Thimble Hall stands on Church Street and holds a Guinness World Record as the world's smallest detached house — eleven feet ten inches by ten feet three, twelve feet high. Around 1900 a family of eight lived in it. It was last occupied in the early 1930s and sold at auction in 1999 for £39,500.
That gives you the scale of Youlgreave, a long gritstone-and-limestone village strung along one main street at about 600 feet, above the point where Lathkill Dale and Bradford Dale meet. Locals prefer to spell it "Youlgrave," and say it that way too.
There are three pubs. The George Hotel sits on Church Street opposite the church, run by the Marsh family, with three rooms and a kitchen that makes its own chips and keeps game on the menu. On Fountain Square is the Bulls Head, a former coaching inn run by the Hill family — dog-friendly, with a garden and a "muddy boots menu." The Farmyard Inn on Main Street does pie night on Wednesdays, curry night on Thursdays, and a Sunday carvery.
For food to take away there's Youngs of Youlgrave, the post office and general store run by Amy Young, open from half past six in the morning. The community-run Village Shop & Tearooms does rolls, sandwiches and paninis, run by Jade Stacey. Peak Feast, a bakery, sells Bakewell tarts, quiches and traybakes, all of it vegetarian. And Amy's Dairy.
The reason to walk here is Bradford Dale. The River Bradford runs entirely through limestone and is known for the purity of its water; the path passes three bridges — a road bridge, a former packhorse bridge, and an older clapper bridge — along with stepping stones and a chain of small dammed pools once used to feed the Alport ore-mill. One of those pools was converted into the village swimming pool, which is still there. A longer circular links Bradford Dale with Lathkill Dale, about 6.6 miles, where trout hold in the deep pools below Raper Lodge. One local guide notes that "monster-sized fish can sometimes be spotted lazing beneath the narrow pack-horse bridge." Three long-distance paths — the Limestone Way, the White Peak Way and the Alternative Pennine Way — all pass through.
All Saints' Church is Grade I listed and reputed to be the second largest in the Peak District. The nave dates to around 1150, the west tower to the 15th century, and the east window was designed by the Pre-Raphaelite Edward Burne-Jones.
The village has piped its own water since 1829, when the Youlgreave Friendly Society of Women funded a stone conduit head in Fountain Square holding 1,500 gallons, ending the summer reliance on contaminated river water. Youlgreave Waterworks is still one of the very few private water companies in Britain.
Matlock station is about eight miles by road; the 172 bus runs from Bakewell in around 43 minutes.
Every June, on the Saturday nearest St John the Baptist's Day, the village dresses its six wells with floral pictures — a custom kept up since that same year of 1829.
