When I was a kid in the Seventies, we would sometimes walk into town on a Sunday and it would be quite ghostly. It’s hard to imagine central Manchester like that now, as it’s such a buzzing place at night — I find myself yearning for those days when there was nothing much to do — but you still get that peaceful, otherworldly feel as you walk along its canals.

Exploring cities by foot is something I’ve always done. I’m an early riser and whenever my band New Order was in the studio I’d walk for two or three hours before everyone else got up. I’ve done a lot of recording in my time, so that’s a lot of urban walking.

It keeps me fit but, more importantly, you see the world in a different way — you have a more romantic vision of the areas you’re passing through. You get a much nicer sense of a place when you’re walking, especially with a city like Manchester that has changed so much in the past few years. The only way I can keep hold of the old Manchester that I loved is by walking around it — I can see the places that survived, and the old textile buildings which are now hotels, restaurants and shops.

I used to work for the Manchester Ship Canal Company so I got to know the areas you could walk through. In the old days, you couldn’t go down to the towpaths because they were so run down. Now the whole area has been tidied up: you can get on to the Rochdale Canal at the west end of Deansgate and follow it through Manchester to Great Ancoats Street in the north.

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It’s a wonderful walk. It passes right by the Haçienda building [the site of Hook’s legendary club that closed in 1997]; the developers engraved every name of every band who played there, and you can see it only from the canal. On the way, you can get a different perspective on the beautifully restored buildings such as the Midland hotel, the old Free Trade Hall, and Beetham Tower, which houses the highest apartments in the UK.

At the other end of the city centre, you reach New Islington, near Piccadilly. It’s an unusually open space with striking ultra-modern apartment buildings — they’ve even created a 21st-century stretch of water. It’s not what you expect to find near the chaos of Piccadilly. It’s almost surreal.

Every time I get in the car, I’m rushing, but when I go out for a walk I can react to the surroundings at a different pace, which is just lovely. I can prepare myself to enjoy the world more.

visitmanchester.com

The Haçienda: How Not to Run a Club by Peter Hook (Simon & Schuster; £18.99)

Interview by Angela Pertusini