Who doesn’t like a snowy scene?
The other day, I drove up to the New Drop Inn from the Hall’s Arms. Both these long-established locals are now closed, one becoming a business centre and the other residential units. The road was just clear of snow, but there was little room for passing other cars. The temperature hadn’t risen above freezing for a few days. I was hoping to walk around Cowley Brook Plantation to complete my year’s archive of photographs. My usual pull-ins looked dicey. I was afraid I would become stuck, so I turned tail and drove home, probably the most sensible option.
The freeze continues. Thankfully, no more snow falling around here, and the sun shines brightly. I can’t resist another attempt to walk the fell in these conditions. This time, I take caution to heart and park easily at the New Drop crossroads. The side road coming directly up from Longridge past the golf course looks treacherous, and I wish I had brought my microspikes as I walk a hundred yards or so down it. 
My footprints are the only ones coming through the waterboard gate by Cowley Brook. Lovely crunching sounds as I pass into the plantation: a couple of roe deer run across my path into the trees, too fast for a photo. 
Knowing my way up the hillside, I arrive at my four-way photo spot.
I have time to admire the frozen minutiae.
Continuing through the trees to reach my other fixed point. 
Mission accomplished, I will put together a montage of the year later or perhaps record another year of changes in the young plantation.
While I’m up here, why don’t I go farther up the fell? It is difficult walking in the snow in the plantation, so I decide to use the road to gain the fell proper. There is very little traffic. Pendle Hill has become a giant in its winter garb. 
Through the gate onto the fell, and I trudge up alongside the wall. Only a few have passed this way. I avert my eyes from the scene of the ‘Grim up North’ tree massacre. Time is a little tight, so I don’t go to the trig point but arc around at the Christmas Tree to take the balcony route back to the Jeffrey Hill carpark. The views across Bowland are spectacular, as are the distant ones into Yorkshire. 
As I reach the car park, I see a motorist in trouble on the icy roads below. A notorious blackspot where cars have, in the past, slid off the hill into the fields below. I’m not sure why anyone would have driven up here in the first place. A crowd gathers out of nowhere to give advice. Luckily, the driver, unprepared in his own words, manages to dig himself out, avoid the drop and continue down the slippery road. 
I march along the road back to my car, a great four miles in the perfect Winter scenery.
***
No new ways today but I enjoy revisiting others and seeing what has changed since last time, bear with me. I’m up and ready early (for me) as I have an appointment at the hospital late afternoon. ( Junior doctors working on a Sunday to get the NHS back up to speed. Hope they agree to the new governments pay offer). Driving along the Chaigley road a fleet of vintage tractors is coming towards me, I pull in to get a photo. It is then I realise I have left my camera and phone at home. Some days I’m not fit to be let out.
Renovations are going on at the old house so I take a picture of the new build in the back garden. 
It was good to get a bit of shade for a short time before walking up to the trig point, 350m. The views were a bit hazy but all the Yorkshire three peaks could be made out but perhaps not on camera. Looking down into Chipping Vale is always a revelation, spotting individual farms and lanes from on high. 
…and then I recognise the country lane I meet, Whins Lane, the original medieval road between Whalley and Padiham before the turnpike road was built lower down in what is now Read. Along here are the posh houses of Read boasting large gardens and views south across the valley.
…and march on along past the sawmill thinking to myself that it would nave been better to have taken to the fields and woods above the lane. After a quarter of a mile I realise I should have done and backtrack to find the rather hidden stile. 
I emerge at Priddy Bank and weave through the private properties. 
It’s all down hill from here but beware, don’t take the stile directly ahead but keep to the right side of the fence to avoid very boggy ground. A wooden stile brings you out of the field into rough ground for the descent to Sabden, which is seen in perspective to the road dropping down from the Nick of Pendle. Silver birch trees dominate this last slope. 
Another from a leaflet in the series of Walks with Taste in Ribble Valley, this time setting off from the centre of Clitheroe. I’m becoming lazy with route planning and relying on someone else’s choice, Ribble Valley BC this time. It promised “starting from Holmes Mill, wandering through the grounds of Clitheroe’s Norman Castle to the River Ribble for an easy riverside ramble” 
.
Too good to go back to bed. I’m motivated to get out there and do a walk. This one springs to mind. 
The path now continues back along the true left bank of the river. I’ve seen Kingfishers here, but not today. One is soon away from the razzmatazz of the picnic area only to find oneself on the busy little road to Clitheroe’s Waste Recycling centre. Past this there are only a few houses before the road ends and one is back into fields close to the river. I notice a reminder of the Covid restrictions and on the water Canada Geese are protecting their young whilst fishermen discus the best spot. 
As we leave the forest a stark metal silhouette of Chained Witches, (Peter Naylor) being marched from Pendle to Lancaster. I am impressed with the detail imparted by a few strips of metal, a reflection of the artist’s skill. 
We now follow the quiet lanes for a mile or so, at the high point Pendle comes into view again. There are lots of cyclists, presumably from east Lancashire clubs, using this switchback route. A majority of the properties seem to be holiday lets, is this the only future for English farming? See below. 
From this elevated position the Three Yorkshire Peaks are just visible but too hazy to photograph. It is a slightly better view down the Ribble Valley towards the Parlick and Fairsnape group of Bowland. And of course you can’t get away from Pendle in these parts.
Soon we are on the return leg, again on quiet lanes, through the hamlets of Howgill, Newby and Stopper Lane. Lots of interesting buildings are passed and we guess at their original purposes.
Here abouts is the village institute hall, a good half mile out of the village proper. But it does have an information board which tells us, all too late, about the Heritage Trail we have almost followed. 
