Stage 12 Norden to Bury
Distance 13 miles
Ascent: 450m
Warm, drizzle most of the day with sunshine at the end of the day
Alpacas, dipper, flies, cats, bunny, steam trains tooting
We took the tram to Rochdale and the bus to Norden village, buying lunch supplies at the Co-Op before heading back up the path to Greenbooth reservoir. Today's route goes up along the other side passing some smart new houses, along a footpath with lots of steps up and down over the rocky shoreline, then through wet grassy cow fields, wet grassy sheep fields and wet grassy moorland. The mizzle thickened as we got higher, the wind turbines clanking above us half obscured by cloud. At Ashworth Moor we crossed the main road by the burger van and dropped down through a gap in the wall back on to the moorland towards Lumb Bridge, with its remnants of old industry.
A grassy path follows the stream and over little lumpy hills into Deeply Vale, and into wood where the path was very muddy and we met some flies. The flies decided to come with us through Deep Moss and up the steep narrow footpath up to Birtle which would have been quite pleasant and we might have stopped for lunch if not for the buzzing around our ears. It was quite a relief when we emerged from a farmyard on to a quiet lane and the flies decided to turn back.
We followed the lane to a place marked on the map as White Ash, which shows a chimney, some ponds and a pub, so we thought there might be somewhere nice to stop for lunch but the place has been converted into an exclusive luxury retirement complex and all the picnic tables are behind locked gates. We found a bench a little further on near the old schoolhouse and ate our sandwiches there. The quiet lane crosses over the M66, there were a lot of cats here, through some woods and a golf course and more woodland to meet the River Irwell at Burrs caravan park. We had a sit down and changed our (stinky) socks and shake the rubble out of our shoes before walking into Bury town centre and the metro station.