An 8 mile walk from Rowarth near Hayfield. It was a very murky morning, but the low cloud was breaking up as we set off up the hill northwest of Rowarth.
Across the fields we took a slight detour to visit Robin Hood's Picking Rods. They're very old, that much is obvious and may date back to Anglo-Saxon times. There's some conjecture that the stones may originally have been one single column that was broken and later placed roughly into an undressed piece of stone. One 'theory' is that the stones were used by Robin Hood and his men to stretch their bows. Another theory is that they may have been preaching stones or grave markers in Anglican times. The most likely, and certainly what I'm inclined to think, is that they mark the meeting of a number of boundaries within the forest that used to cover that area - probably a 'hunting' forest that than woodland.
Paul at Robin Hood's Picking Rods
We continued until we reached the southern end of Cown Edge. There were several pairs of ravens flying about.
At the far end of Cown Edge, we dropped down to the road and followed it for maybe a mile before stopping briefly for another snack and then back into the fields. After a mixture of following lanes and paths through fields, we found ourselves on a track running to the east of Lantern Pike. The book said that it was worth a visit right to the top of the hill, so off we went - the book was right, to the east were fabulous views right across to Kinder Downfall.
The view to the south across Hayfield
Having dropped back down to the track we followed this down to the road and circled the end of the ridge to follow a track back along the other side of the ridge, heading back towards Rowarth.
Back in the village proper, we came upon the village pub, the Little Mill Inn, which we hadn't seen when we parked and walked off north. There was a leat from the small river taking water to a large diameter overshot waterwheel.
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