A Walk Along Derwent Edge, Peak District

It was milder than recent days but still chilly and the weather forecast was for a dry day. After a quick breakfast, Karen and I drove through Bamford and parked at Fairholmes car park between Derwent and Ladybower Reservoirs in the Upper Derwent Valley. We walked past loads of ducks which were waddling about, probably attracted by people feeding them bread and also some bird feeders below which were several ducks collecting bits of seed and nuts dropped by other birds.
After a short distance, we passed below the Derwent Reservoir Dam, which was used by the RAF "Dam Busters" Squadron during WWII for practising (see Operation Chastise" on Wikipedia), with a large amount of water cascading down the blocks of Gritstone, of which the dam was built from. After climbing up a short fleet of steps, we walked along the road which follows along next to Derwent Reservoir for a couple of miles before turning off to follow a footpath along the very picturesque Abbey Valley with Abbey Brook flowing down as one of the feeders to the Reservoir. This is a very pleasant and easy path which gradually rises along one side of the valley before reaching a flatter area which was a bit boggy. As we followed the gradually rising path, the views in to the distance opened out and we soon reached the feature known as Lost Lad. Lost Lad is said to commemorate a shepherd boy who lived in Derwent village, which was flooded in the 1940's to create Derwent Reservoir) with his widowed mother. One harsh winter's day, he set out to find his missing sheep but was caught in a blinding snowstorm. In the deepening snow and now quite lost, he scratched the words "lost lad" on a large rock before curling up beneath it for shelter. He never returned home. Three months later, in the spring, some shepherds noticed the pathetic message and found the boy's body. Here, we stopped for a minute or two by the cairn of stones and small circular column (which has a pantograph giving the names of surrounding hills and other features) so that I could fish out my hat and gloves from my rucksack as we were now in a strong and very cold wind.
Leaving Lost Lad, we soon we reached a set of old limestone slabs, which were recovered from various mills, and used to help control erosion of the peat moorland from all the traffic of passing walkers, and soon arrived at Back Tor which was only a short distance away and the half-way point of our walk. After spending several minutes seeking out a sheltered spot in the lee of the large gritstone Tor, we settled on a good spot and stopped to have a quick lunch. Afterwards we continued on our way along Derwent Edge with lovely views in all directions across this area of the Peak District. We passed more gritstone rock formations such as the Cakes of Bread, Dovestone Tor, Salt Cellar and the Wheel Stones of Coach and Horses.
we reached a crossroads of footpaths and turned right to follow the path leading back down above a coniferous wood past some fields and an old stone barn (with a date of "1647" above the door) to reach the road next to the reservoirs again which we followed back towards Derwent Dam and the car park.