Rides into the High Peak

Now that I live so close to the Monsal Trail, hardly a week goes by without me riding up it from Bakewell, either to the other end or to some intermediate point like the Headstone Viaduct. Recently I have used the MT to visit Buxton and then travelled further on. On Monday I went to Millers Dale, rode north on relatively quiet but hilly roads to Doveholes and then took a pretty single-track road, with great views of the hills, to Chapel-en-le-Frith station. From Charley Lane to Bugsworth Basin I was on the trackbed of the Peak Forest Tramway (1), over which horses once hauled trucks laden with stone from local quarries to the Peak Forest Canal. This was only my second visit to Bugsworth (the first was on the previous day, Sunday!) and it's a fascinating place to visit, with lots of interesting industrial archeology, as well as it being at one end of a working canal.
I then went by the towpath to Whaley Bridge, another basin where freight from trains on the Cromford and High Peak Railway were loaded onto barges (and vice versa.) This railway is of course, at its southern end, now the High Peak Trail from Cromford to Hurdlow. If all goes to plan, an extension northwards of this ex-railway line from Hurdlow will become an essential part of the Peak Cycle Links 60-mile circular trail (see previous posts on the subject.)
From Whaley Bridge (2 - railway bridge over the Goyt) a path ascends what was one of nine inclines (3) and a bit of local knowledge from a passer-by informed me how to find a continuation of the line up a second incline at Shallcross (4). When the railway was open, trains were hauled up these inclines by stationary steam engines. This one has recently been resurfaced and opened as a greenway by DCC - and they've made a good job of it! After this, signs of the line have been obliterated, until you ride on it again beside the beautiful Fernilee Reservoir (5) (the reservoir wasn't there when the railway was built.) At the end of this stretch I had to climb to the level of top of the dam up a steep path and then on a road (which has been built over the trackbed) up a very long and even steeper hill. Taken together, these were two parts of the the Bunsall Incline. At the top the road levelled out and a path to the right was the continuation of the line across Wild Moor (6), which deserves its name! There are stunning views to be had up here of the desolate, wind-swept hills.  After a mile or so of level, twisting trail, it terminated abruptly at a bricked-up tunnel (7). I pushed my bike up a steep, boggy slope and over the hill. I couldn't see the other portal because it is on private property (appropriately enough,Tunnel Farm) but there was one last straight bit of track (8) before Buxton and this brought me to near the Macclesfield Rd (A54). I could see the continuation of the line on a grassy embankment (9), which was unfortunately impossible to access. A diversion through residential roads brought me to the junction of the Leek Rd (A53) and Grin Low Rd, at a hamlet called Ladmanlow, and here the line continues onto the property of the Health and Safety labs (10). It is the stretch from here to Hurdlow which will one day be part of PCL's White Peak Trail (I've yet to try this bit!) I returned home by road via Harpur Hill, Brierlow Bar, Chelmorton, Taddington and the A6. Total distance: 95 km.
Here are links to two bits of my ride on the Sustrans online mapping: 
http://www.sustrans.org.uk/map#userroute/9B01D19BF21AF452DC3FEB2BB6D06608,408100.78465452505,377718.54304264253,2
http://www.sustrans.org.uk/map#userroute/75BB498B79E0CC2C6116BBEB7221163A,402626.630352732,377034.345329332,2