The Singing Ringing Tree

Up on Crown Hill near Rossendale stands a sculpture that sounds as mad as it looks - a metal tree that actually sings when the wind picks up. Created by Mike Tonkin and Anna Liu, it's basically an enormous kinetic art installation made from hundreds of hollow steel tubes tuned to different pitches. When the breeze flows through them, you get an eerie, genuinely beautiful harmonic drone.

It's a short walk from the nearby car park, and the installation sits among moorland with views across Lancashire. What makes it work is the location itself - windswept, wild, a bit elemental. On calm days it's visually striking but essentially silent, so timing matters. Come when there's a proper gust and you'll understand why people make the effort.

Walkers heading across the Rossendale fells will find this fits naturally into a route. History types might find it a bit too contemporary, but anyone interested in land art or sculpture that actually engages with its environment will rate it. There's no visitor centre or café, so it's pure experience - about an hour up here if you're taking photographs and letting the atmosphere sink in.

Free to visit. The walk is manageable but the moorland can be boggy after rain, and the elevation gain isn't huge but it's real enough. If you're staying at Rossendale Holiday Cottages & Glamping, this is easily incorporated into a day on the hills - it's genuinely rewarding on a windy day, less so when it's dead still.