrove reservoir. The low winter sun was shining brightly as we ate and we were even visited by a robin redbreast.

		left: Shore Hall
		right: Watergrove Reservoir

From here we headed north and gradually made our way around the shores of the reservoir before veering due east to the lower slopes of Brown Wardle Hill. Perhaps on another day we might have climbed to the top but skirting around the base was quite adequate at this particular time, especially as we were very close to our afternoon refreshment stop, in layman’s terms - the pub. After following the track around Lobden Golf Club, reputed to have the highest tee in England we were soon bearing down on our goal. A quick look at the gargoyles on the church tower and the stocks in the churchyard and we were at the pub. Incidentally, the last person to occupy those stocks was in there for drunkenness, maybe it was in the same pub we were about to frequent and hopefully not the night before!

		left: Brown Wardle Hill
		right: Trevor and David in the stocks!

After imbibing a pint of brew called Snowflake, in front of a roaring fire, it was quite tempting to stay and have more but the leader of the group gathered us all together for the final push. Off we went down the narrow road dodging cars from the front and behind and, after crossing the main road, we then joined the disused railway. We followed this for the final mile to Healey Dell and over the viaduct. From here it was but a short uphill track back to our starting point and the cars. Thanks were made to David our leader and many Merry Christmas’s were also said to all.

	The weird wildlife