The U3A movement began in the UK in 1982, so September 2022 saw us celebrating our 40th birthday.
The Relay was ceremonially started by John Merrill, a major celebrity in the walking community and a man who loves walking in Derbyshire. He’s an author of more than 500 walking guides and a record-breaking marathon walker who has so far covered 227,527 miles, wearing out 151 pairs of boots.
New Mills and District U3A longer and medium walking group leaders organised our leg of the baton relay which took part on 14th September 2022. A few of our members met Buxton U3A at Whaley Bridge canal basin the day before and walked the final part of their walk with them along the canal to New Mills. Once at New Mills the baton was formally handed over to us.
The next morning, members of New Mills and District U3A gathered at the Torrs and proceeded to walk the 10 miles to Edale. Our route took us via the Sett Valley Trail to Hayfield, up to Bowden Bridge and over to Edale Cross. We enjoyed stunning views of the Hope Valley and the Great Ridge as we dropped down into the Edale valley via Jacob’s Ladder. We arrived in Edale in good time and took the opportunity to quench our thirst at The Rambler Inn where we had arranged to hand the baton over to the Hope Valley U3A for it’s onward journey. We returned to New Mills by train.
We enjoyed a fabulous walk in beautiful conditions and felt a real sense of achievement in completing the walk and enabling the baton to continue its journey. It was great to share our walk with regular members of the medium and longer walking groups as well as a few members of other activity groups.
You can see photos from the stages of the relay walk via the Derbyshire U3A Network Facebook page.
http://www.facebook.com/u3aDerbyshireNetwork
Here are a few from our walk. |