Smiddy Shaw Reservoir and Lamb Shields Farm

?By car: Waskerley Station car park on the Waskerley Way.  Take the Consett to Stanhope road and turn left 0.5km after passing Honey Hill Treatment Works.  NZ 051453 on EXP 307

By public transport: There is no public transport to the start point

[1] From the Waskerley Station car park go through the gate onto the Waskerley Way and turn right along it.

[2] After 2 km, cross the access road to Waskerley Reservoir and go through the car park and continue on the Waskerley Way. 

[3] After a further 1.5 km, turn right onto a track which crosses the Waskerley Way and follow the track uphill to the road.

[4] Turn right on the road and continue straight ahead on the Edmundbyers road for 1.3km up to a footpath sign on the right hand side.

[5] Fork 30 deg. right along this footpath heading for the top of the nearby hill and soon crossing a track to an old quarry. (This section of footpath to Lamb Shields Farm is undefined and can be hard going through the heather.  For the first section, the quarry access track provides an easier alternative route).  Continue in a north easterley direction along the ridge of Harehope Hill.  On passing the summit of this hill, continue in the same direction, heading for the trig point on the summit of Stoterley Hill.  Bear right past this and go through a gate into a field and continue through two fields to Lamb Shields Farm.

[6] Go past the farm and through a gate in a facing wall.  Turn right and follow the wall and then fences on your right, crossing stiles until the path begins to descend into the valley of the Hisehope Burn.  Cross a ladder stile over the wall on your right and continue downhill with the wall on your left to cross the burn over a footbridge.

[7] Climb the facing slope with a fence on your left.  Where the fence turns sharp left, follow a faint path parallel to the fence and then wall, until opposite a gate through it.  Turn sharp right up the hill on a faint path heading for a structure on the skyline.  Climb the hill and then steps up the embankment of Smiddy Shaw Reservoir.

[8] Turn right along the embankment and follow the track past Smiddy Shaw house and around the reservoir eventually reaching the public highway.  Turn left for 50m and then right along the access track to Waskerley Station car park.

(A)  The Wasklerley Way is the route of a former mineral railway that served the Weardale mines and quarries, and led down to Consett.  The line closed in 1969.  Waskerley Station was a thriving railway community up to this date.  The line is now part of the Coast to Coast cycle way.

(B)  Waskerley Reservoir owned by Northumbrian Water (NWL) was built in 1877.  It formerly had a water treatment works at the site but the water now flows through a tunnel to Honey Hill treatment works.  Water is supplied into the reservoir from Burnhope reservoir at the head of Weardale through a pipeline and tunnel and also water can be pumped up to the site from the Kielder tunnel between the Rivers Tyne and Tees which passes deep below the site.

(C)  The stone wall on the right hand side of the Frosterley Cut is made from sleeper blocks from the old railway.  Note the SDR (Stockton and Darlington railway) stone markers alongside the Waskerley Way.

(D)  Lamb Shields farm is the site of a murder when two brothers fell out over the inheritance of the farm.

(E)  Smiddy Shaw reservoir is also owned by NWL and supplies Honey Hill Treatment Works.  

(F)  Honey Hill Treatment Works is owned by NWL and treats water for the Derwentside and Chester le Street areas.

Map:  OS Explorer 307