Thirteen people turned up at a new venue for our regular Tuesday walks, namely Botany Bay car park. The weather was perfect as we set off on John Evenden’s take of the Chorley Circular Walk which was officially opened in April 1993. John wanted to avoid a long stretch of canal at the start of the walk so his version took us through fields before meeting up with the canal near Cowling where we commenced the Chorley Circular walk.

Soon we left the towpath and headed through a wood, crossing the River Yarrow and on to the A6 before entering Duxbury Park. In winter or after periods of rain Duxbury park can be a bit of a nightmare with paths covered in mud up to your calves but recently the council have spent quite a bit of money improving the paths and today we had no problems whatsoever. It was very pleasant walking in the shade of the trees and we passed a couple of really good wooden sculptures – an owl and a very long snake.

Leaving Duxbury woods we walked down Burgh Lane into Yarrow Valley Park stopping for a short while to admire the weir and fish pass on the River Yarrow which, after a long period of industrial pollution, now supports salmon and sea trout and they in turn provide food for several varieties of birds. Continuing on now we came to the attractive lodges at Birkacre where we stopped for lunch at one of the picnic sites.

The afternoon saw us following the meandering Yarrow through the valley and ascending to Common Bank road before making our way to the attractive Astley Park which has, at its heart, Astley Hall, built during the reign of Elizabeth I. It is rumoured that Oliver Cromwell stayed there in 1648 during the Battle of Preston but nowadays it functions as a museum and art gallery open to the public. We continued our walk through more shady woodland leaving the park through the gates on the main road in Chorley town centre. John took us past the flat iron market which seemed to be doing quite well and showed us the sculptures, all made of wicker, outside the town hall depicting  soldiers of the Chorley and Hoghton Pals in World War I, with a poppy, again made from wicker, at the far end.

We ended the walk by going through various estates before turning left at Botany Brow and making our way back to the cars. The walk was a little longer than normal at 12 miles and we arrived back at 3pm but it had been a very interesting day in perfect conditions.