Izaak Walton, seventeenth century author of ‘The Campleat (sic) Angler – The Contemplative Man’s Recreation’ would have been familiar with at least half of this walk. The Dove was one of his favourite places to cast a fly, along with his younger friend, the impecunious Hartington landowner, Charles Cotton. They regularly fished the river’s clear waters, mostly below Hartington, especially favouring the quiet pool opposite Cotton’s home at Beresford Hall. This quiet spot they named Pike Pool in acknowledgement of a monster pike that traditionally lay in wait beneath the shadow of the tall pillar, or spike of rock rising from the deepest and shadiest part of the pool. In the treatise, Walton calls himself VENATOR (traveller) and Cotton is known as PISCATOR (angler). Charles Cotton had a fishing temple built as a resting place for them, it still stands behind a high stone wall in the grounds of now demolished Beresford Hall, but being on private land the only time to catch a glimpse of it is in winter when the surrounding trees are bare. The Dove flows through two accessible dales below Hartington which are followed on this walk. Named in some far off time, these are Beresford and Wolfscote Dales, just waiting to be explored after the walker climbs down through comparatively dry Biggin Dale on the way back to Hartington. Leaving the riverside path and following a short walk across fields beyond the head of Beresford Dale that would have been familiar to the two angling friends, the village is reached after a mere fifty yards of road walking. Hartington has long been a busy village. A market place for locals until a few decades ago, but now the only agricultural industry is the delicious Stilton cheese, made in one of only a handful of places...
