My Two-Day Walk from Settle to Grassington – Part Two

I’d enjoyed my wild camp near Malham. It had been in a fantastic setting and had gone well. I’d pitched my little tent and had my dinner in golden sunshine, under a blue sky. My mood wasn’t dampened by the clouds that formed as the sun began to set, nor by the wind growing stronger and colder. I simply accepted that I wouldn’t be doing any stargazing that evening, and went to bed early. Yet in the early hours of the next day, I woke up to find my tent full of silver light. I peeked out to see a full moon shining through in an opening in fast-moving black clouds. When the moon sank out of sight, I zipped my tent up against a raw wind and huddled back in my sleeping bag. A few hours later, I opened the tent again to find a low, slate-grey sky and a dank, sharp wind. This day was going to be different from the sunshine, crags and valleys of the first day of this walk. 

Continue reading “My Two-Day Walk from Settle to Grassington – Part Two”

My Two-Day Walk from Settle to Grassington – Part One

My plan was to walk across the south of the Yorkshire Dales National Park from Settle to Grassington. I’d get the train to Settle, on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales. I would then follow the Dales High Way past limestone scars, along a secluded valley, up onto Kirkby Fell, and then through Malham’s karst landscape. A wild camp near Malham would break up my journey and allow me to have a night under the stars. The next day I’d follow the old Roman and mediaeval road of Mastiles Lane eastwards over the moors. I’d then leave Mastiles Lane to head down to Grassington and a bus towards home. I was excited by the prospect of walking this linear route across the Dales, and the first day of this trip proved to be one of my best ever days in the hills. Continue reading My Two-Day Walk from Settle to Grassington – Part One

Linking Together Some of the Best of Wharfedale

A few weeks ago, I was puzzling over where to go for a walk. I wanted to do something new, but I’d ruled out doing several of the routes on my “to do” list of hikes in the Yorkshire Dales because I wanted to do them when the conditions were better. After looking over my maps for a while trying to decide which walk I might repeat, I realised that the most interesting option would be to bring together in one hike the highlights of a few different walks. It would be like doing a dot-to-dot puzzle of great limestone features in Wharfedale. This I could do by walking a loop that started and ended in the town of Grassington, and which took in a waterfall, a strid, a gorge, and plenty of limestone pavement. Continue reading Linking Together Some of the Best of Wharfedale