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Location:
Europe,
United Kingdom, Peak District
Category:
Landscape view
Description:
View of the countryside surrounding
the villages of Foolow and Monyash
Location Information:
The
Peak District is an upland area in
central and northern England, lying
mainly in northern Derbyshire, but
also covering parts of Cheshire,
Greater Manchester, Staffordshire,
and South and West Yorkshire.
Most of the area falls within the
Peak District National Park, whose
designation in 1951 made it the
first national park in the British
Isles. An area of great diversity,
it is conventionally split into the
northern Dark Peak, where most of
the moorland is found and whose
geology is gritstone, and the
southern White Peak, where most of
the population lives and where the
geology is mainly limestone-based.
Proximity to the major cities of
Manchester and Sheffield and the
counties of Lancashire, Greater
Manchester, Cheshire, Staffordshire
and South and West Yorkshire coupled
with easy access by road and rail,
have all contributed to its
popularity. The spa town of Buxton
was developed by the Dukes of
Devonshire as a genteel health
resort in the eighteenth century;
now the largest town in the Peak
District, it has an opera house with
a theatre, museum and art gallery.
Another spa town is Matlock Bath,
popularised in the Victorian era.
Bakewell is the largest settlement
within the National Park; its
five-arched bridge over the River
Wye dates from the 13th century.
Buxton, Matlock and Matlock Bath,
Bakewell, Leek and the small towns
of Ashbourne and Wirksworth, on the
fringes of the Park, all offer a
range of tourist amenities. To the
north the village of Hayfield sits
at the foot of Kinder Scout, the
highest summit in the area.
Historic buildings include
Chatsworth House, seat of the Dukes
of Devonshire and among Britain's
finest stately homes; the medieval
Haddon Hall, seat of the Dukes of
Rutland; Hardwick Hall, built by
powerful Elizabethan Bess of
Hardwick; and Lyme Park, an
Elizabethan manor house transformed
by an Italianate front. Many of the
Peak's villages and towns have fine
parish churches, with a particularly
magnificent example being the
fourteenth century Church of St John
the Baptist at Tideswell, sometimes
dubbed the 'Cathedral of the Peak'.
'Little John's Grave' can be seen in
the Hathersage churchyard.
Local
Weather:
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