I walk down into Buxton - all solid grey/brown buildings.
I'm quickly through the town and walking past a golf course on the edge.
I end up walking along a road with a recycling centre and a quarry, lorries thundering past. Wild flowers surviving on the verges despite coated in a grey film. I can feel dust on my teeth and in my nostrils.
I quickly cut off the road, across a field where the long grass has been cut ready for baling. Walking across the field is like being on a thick mattress of grass, as difficult as trudging across sand.
Through the stone and peddle dash of the village of Upper End passing the giant Dove Holes Quarry - a bite out of the landscape.
Some more country roads and then through the nature reserve at Hay Dale.
And then to Tideswell where Lil meets me ready for some walking the next day.
Lil treats me to a steak dinner at The Star Inn. We play the pub quiz and get chatting to the locals. The pub has a whip round for my charity fund - £42! - both me and Lil fall a bit in love with the village.
We meet a master potter, Christopher Jenson. We talk about the individual trophies he makes for the local show, Dr Beeching's vandalism of Britain's railways and how the rivers now run bluer now so much china clay has been mined away. On the walk back we have a peak into his studio.
