Description
"The Charles Cotton Hotel is located in the picturesque village of Hartington in the heart of Peak District National Park. The hotel has been providing food and accommodation to travellers and guests for the last two hundred and seventy five years.”
The Charles Cotton Hotel changed ownership late 2006 and has been through a period of extensive renovation. Our rooms offer all the facilities one would expect of a classic coaching inn; we are ideally situated for anyone wanting to explore the Peak Park and welcome walkers and dogs. We are also please to welcome families visiting Alton Towers.
Our cosy bar with it’s open fire serves a changing selection of real ales includingthe local Hartington beers brewed in the village by Whim Ales. The bar is opendaily from noon to 11 p.m.
During the winter food is served from 12:00 to 15:00 and 18:00 to 20:30 on Monday to Friday; 12:00 to 16:00 and 18:00 to 20:30 on Saturdays and 12:00 to 17:00 and 18:00 to 20:00 on Sundays.
You can enjoy a drink or meal outside under one of our heated canopies overlooking the Market Place or in our quiet rear beer garden.
The ideal place to relax ane enjoy a perfect cup of coffee or tea.
The tea shop is open each day from 9:00 a.m. until 6:00 p.m. in high season and weekends and from 10:30a.m. to 3:00 p.m.at other times.We serve a wide range of coffees including cappuccino, latte, americano and espresso, a range of teas including Earl Grey, fruit tea & green tea plus a range of soft drinks including smoothies and cordials. We offer a full take out service.
We serve sandwiches with a wide selection of fillings and have a wide range of homemade cakes and quiches. There are also a wide range of soups, snacks and meals which change daily and include old favourites like home baked pie and fish & chips. In the summer months we serve a wide choice of salads.
The Tea Room also sells a range of Charles Cotton jams, marmalades and chutneys, local interest books published by Landmark Publishing and Charles Cotton memorabilia.
The Charles Cotton Hotel welcomes walkers, their boots, maps and tales of blisters.
Walking in The Peak District, courtesy of Peak Walking we can bring you a beautiful 7 mile walk right from the hotel .
Terrain: Paths along limestone dales and green lanes between fields. Steady climb through Biggin Dale. Length: Seven miles
Time: About three hours
Map: OS Outdoor Leisure sheet 24, White Peak
From the public toilets in Hartington (on the Hulme End road) and join the well-made footpath through a gate to the left of them after a short distance this crosses a track and enters fields. Follow the way marked path through the fields until wooded.
Walk through this short dale which, along with the others on this walk, is owned by the National Trust. The mixed woodland is being regenerated and is home to a good bird population. trout can be seen in the clear waters of the river Dove, this being a favourite place for fly-fishing: the building to the right at the beginning of the dale is Charles Cotton's Fishing House. Water birds also take advantage of the river, which you cross twice, once by a wooden bridge and then by a narrow concrete-and-wood affair near a large tree. After the second crossing, walk through an often-wet meadow to enter Wolfscote Dale. This dale is very different - wide and open as opposed to Beresford Dale's rather claustrophobic air. The dale sides are carpeted by sheep-cropped turf, supporting a variety of plant life, punctuated with scree-runs. Sheep are essential to keep the dale in its current condition as without their constant cropping of the vegetation it would quickly be colonised by hawthorn scrub and would eventually become woodland.
The path through here was constructed a few years ago, despite some opposition from those who felt it intruded on the landscape. They did have a point but, as in so many other places, the valley floor had turned into a sea of mud under pressure of visitors and something had to be done.
Follow the dale for a little over a mile, then turn left into Biggin Dale at a point where the main path crosses a little causeway. This dale climbs gradually and you'll leave any crowds behind at this point. The lower reaches show what happens when these dales are not grazed sufficiently - hawthorn and gorse scrub has colonised much of the left-hand side although some of this is now being removed. Between the scrub, cowslips bloom profusely in spring.
Biggin Dale is dry for most of the year but in wet winters it acquires a stream. The source of this is near the top of the dale and can be spectacular on frosty mornings. The water, which bubbles up from underground, is slightly warmer than the air and steams on contact with it, giving the area the look of a hot volcanic spring!
The path through the dale is easy to follow, passing through a rather ruinous gate at one point. The upper reaches, accessed through a second gate, are a National Nature Reserve. This is an important piece of limestone upland so please keep to the path alongside the wall in order to avoid disturbance to the reserve.
Keep the wall on your left until it ends and the dale swings sharp right. At this point turn left by a finger-post (marked to Hartington) to pass through a gate. Walk through several fields, ignoring the bridleway to Hartington which leaves to the left after a few hundred metres. Eventually, after passing a rather incongruous sewage works, you emerge onto a road. Turn left and after a hundred or so yards/metres, take a left fork by some buildings onto a track.
Follow the walled lane straight ahead between fields, ignoring branches to left and right at one point. A good height is reached and there are fine views both ahead and behind. After a mile or so, the track leads you onto a minor road. Turn left and follow the road downhill back to Hartington.
|
