Cromford and the Black Rocks

Walking through the Industrial Revolution in a once quiet valley where history was made.

Distance 5 miles (8km)

Minimum time 3hrs

Ascent/gradient 720ft (220m)

Level of difficulty Easy

Paths Well-graded - canal towpaths, lanes, forest paths and a railway trackbed, quite a few stiles

Landscape Town streets and wooded hillsides

Suggested map aqua3 OS Outdoor Leisure 24 White Peak

Start/finish SK 300571

Dog friendliness Dogs on leads over farmland, can run free on long stretches of enclosed railway trackbed

Parking Cromford Wharf pay car park

Public toilets At car park

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Directions
Background
Information

1 Turn left out of the car park onto Mill Road. Cross the A6 to the Market Place. Turn right down the Scarthin, passing the Boat Inn and the old millpond before doubling back left along Water Lane to Cromford Hill.

2 Turn right, past the shops and Bell Inn, then turn left up Bedehouse Lane, which turns into a narrow tarmac ginnel after rounding some almshouses (otherwise known as bedehouses).

3 At the top of the lane by a street of 70s housing, a signpost for Black Rocks points uphill. The path continues its climb southwards to meet a lane. Turn left along the winding lane, which soon divides. Take the right fork, a limestone track leading to a stone-built house with woods behind. On reaching the house, turn right through a gate, and follow the top field edge.

4 After climbing some steps, climb left through the woods of Dimons Dale up to the Black Rocks car park and picnic site. The track you've reached is the former trackbed of the Cromford and High Peak Railway. Immediately opposite is the there-and-back waymarked detour to the rocks.

5 Returning to the car park, turn right along the High Peak Trail, which traverses the hillside high above Cromford.

6 After about ¾ mile (1.2km) watch out for a path on the right leaving the Trail for Intake Lane. On reaching the lane, turn right and follow it to a sharp left-hand bend. Here, go straight on, following a path heading south east along the top edge of some woodland. (Note: Neither the path nor the wood is shown on the current OS Outdoor Leisure map of the White Peak.)

7 On nearing Birchwood Farm, watch out for two paths coming up from the left. Take the one descending more directly downhill (north west, then north). At the bottom of the woods the path swings left across fields, coming out to the A6 road by Oak Farm.

8 Cross the road and follow the little ginnel opposite, over the Matlock railway and the Cromford Canal. Go past the High Peak Junction information centre, then turn left along the canal towpath. Follow this back to the car park at Cromford Wharf.

For many centuries Cromford, 'the ford by the bend in the river', was no more than a sleepy backwater. Lead mining brought the village brief prosperity, but by the 18th century even that was in decline. Everything changed in 1771 when Sir Richard Arkwright decided to build the world's first watered-powered cotton-spinning mill here. Within 20 years he had built two more, and had constructed a whole new town around them. Cromford was awake to the Industrial Revolution and would be connected to the rest of Britain by a network of roads, railways and canals.

As you walk through the cobbled courtyard of the Arkwright Mill, now being restored by the Arkwright Society, you are transported back into that austere world of the 18th century, back to the times when mother, father and children all worked at the mills.

Most of the town lies on the other side of the busy A6, including the mill pond which was built by Arkwright to impound the waters of Bonsall Brook, and the beautifully restored mill workers' cottages of North Street.

The Black Rocks overlook the town from the south. The walk makes a beeline for them through little ginnels, past some almshouses and through pine woods. You'll see climbers grappling with the 80ft (24m) gritstone crags, but there's a good path all the way to the top. Here you can look across the Derwent Valley to the gaunt skeleton of Riber Castle, to the beacon on top of Crich Stand and down the Derwent Gorge to Matlock.

The next stage of the journey takes you onto the High Peak Trail, which uses the former trackbed of the Cromford and High Peak Railway. Engineered by Josias Jessop, and built in the 1830s the railway was built as an extension of the canal system and, as such, the stations were called wharfs. In the early years horses pulled the wagons on the level stretches, while steam-winding engines worked the inclines. By the mid-1800s steam engines worked the whole line, which connected with the newly-extended Midland Railway. The railway was closed by Dr Beeching in 1967.

After abandoning the High Peak Trail pleasant forest paths lead you down into the valley at High Peak Junction, where the old railway met the Cromford Canal. The 33-mile (53.5-km) canal was built in 1793, a year after Arkwright's death, to link up with the Erewash, thus completing a navigable waterway to the River Trent. Today, there's an information centre here, a fascinating place to muse before that final sojourn along the towpath to Cromford.

While you're there

If you have time, visit Wirksworth, a former lead mining town on the hillsides above Cromford. Until a restoration project of the 1980s Wirksworth had become a dusty, derelict place that nobody wanted to visit. Take a look at the National Stone Centre on Portway Lane. Here you can have a go at gem panning and join guided walks. The Wirksworth Heritage Centre, which is housed in a former silk and velvet mill at Crown Yard, gives a fascinating insight into the town's history.

What to look for

Besides the Arkwright Mill, which is a 'must see' venue, take some time to visit the exhibits in old railway workshops at High Peak Junction and the Leawood Pumping Station, which pumped water from the River Derwent to the Cromford Canal. The restored Leawood works has a working Cornish-type beam engine.

Where to eat and drink

Arkwright's Mill has a small café for coffee, cake and light snacks. For bar meals try the Greyhound Inn at Cromford. The excellent Boat Inn free house on the Scarthin at Cromford serves bar meals at lunchtime only.