A Walk Into History

Not one, but two castles loom over us on this month’s walk - a circuit of Beeston and Peckforton, writes HOWARD BRADBURY

- Howard Bradbury

GIVEN a big hill overlooking a plain, mankind will, sooner or later, stick a castle on it.

Hence the hills at Beeston and Peckforton - rising majestically from the surrounding flatness - each boast a castle, one arriving sooner, another later. Beeston Castle was built in the 1220s by Ranulf, 6th Earl of Chester, though it incorporates defences dating back to the Iron Age. Neolithic man may also have clambered up the crag, perhaps surveying the Cheshire Plain for woolly mammoths and the prospect of a large barbecue.

Rising a good 600 years after Beeston, Peckforton Castle is nothing like as old as its turrets and battlements may suggest. John Tollemache came in to 36,000 acres of land, including Peckforton and Beeston, in 1840, and decided to build a home in the style of a medieval castle. And so, while Beeston has crumbled since the English Civil War - when it was occupied by the Royalists under siege - Peckforton is in splendid shape, serving as a hotel, a three AA rosettes restaurant and wedding venue.

Our circuit takes us from Beeston, into the Peckforton Estate and on to one of Cheshire Life’s favourite pubs before coming back around the other side of Peckforton’s hill. Of course, you could also rest your legs and seek refreshment at Peckforton Castle.

THE WALK