(S/E) From Rosie Lee Tearoom front door of the tearoom, turn left up Kinder Road. Pass Hayfield Library and Vicarage Lane on your left.
By a house on a bend called Grey Beck, turn right into Spring Vale Road and descend to the stream (River Sett). Cross the stream and continue out to Valley Road.
(1) Turn left. After a row of terraced houses on the right, keep left along the no-through road. Keep left again at a fork below a high stone retaining wall on your right.
Descend to the river and follow the riverside path, ignoring a footbridge. At a fork, keep left between the gateposts, staying close to the river. Walk between the river and the campsite.
(2) At the campsite entrance, turn left over the road bridge. Turn right past Bowden Bridge car park. When the road bends slightly left at Bowden Bridge Cottage, turn right onto the riverside track.
At the entrance to Oakbank, turn right over the packhorse bridge. In the corner beyond, turn left through a gate. Climb a walled path and go through a gate and past a converted barn to emerge at Hill Houses.
Turn left past the farmhouse on your left and go through a gate. Follow the track beyond, bending left then right to reach Booth Farm after half a mile. Beyond Booth, descend to a lane. Turn right, uphill, passing between the buildings of Farlands.
(3) Opposite a bench and path on the left, turn right through a gateway. Follow the track across the field up to the edge of a coniferous plantation on your left. Follow the edge of the wood to its end, ignoring the Oaken Clough bridleway that heads off right at PNFS sign no. 285.
(4) Beyond the end of the wood, follow the track ahead to a stile by a gate and National Trust sign, then ford the stream on your left. Cross the National Trust stile and follow the path beyond up the hillside; bear right then
left between broken walls to a gate in a more complete wall.
(5) Turn left, parallel to the wall, then when the vague track bears left, turn right on a narrow path that descends to meet another wall obliquely. Follow the wall to a junction of walls then bear right along the obvious descending path that curves left down to a footbridge.
(6) Cross the bridge and turn left, taking the higher (right-hand) path that passes above a walled clump of birch trees. Bear left along the wall towards the reservoir, leaving it to ford a small stream then climbing to a hand-gate. The path beyond contours above trees then curves right and descends to a gate.
(7) Ford a side-stream and continue to cross the footbridge over William Clough. Turn left and follow the path above and along the reservoir wall.
At a fork, take the right-hand (upper) path that climbs slightly through the heather, leading away from the reservoir. Rejoin the reservoir wall at a hand-gate and continue along the wall, below open woodland.
(8) After an information board erected to mark the centenary of the reservoir, level with the dam, turn right onto an ascending path (signposted “BRIDLEWAY”).
Follow the path alongside the wall to a gate at the top. Bear left then right across the open moor to a junction of paths below the shooting cabin.
(9) Turn left (signposted “Hayfield 11⁄2 miles”). Follow the obvious path through the heather to a National Trust sign for the Snake Path. Go through the kissing gate and follow the track across rough grazing land.
(10) After a stretch alongside a wall, go through a gate and cross the field, aiming for the treetops of Twenty Trees. Follow the wall and then go through a kissing gate on your right, above the clump of trees.
Bear left past the trees to a further kissing gate and commemorative sign. Descend along the bottom of the next field to a gate and stile. Follow the track beyond, which bends left to join a concrete drive and leads down to the
Kinder Road. Turn right and walk down the road back to Rosie Lee Tearoom.(S/E)