Derbyshire, England

Combs Sailing Club slipway

Launch — A ramp at the Combs Sailing Club boat park, with club pontoons alongside where buoyancy aids must stay on.

Parking — A small on-site car park that gets busy around scheduled sailing, paddling and swimming sessions; double parking is allowed on the reservoir side if you leave contact details on the dashboard, but never in front of the ramp.

Access — Paddling here is club-only. Visiting Membership is open to paddlers who live more than 25 miles from the club, capped at two weeks' use a year. The site is gated and keys aren't issued to visiting members, so getting in depends on a permanent member opening up. Guests of members can paddle for up to four days a year and must sign in at the clubhouse first. Paddling has set slots around the club's racing, training and swimming calendar, so check before you go.

Season — Combs Reservoir also feeds the Peak Forest Canal, and the Canal & River Trust draws the level down from time to time for engineering work on the wider network.

Regulations — All craft need third-party insurance of at least £3m; a Paddle UK/British Canoeing membership covers this and includes a Canal & River Trust waterways licence for the reservoir, or you can pay the club's own boat fee instead. Buoyancy aids need at least 50N of permanent foam buoyancy, and SUPs must wear a leash because Combs is flat water. No powered craft are allowed, other than the club's own patrol boats.

Combs Reservoir is a Canal & River Trust reservoir near Combs village, about a kilometre from Chapel-en-le-Frith, built in 1797 as the first feeder for the Peak Forest Canal. This slipway belongs to Combs Sailing Club, and paddling here is on club terms.

The dam was raised between 1834 and 1840, once the Macclesfield Canal had joined the network at Marple, to meet demand from the wider canal system. The reservoir is fed by the Meverill and Pyegreave brooks and drains out via the Randall Carr Brook.

Combs Reservoir is a Site of Special Scientific Interest for the plant life its receding shoreline supports, including the nationally rare moss Physcomitrium sphaericum, and for the birds that breed and feed around it, among them great crested grebe, little ringed plover, snipe and lapwing. Paddlers share the water with the club's racing dinghies, local anglers and an organised open-water swimming group.

Nearby

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Combs Valley Campsite

An all-year touring site with tent, caravan, motorhome and glamping pitches, plus two amenity blocks with showers.

Website

The Picnic Basket

A cafe on the High Street in Chapel-en-le-Frith, about 2km from the slipway.

Conditions to check

Boat traffic

Combs Sailing Club's dinghy racing fleet uses the reservoir; sailing boats have no brakes, so paddlers must give way to sail craft at all times and pass behind a boat's stern when crossing its course.

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Other

The Prince Albert Angling Society fishes bays around the shoreline; paddlers are asked to keep a wide berth to avoid their lines.

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Other

An organised triathlon group holds open-water swimming sessions from the clubhouse pontoon on Thursday evenings and Saturday mornings between May and September; keep clear of the marked swimming zone.

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Shallow or rocky

When the reservoir is drawn down, shallow, muddy margins can appear and the usable length of the slipway can shorten, particularly in late summer.

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