Bridges to Ridge and return

This was quite a challenging walk, but an extremely enjoyable one. It included a climb to and a walk along the Stiperstones ridge, then a return to Bridges along a minor road. We essentially followed three sides of a triangle, to the north-west then to the south-west, then to the east.  We started from the car park in Bridges, at SO393965, which was just a short drive from our cottage.  We weren't entirely sure whether this car park was meant to be open for all, or whether it was meant for patrons of the pub (and from a conversation with friends, we are clearly not the only ones to have had this concern); it's a large car park, so we reckoned we wouldn't be anyone's way, so we took the risk.

There were a few spots of rain as we left Bridges but it didn't come to anything. We crossed the slightly more major road we'd driven along, then turned right on the minor road which is signposted towards Gatten, Minsterley Ranges, The Bog Visitor Centre and the Stiperstones, The road climbed steadily and after about half a mile we took a right-hand fork and continued to climb.  There were increasingly good views to the rocky outcrops on the ridge.  After another mile or so, the road curved to the right, but we continued straight ahead, past The Hollies Farm.

The final approach to the Stiperstones was on a track over moorland, which would have been a blaze of colour if the heather was in flower. Then we turned left onto a rather stony track heading towards the first outcrop, or tor, to use what appears to be the correct name for the quartzite formations, all that remains after freezing and thawing in the last Ice Age reduced the surrounding rock to scree. The first formation we encountered was the "Devil's Chair", and we began to get lovely views down to the valley to the west. We could also hear strimming, which I guess is important in keeping the vegetation in order. I was somewhat surprised (and pleased) to see that one of the strimmer operators was a woman. My surprise was a salutory reminder of the fact that we all suffer from unconscious bias; when I heard the sound I had just assumed, without thinking about it, that this job would be  being done by a man, but there is no reason whatsoever why this should be the case.

The stony track continued and took us to Manstone Rock, the highest of the tors. A couple were scrambling over it; they didn't look entirely safe, so we walked past quickly.  This section of path was the busiest of any that we walked in this holiday, presumably because there are two car parks less than a mile away (to the south-west and south-east) and the Stiperstones tors are quite well known. Some of the walkers seemed well equipped, others were walking in ordinary shoes, which I wouldn't want to do on this rough surface - it was slow going even in walking boots. Somewhere between Manstone Rock and Cranberry Rock the route of the Shropshire Way became a little unclear, but we knew we wanted to pass to the west of Cranberry Rock i.e. below the outcrop, and we were soon back on a narrower but clear route bearing the helpful Shropshire Way signs. There were no further route-finding difficulties as we descended to the minor road, near Upper Knolls Farm.

On the other side of the road, we climbed steadily across a grassy field, passing some other walkers. The views were once again of typical rolling Shropshire hills, complete with sheep, rather than the bleaker landscape we'd left behind amongst the Stiperstone tors. After lunch, the path led us through attractive woodland, but then we emerged back onto open access moorland, by Nipstone Rock. I hadn't realised it until I came to write up this walk, but this (and "The Rock", about half a mile further on) is included on the list of Stiperstones tors, and we were indeed on a continuation of the Stiperstones ridge.

We passed Nipstone Rock then essentially walked around The Rock, descending quite steeply through a scrubby, slightly overgrown landscape  and then through woodland. We crossed a minor road and continued to descend, with the landscape now having an Alpine feel to it. After crossing a footbridge in a little wooded valley, we climbed steeply to another little road ; I'd missed that bit on the map, I thought we'd done with climbing for today! We were rewarded by a lovely view back the way we'd come. We turned right along the road, still on the route of the Shropshire Way, and followed this to what is marked as "Ridge" on the map. Ridge (which I suppose would be described as a hamlet, though it was little more than a single farm) is most definitely not on a ridge; the Shropshire Way climbs from here up onto Linley Hill. Although we'd have had time to continue,  we decided to leave the climb for another day, because it seemed silly to climb up a hill only to immediately descend again (and we didn't have the time or energy to walk the whole length of Linley Hill and then to return). 

All that was left for us to do today was to follow the minor road, back the way we had come for a short distance, still with those lovely views, then past Great Wood House, Cold Hill Farm, Kinnerton Green and Kinnerton Farm, through most attractive countryside. We stopped for a chat with a woman with a dog who was going the other way; apparently they walk a  circuit of a few miles every day, sometimes up to the Stiperstones and sometimes up to Linley Hill. What a wonderful place to live!