Everything Awesome

Sheffield is surprisingly well-served for paddleboarding (SUP), offering a mix of grit-stone urban canals, managed country parks, and scenic Peak District reservoirs.

However, a crucial rule applies here: most reservoirs in the Peak District strictly prohibit swimming and paddleboarding due to cold water shock and hidden machinery. You should stick to approved locations but many local groups take precautions, and use these reservoirs despite the warnings.

Here are the best 6 spots to paddleboard in and around Sheffield.

1. Sheffield & Tinsley Canal (Victoria Quays)

Best For: Urban exploring and an easy, sheltered paddle. The historic Victoria Quays basin in the city centre is the perfect launch point for a unique urban ride.

• The Vibe: Industrial heritage meets street art. You paddle past old warehouses and under bridges, eventually reaching the spot made famous by The Full Monty.
• Logistics: You need a Paddle UK (formerly British Canoeing) license to paddle on the canal. Launching is usually easiest from the Quays.
• Note: This is an “out and back” route. The water is calm, making it great for beginners, though you should be mindful of barges and debris in the water.

2. Ladybower Reservoir

Best For: Iconic Peak District scenery and big water feels. Historically off-limits, Ladybower now allows paddleboarding, but strict rules apply to protect the water and users.

LadyBower no longer allows Paddlesports

This may change but as of July 2026 its not permitted

• The Vibe: High-moorland views and pine forests. It is one of the most scenic places to paddle in the UK.
• Access Rules: You cannot just turn up and launch. You must book a slot through Ladybower Paddlesports, launch only from their designated pontoon, and wear a mandatory buoyancy aid.
• Cost: There is a launch fee (approx. £10–£15), and sessions are often limited to weekends or specific times.

3. Rother Valley Country Park

Best For: Beginners, families, and equipment hire. Located just southeast of the city, this is a dedicated watersports centre with a large, clean lake.

• The Vibe: Safe, supervised, and social. It’s a great place to learn the basics without worrying about river currents or canal boat traffic.
• Logistics: You can launch your own board for a fee (check their “launch and recover” prices) or hire equipment directly from the centre.
• Bonus: There is a cafe right on the water’s edge for a post-paddle coffee.

4. Manvers Lake (Wath-upon-Dearne)

Best For: A community club atmosphere and clean water. A reclaimed industrial site turned into a beautiful lake, home to a very active boat club.

• The Vibe: Sporty and friendly. It is popular for triathlon training and open-water swimming, so the water quality is generally excellent.
• Access: It is run as a club (Manvers Waterfront Boat Club). You typically need to join as a member or book a specific session/course. It is less of a “turn up and dip” spot and more of a community hub.

5. River Don (Kelham Island Loop)

Best For: Experienced paddlers seeking a challenge. The River Don runs through the heart of industrial Sheffield.

• The Vibe: Gritty and adventurous. Paddling through Kelham Island offers a view of the city’s breweries and museums from the waterline.
• Warning: Rivers are dynamic environments with weirs and currents. This is not for total beginners.
• Access: The most popular launch is near Ball Street Bridge (Kelham Island). Ensure you check water levels—too high is dangerous, too low is a scrape.

6. Underbank Reservoir.

Best For: Casual confident paddlers.

• Underbank is owned by Yorkshire water.
• Paddlesports are not allowed to use that area.
  This does not seem to deter the hundreds of weekly users
• Beware, there are no facilities, no safety boats, no help if anything goes wrong.

⚠️ Where NOT to Paddle

Avoid Rivelin Valley and Damflask Reservoir (unless you are part of the specific sailing/rowing club there).

We can provide beginners instruction sessions, getting you up and standing and we can provide coaching for the more confident paddler to improve your skills.



Drop a message to our PaddleUk Coach qualified staff

Weaseling is an outdoor activity that blends rock scrambling, above-ground caving, and parkour. Participants navigate through mazes of gritstone boulders, squeeze through narrow tunnels, and leap across rocky gaps without the need for ropes or harnesses. It is a highly popular and accessible adventure for all ages and fitness levels in the Peak District. 

Top Weaseling Locations

The dramatic, weathered gritstone edges of the Peak District offer the perfect natural playgrounds for weaseling.

• Higger Tor: Located just outside Hathersage (a short 15-minute drive from Sheffield), this is the most famous weaseling spot in the region. It features massive jumbles of boulders and tight squeeze-throughs like the “womb”.
• The Roaches: Situated near Leek in the southwestern Peak District, this dramatic ridge offers incredible rocky mazes and tunnel networks ideal for scrambling.
• Burbage Valley: Just south of Higger Tor, the valley is scattered with perfect natural rock features, making it a safe, scenic location favored by guided groups.

Tips for Your Trip

• What to wear: Wear sturdy trainers or walking shoes with good grip and older layers you won’t mind getting dirty or scraped on the rock.
• Safety & Routes: All obstacles are strictly optional; if a tunnel looks too small, there is almost always an easy way to scramble around it.
• Self-guided vs. Guided: While popular routes at Higger Tor are easy to explore on your own, Everything AWesome offer half-day and full-day courses to help you find the best hidden tunnels. You can book introductory scrambling and weaseling experiences directly through us here at Everything Awesome

Described as bouldering, in wellies, in the rain.

Caving (also known as spelunking in the US or potholing in the UK) is the recreational pastime of exploring wild, non-commercial cave systems. Unlike a casual tour of a well-lit show cave with concrete pathways, true caving takes you into a raw, pitch-black subterranean environment where you rely entirely on your own gear, skill, and nerve.

It is part exploration, part athletic challenge, and part science.

What the Experience is Actually Like

• Absolute Darkness and Silence: Once you move past the “twilight zone” (the cave entrance), the darkness is absolute. If you turn off your headlamp, you cannot see your hand an inch from your face. Sound behaves strangely—sometimes muffled by mud, other times amplified by echoing rock walls.
• Physical Variety: A single cave system can require a massive mix of physical movements. You might find yourself walking through a chamber the size of a cathedral, crawling on your stomach through a muddy tube, squeezing sideways through a narrow fissure, or wading through an icy underground river.
• Constant Environment: Deep caves stay the same temperature year-round, typically reflecting the average annual temperature of the region above (often around 10°C to 13°C / 50°F to 55°F in temperate zones). They are highly humid, damp, and frequently muddy.

The Different Types of Caving

Depending on the cave’s structure, the activity generally splits into two main styles:

1. Horizontal Caving

This involves navigating caves that mostly develop horizontally. While it still includes climbing over boulders, scrambling up mud banks, or squeezing through tight slots, it does not require specialized rope work.

2. Vertical Caving

When caves descend straight down through shafts and pits (sometimes hundreds of feet deep), cavers use a discipline called Single Rope Technique (SRT). Using specialized mechanical ascenders and descenders, cavers safely rappel down into the deep and climb back up a single hanging rope.

Core Gear and Safety Rules

Because caves are unforgiving environments where rescue is incredibly difficult, cavers adhere to a strict ethos:

The Golden Rule: Always carry three independent sources of light per person (usually a primary helmet-mounted LED headlamp and two backups).

Conservation: Caves form over hundreds of thousands of years. Cavers follow a strict code: “Take nothing but pictures, leave nothing but footprints, kill nothing but time.” Touching delicate crystal formations can permanently ruin them due to the oils on human skin.

The Uniform: A rugged helmet, durable coveralls (often Cordura or PVC to handle abrasion), sturdy boots, and knee/elbow pads.

The Team: True cavers never go alone. A standard group size is at least four people—if someone is injured, one can stay with the victim while the other two head out to get help.

Everything Awesome can provide experiences that will change your life. Contact us to book.

For some people, Stand up Paddleboarding starts and stops with being able to balance on the board, have an awesome day out with friends, paddling around flat water in some beautiful locations.

For others, their fun is in Whitewater Paddleboarding.

Whitewater paddleboarding (often called whitewater SUP) is exactly what it sounds like: taking a stand-up paddleboard off the calm lakes and ocean flats and dropping it right into turbulent river rapids.

Think of it as a hybrid between surfing and whitewater kayaking. It’s fast-paced, highly engaging, and requires a mix of intense core strength, quick reflexes, and a willingness to get wet.

Some like SUP freestyle
If whitewater paddleboarding is the aggressive, rugged cousin of the sport, freestyle paddleboarding (or Freestyle SUP) is the figure skating or skateboarding equivalent.

Instead of trying to travel from point A to point B, freestyle is entirely about artistic expression, flat-water tricks, and acrobatics. It is a rapidly growing, highly creative discipline where the goal is to test the absolute limits of your balance by manipulating the board in ways it was never technically designed to move.

All the above need some finer balance skills, and the ability to move around the board, to be able to jumps, to paddle in a surf stance, and to be dynamic enough to deal with some random unstable movements.

This weekend we got the chance to work on those.