Had a weekend riding planned this weekend in the Peak District with an old mate for a few weeks now and obviously the big snow dump has happened.  Any ideas on whether it’s clear on the majority of trails yet?  Been looking online and people are saying everything from it’s fine and just a bit wet to there still being drifts blocking everywhere!  Looking round Edale area for two days worth of riding, most likely the Edale winter loop and a something similar for variety.  If the snow is still too bad we can always postpone but need to make a decision by tomorrow evening really.  We don’t mind the odd bit to wade through, adds to the fun but if it’s only going to be rideable in places we’ll reschedule.

I haven’t been over as far as Edale, but it’s thawing fast on the Hayfield side of the Peak and I can’t believe there’ll be much left at all by the weekend.

Even when it was in full-on snow mode, it was more being blown about than settling – we got almost up to Derbyshire Bridge before hitting deep snow near the top of the Goyt Valley road so you may find some isolated drifts in walled lanes, but I suspect you’ll be more likely to encounter wet slop and ankle-deep pools of molten slush-puppy than any real snow.

I’ll update if I ride over that way before the weekend though. Check the keeper of the peak twitter feed as well:

https://twitter.com/KoftheP

Cheers BadlyWiredDog, sounds promising.  If you have an update later i the week that would be great as we can always alter our route plans if needs be to avoid something.  I’ve been following KOTP for the last few days but reports seem sporadic, guessing not many people out right now. Wet and muddy we can cope with, we’re both Welsh after all!

No worries. You’ll be glad to know that there’s now a Met Office yellow snow warning for the Peak District tomorrow… I’ll believe it when it happens though, feels vaguely spring like at the moment.

Can anyone say whether the snow arrived?

Yep it did snow this morning for a couple of hours

As the temp is around 5deg c though it quickly melted

It’s very very wet out on the trails currently and mushy snow with mud and some drifts makes it hard going at times

I passed through Hope and Edale on the train from Stockport to Sheffield this morning. From what I saw the snow was deep and in for the long run.

Bugger, it’s the Edale area we’re looking to ride in!  Would it be foolhardy to go then?

Drove up Buxton way last night and there was still plenty about off the roads, horrible slushy stuff to.

Well we decided to give it a bash anyway and had the option of bailing to a pub if conditions were too bad but we really lucked in!

Did the Edale winter loop and we only had a few bits of snow to walk through, the route was mainly ridable.  Even had clear skies for 3/4 of the day, only getting rained on for the last half hour as we headed towards Jacob’s Ladder.  We weren’t the only people out either so it was a great laugh smashing through the odd snow drift and revelling in the ridiculousness of it all.  The only really bad bit was the climb back out of Coldwell Clough where the track was 2 feet deep in drift snow at places, that was a tough push as we just sank into the snow with every footstep.

As an aside, what’s the deal with the Rushup Edge repair?  There was evidence it had been done but lots of it had washed away and it was back down to the bedrock in a few places.  Did they remove the crap they dumped o it or has the weather washed it all away?

Rushup (Chapel Gate) “repair” has just been left for the past couple of years, as it was when worked stopped after our protest. The route is also technically still closed, although the signs have disappeared and no one pays any attention.  I think DDC are just hoping it goes away