(S/E) Leave The Church Inn pub and turn right down the main village street, passing the Chelmorton Troughs.
(1) Turn right into Common Lane and follow it for 1⁄4 mile until a footpath crosses at right angles; turn left into a walled trackway.
Pass a small farm building on your left and then, just after the track bends sharp right, cross a stone stile on your left, next to a gate, into open fields. Head half right towards a clump of trees. Follow a path between walls to the right of the trees, at one point climbing a stone stile next to a gate, until you meet the main road (A5270).
(2) Turn left. When the road bends left, take a path on the right in the corner and turn half-left, slightly away from the dale on your right, aiming for a telegraph pole in the middle of the field. At a stone stile turn slightly left and follow the broken wall back to the main road.
(3) Turn right and walk down the main road (A5270) past a house and into Horseshoe Dale. At the bottom turn right through a gate and between farm buildings to join the dale proper. Look out for Bullhay Dale Calcite Mine on your right.
(4) Keep on straight down the main dale, which becomes gradually deeper and rockier and enters the Topley Pike and Deep Dale SSSI. The obvious entrance to Thirst House Cave appears above and to the right of the path.
(5) Just beyond the cave, the dale is crossed by the Midshires Way. The path down the dale beyond this point is subject to a long-term closure, so turn right onto a narrow path up the steep daleside, zig-zagging past another small cave.
Once out of the dale, bear right to a wall stile, then cross three more fields in the same direction to reach a walled farm track.
(6) Turn left, then left again at a T-junction of tracks. Follow the rutted track ahead for 300 yards; beyond a field entrance it becomes a grassy walled green lane. After a further 300 yards, at the end of the walled section, turn right over a wall stile. Bear slightly left across the field, towards the distant quarry, to reach another stile overlooking the dale and quarry.
(7) Turn right onto the lower of two paths, dropping obliquely down the dale side between low limestone crags. The path zig-zags to the top of a set of steps that drop steeply down past a bench to a hand-gate at the junction of Marl Dale and Deep Dale.
(8) Turn left down Deep Dale, passing the quarry workings on your left to reach the A6. Cross the main road carefully and turn right through the car park to a metalled drive beyond which heads downstream beside the River Wye, passing under three railway viaducts.
(9) At Blackwell Mill, cross the river on a footbridge and turn right, now with the river on your right. When the Pennine Bridleway heads off uphill to the left, keep right along the river bank. At the next viaduct, do not cross the river but stay on the left-hand bank.
(10) Pass under a fifth railway viaduct after quarter of a mile to enter the most rocky and dramatic section of the dale. Cross the first set of stepping stones under the cliff when you encounter them and, shortly afterwards, cross to the other bank via a footbridge.
Climb some steps to bypass a narrow gorge then keep left to drop back down to the riverside, passing under yet another railway arch, before crossing another footbridge back to the northern bank of the river, continuing downstream. Cross the second set of stepping stones.
(11) At Wormhill Springs the path crosses a side-stream via a footbridge, beyond which the valley opens out slightly. Ignore a footbridge over the Wye to your right signposted Blackwell, keeping to the left-hand bank. Pass under a final viaduct and continue until you reach the road in Miller’s Dale.
(12) Turn right across the river. By the speed limit signs, take a footpath doubling back into the woods on your left. When it divides, take the right-hand fork up the steps.
At the top of a steep climb the path passes some disused quarries and enters open fields. Aim for the opposite corner of the field ahead, to a gate under a tree. Cross two more fields to reach a gate into a track. Keep on in the same direction (left).
(13) Pass Lydgate Farm on your right and keep right when you meet the metalled road, passing further houses and farms. When you meet a larger road, cross carefully and follow the road opposite. At the main road (A6), cross with care and take the track to the left of the Waterloo (no longer open as a pub).
(14) This climbs gradually to a hairpin bend. Look out on your right for a stile in the wall; once over the stile head half-left to the corner of the field.
(15) Beyond this head for Five Wells Farm and walk between the farm buildings and along the farm drive beyond to the road. Take the path opposite – a former lead-mining “rake” – and follow it downhill and pass Bank Pit Spring to return to Chelmorton and The Church Inn pub. (S/E)
