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About The Roaches | About Luds Church
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The Roaches is an area we have spent a huge amount of time at, it’s close to home for us but far enough that it feels like a trip out, and has some of the best views and walks in the surrounding area. Luds Church, is another place we visit frequently for similar reasons and combining these too is quite straight forward. This walk we wanted to do something slightly different, so we decided to come out of Luds Chruch differently than we usually would.
Parking at the usual Roaches car park, we moved towards the bottom of hen cloud and headed up the ridge onto the roaches, the first part is a little steep but once you hit the first high point, it’s very easy going along the ridge of the roaches. We follow this path up towards Doxy pool, a beautiful little tarn on the ridge that looks out over the surrounding area. Moving along across the top you can get some pace going and after 20 minutes or so you will likely get to the Trig point marking the high point of the roaches, again the views are fantastic and the path down (which has recently been replaced) is very easy going.
Once at the bottom you come to a quiet, but used road which we crossed over and headed straight over to carry on the route, this is another straight section, where you follow a wall for a bit and eventually you get to a crossroad, here we turned right and headed down towards luds Chruch. The route from here is easy to follow as you head down into the forest and take the first left, not too long after this you eventually enter Luds chruch.
Heading down the stone steps (which can be slippery) once down, the space opens up and you enter a simply beautiful area where the rock has split and caused a walkway between two steep sides. Moss, grass and some plants growing in the rock gives it a real mystical feeling.
Once we headed out, we followed the route around to the left and headed towards Danebridge. Before getting to the path down to Danebridge however, we take a left turn which starts bringing us round in a circle back towards the roaches. Beautiful views back towards the rocky outcrops are here so we settled in for a spot of lunch. Once we were back on our way we soon get back to the crossroads, this time heading back the way we came, usually an annoyance for us, but the difference in views make it worthwhile.
When back to the road, we turn right and follow the road back to the car. This is a quiet road and any cars generally do go slow; however, care must be taken as always on a road and I would only suggest this if you are comfortable. The reason we head this way, is this is the road the car is parked on, and you can get some pace back up towards the car.
If you have never been to the Roaches or Luds Chruch, this is a fantastic route to allow you to sample to two of these and is accessible rain or shine.
