Читать книгу The Pennine Way - the Path, the People, the Journey онлайн

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Perhaps not surprisingly, this section of the M62 is the highest point of any motorway in England, peaking at 1221ft. And with Scammonden Bridge (the longest single-span concrete arch bridge in the UK) and the well-known Stott Hall Farm (where the motorway carriages were built either side of the building, so marooning it in the middle) just to the east, the Pennine Way footbridge is in noteworthy company.

I stood mid bridge and took a photo of the endless stream of traffic 65ft below. A lorry hooted and I waved. I looked down as vehicle after vehicle sped underneath at what seemed to be breakneck speeds. A few drivers glanced up at me, perhaps fearful of what I was about to hurl down on them, or maybe wondering why a fully grown man was spending a July morning taking photos of motorway traffic.

The M62 is just one of numerous trans-Pennine roads that the Pennine Way hops across. Beginning with the Snake Pass and A628 Longdendale highway, there are five other major A roads that cross the Pennines within a few short miles; and at Standedge the railway and canal also go deep beneath the surface. On occasions, walking the Pennine Way seemed like an exercise in geometry, at least at its southern end.