Dales Way 2005

Dales Way - the cows and tech info

Prepare beforehand, the cows along the Way are cunning and will sneak up on you without any warning! Not quite as intimidating or ruthless as the infamous Kinder Sheep ( see sheep journal ) but you do need to keep an eye on them.

As this was the first time Liz had walked long distances on consecutive days and the first in many years for me we embarked upon a fitness training regime based around Alfriston in East Sussex - for no particular reason other than the place looked nice when we drove through once. By accident rather than design this proved to be ideal. Plenty of routes so you can build up from easy 7 mile days to the 20 mile plus we were doing by early June.

And as a bonus Alfrison boasts one of the best cafes in the south - Badgers Tea House where we were looked after with big cakes and endless pots of tea after all of our long walks.

We used Brigantes to transfer our luggage from day to day, in retrospect we both took more than we needed due to the luxury of having it carried for us but this did mean that we were prepared for any eventuality weatherwise. Felt very sorry for the old guy having to move the bags each day though!

Socks - Liz ended up using more than anticipated and had to restock (re-sock?)at Grassington, over time we have restricted the make of sock we use to two manufacturers Tholos and Falke - we both find other makes have such a difference betweeen sizes that they do not fit as snuggly as Falke for example.

Food - Generally we managed with the evening meals available locally, either in pubs or cafe's, however both being vegetarian the choice was not as good as we find at home. Best evening meal en-route at The Dalesman Sedbergh. ( Castle Green Hotel, Kendal not eligible as it is technically of route )

During the day we rarely eat whilst walking, a chocolate bar manages to keep us going and this was much the case on the Dales Way. Bought sandwiches once and carried them around for 2 days!

One thing we did notice though was the high prices of eating out along the route, pubs offering basic lunch menus at around  £6 or £7 for a main meal each, in London we can both eat out for that!

Drinks - we always both carry water in hydration pack and one bottle of SIS Electrolite Fluid - you mix this powder with water - a habit from my days cycling but equally adaptable to walking or any activity. You may not think it as you wander along the path but even moderate exercise depletes natural salt and mineral levels, three days consecutively walking without replacing will slow you down both mentally and physically.

Waymarking - easy to follow except for a few bad sections - especially at Cam Houses, but check for diversions before you go by looking at the Dales Way Association website - www.dalesway.org.uk

Route - The Dales Way is a good route to consider for your first Long Distance Path, over easy in places but ideal for newcomers

Timing - we found that a natural cycle evolved starting at 10.00 am we always finished at about 4.00 pm despite the distance covered ( except on last day )

Gear - Boots both of us used our normal 3 season hiking boots, although the weather was good neither of us found these to be too warm, we didn't get blisters. Kev - Zamberlan, Monte Rosa GTX; Liz - Han Weg Lady Puma, blue - but Liz likes them

Waterproofs - although rarely used we both took Berhaus Paclite Overtrousers - these split along the seam with little use and we won't be using Berghaus again.

Trousers - Convertible trousers proved ideal although in the end we were both just using the shorts - Both of us used North Face,  but have since discovered that Mountain Hardwear are better adapted to removing the legs whilst not having to take off boots and are far more comfortable.

Rucksack - Hydration bags - Liz, North Face Hammerhead which has not really been a good choice, the mesh tears easily on the back and the tube separated from the water valve. Kev - Camelbak Trans Alp - top marks for this one!

Guidebooks - we took 3, Terry Marsh - The Dales Way, Paul Hannon - Dales Way, OS The Dales Way. None of them were particular good to follow during the walk and in the end we only used them as reference the night before, preferring just to follow the map.

Maps - Home made strip maps for each days leg printed from Anquet OS 1:25,000 maps

GPS - Garmin Venture, pre loaded with route waypoints. Proved to be very useful 

|  Add to del.icio.us |  digg this

Dales Way June 2005 day 1

Our first Long Distance footpath, 84 miles from Ilkley To Bowness on Windermere

After completing many day walks over weekends and short holidays we looked for our next challenge and decided to walk the Dales Way, one of the established long distance footpaths in the UK but not recognised as an official National Trail.

At 84 miles we thought that we could comfortably do this within 5 or 6 days holiday and then take a second week to explore the Lake District afterwards.

After a little planning in advance over the previous 6 months we had all of our accomodation booked together with the services of a courier to take our luggage from place to place and set off for Kendal, on the edge of the lakes. Although this wasn't the start of the walk we planned to leave the car there, use the facilities of a good hotel - The Castle Green Hotel where we could return to easily on the penulitimate and final days of the walk and retrieve the car.

It was a little strange the next day to be driven by the courier to the Town where the walk starts, Ilkely, thinking that we are going to have to get all the way back by ourselves on foot! A nice evening so we walked onto the moors and disaster almost struck before we had started - Liz fell over twisting her ankle, luckily nothing too serious.

Next morning after a good breakfast we set off in very warm weather but the British climate was going to have something to say about that before the day was out. The first day's walking was very easy but passed through very touristy areas especially Bolton Abbey and the Strid. The warm weather had also brought out all of the weekend drivers and day trippers, parking their cars in the many attractive riverside villages, setting up picnic tables and watching their kids bomb each other in the river, some just about managing a little walk and make it as far as the nearest picnic site, how things would change towards the end of the day!

It was quite easy to spot those other Dales Way walkers setting off en route with a variety of guide books in hand and over the course of the next week we would constantly meet up or pass by the same people either at the beginning and end of the day or at rest spots. It was quite reassuring to know that certain people were heading in our direction and I think that we all looked out for each other in a small way on the route.

Day 1 finished in dramatic fashion, about 5 miles away from Burnsall where we had planned to stop that evening we were caught up in a thunderstorm. Thinking it had passed we carried on, only to be hit again a mile from the B+B, this time it hit hard. Within a minute the car park by the river in Burnsall was completely flooded, people were leaving picnics on the ground running for cars, many to their regret had left sun roofs open.  As we walked into Burnsall the local residents were getting out the sandbags. A car parked in the pub was floating out the driveway. We were wet! Would we ever dry our things out? And it was only Day 1. The owner of the B+B, The Manor House, took care of the boots and luckily the baggage carriers had delivered our cases, so we had plenty of dry gear.

Dales Way June 2005 Day 2 

The weather had improved, although we heard that several towns nearby had been flooded during the night, but it was a nice dry morning as we set off from Burnsall along the banks of the River Wharfe.

15 miles walking ahead of us to Buckden. The walk follows the River pretty much all the way through Grassington and Kettlewell before heading off over the Limestone pavements near Conistone to Starbottom and finally into Buckden.

The Limestone pavement and route through Grassington seemed to cause some confusion to a few people walking ahead of us, luckily we had checked with the Dales Way Association website and noticed that the path had been diverted in recent years so the old guide books weren't all that accurate.

Buckden is a very pretty little village from the outside but that day deep within lurked something particularly unpleasant, it was the Buck Inn and unfortunately we were staying there for the night.

Omens not good when, I attempted to check in, and after standing at the bar for a good 5 minutes waiting for the manager to finish dealing with a sales rep his wife who had been standing behind him walked straight past me as though I was invisible and served someone who had just come in. We were given our room which was on the small side of miniscule unpacked and headed down to the bar to investigate food and drink.

By this time the landlords wife was sneering at the him behind his back and looked completely wasted, we bought a beer but as the food was ridiculously priced - over £20 for a plate of pasta we went into the village to see what else we could find. The owner of a nearby B+B sympathised with our dilema of having to stay at the Buck Inn advising us that the whole village avoided the place and that the corner shop/tea house now did evening meals, which it did so we booked a table for that evening.

Back to the pub for a quick drink and the wife was now going around to all apologising for here bad attitude.

The Village Tea Shop was a terrific find, partly due to the bad state of the Buck Inn the owners had started to open for evening meals, but booking is advisable as most of the B+B's send their guests here as well! Good food and a few of the other customers were also doing the Dales Way, so before long it became very sociable, unfortunately the owners were no longer able to sell their home-made nettle beer due to health and safety rules, a shame as i was particularly looking forward to trying it.

Over dinner we met someone from the Dales Way Association who was doing a monitoring exercise on the route and had planned  to meet a Bishop from the US that evening who was also walking part of the route because his diocese was twinned with one here. Bishop and his assistant duly arrived and many irreverant jokes later we left having enjoyed a wonderful meal and good conversation and headed back to the pub.

Back at the pob and breakfast next day highlighted all the horrors of the place making us thankful that we had found alternative choice of dining the night before. Cold toast and beans and a rock hard poached egg seemed to be the best the chef could offer!

 

Dales Way June 2005 Day 3 

After surviving the measly breakfast and checking out of the Buck Inn we set off in the drizzle and met the Dales Way Association man again outside Hubberholme church, he was doing a survey on the numbers of people doing the walk. We took the opportunity to look around the church - the pews were made by a carpenter known as the 'mouse man' because he carves a little mouse on the finished piece, looking for the mice helped pass timeand as the weather was showing signs of clearing we set off again.

On paper today was the toughest test. No village or settlements on the way and the stretch towards Cam Houses has always been a little boggy. Cam Houses itself is austere and bleak, you get the impression that walkers are not welcome and the owners have sinister secrets to hide. Care has to be taken here as mid bog the path turns right by a barn to go uphill onto a track leading through the houses, signposting at this point is particularly poor and it is too easy to concentrate on the great view of Ingleborough ahead and miss the turn.

After the house the route heads through a section of forest, this forest is being used as a pheasant/grouse breeding and feeding ground and in order to deter walkers the ground has been left churned up, wet and muddy with most signs removed. Eventually you leave the small enclosed forest and briefly join the Pennine Way. Here we met a couple of old ladies slightly eccentric with the eldest wearing wellington boots, she must have been well into her eighties and delighted in telling us that they were walking the Penine Way - all of it, as it had taken them two days to get to this point from Pen Y Ghent we guessed that they were doing it slowly. Unfortunately as the Dales Way/Penine Way crosses the old Roman road the damage caused by 4x4 traffic is only too evident and huge scars blot the landscape and have caused a lot of damage to the historic road, such a shame to be surrounded by the magnificent 3 Peaks - Whernside, Ingleborough and Pen y Ghent only to see at first hand the erosion caused by off road vehicles.

Accomodation for the night was the Station Inn at Ribblehead, we have passed by here before and to be honest didn't like it that much, staying the night was out of necessity rather than choice. The evening views across to Whernside are indeed spectacular and the bath a welcome change from showers, i enjoyed a nice soak and pint of beer but the place itself was dirty and smelt of old damp dogs. It reminded me of an old Black and White film - Lavender Hill Mob or something like that where the gang lodged in a house next to a railway, the room shaking every time a train went past, well the goods trains carried on going along the Carlisle to Settle line next to our window most of the evening.

 

Dales Way June 2005 DAY 4 

The first train trundled past at 5 am.

Today we had decided to amend the route a little and go around the edge of Whernside rather than head back down the road and up Dentdale. There was a good path marked on the map and a second alternative across the top of the railway tunnel to Denthead if our path proved difficult.

This turned out to be the best days walking on the route, yet it wasn't technically part of the Dales Way. We opted for the track going around Whernside and then dropping down into Dent, the views were wonderful and the going relatively easy apart from a few sections of rutted farm tracks. Being away from the main route gave a real sense of remoteness.

By now we knew, by site at least,  most of the other people doing the Dales Way in our little corridor of time, although in a typical British way nobody rarely said more than a few words to each other - there were two young girls who we kept passing early in the morning, the middle aged lady whose friend couldn't join her due to illness and had decided to continue alone, the 'doctors' a young couple at University and a couple from Sheffield who we first met at Bolton Abbey. The 'doctors' and Sheffield couple also set off that morning from Ribblehead but the 'doctors' decided to take the route across the top of the tunnel. A big mistake by all accounts, as we were just leaving a cafe in Dent they wandered down the street arriving about an hour after we had looking really shattered. Fallen trees blocked the path they took and they had got lost.

We left Dent for Sedbergh pleased we had chosen to go over Whernside.

The accommodation tonight made up for the past two disappointments. The Dalesman, not cheap for a pub but the room was like a palace! Great bed, sofa and table. We just dropped our packs and curled up on the sofa drinking tea. Food was good as well!   

 

Dales Way June 2005 day 5

Well over half way now and only a short trip up the road to Kendal where we left the car and 'civilisation'

When I first did the Dales Way over 25 years ago there seemed to be a greater sense of isolation, nowadays you never seem far away from a road, TV or sense of urbanisation. On the whole the route hasn't changed much, RAF Phantom Pilots used to buzz the Yorkshire Dales in the same way the modern day fighter trainers do, it's just that i remember there seemed to be a little bit more space between the concrete edges and the only 4x4 were very posh tractors.

I like Sedbergh, it has the sense of being a town with a link to the past, on one side the Yorkshire Dales, soft slightly sanitised and touristy on the other The Howgills, Wild and unexplored and just appearing in the distance the Lakes. Surprising then that the main West Coast railway and M6 are a stones throw away.

My first trip to Sedbergh ended in disaster, A Backpackers winter club meet wild camping on the Howgills, heavy rain soon swelled the streams and before long the valley we were camping in flooded. That wasn't the bad part, during the evening someone suggested a trip - in the dark, to a pub that was marked on the map on a road at the bottom of the valley below our wild pitch. We were in for a shock when we got there, although the pub name 'The Temperance' should have given us a good clue, a cup of tea and biscuit later we were back in the rain heading for our tents!

Back to the Dales Way, beginning to get a little serious now with some great scenery along the River Lune to the Howgills and the ascent gaining slightly but on thewhole the way is still a valley walk and nothing too testing. One minute you are sitting in a green field with views across the Howgill fells then literally a step over a large stile and you are walking above the M6 - very surreal. Do the drivers below have time to think about what the walkers above them are doing or take in the views? Will our car still be in one piece at the hotel? Do we care? Well yes we do really we have a week planned in the lakes and after 4 days walking in the valleys have just started to warm up for the big hills.

The hills ( and cows ) lie ahead.

At Black Moss Tarn the 'Doctors' passed us again - going in the wrong direction completely lost, unfortunately they were too far away to shout and warn them and besides I for one was just taking in the remoteness and tranquillity of the place. We stopped for a drink and chocolate bar and this time it felt like we were really in the countryside.

Then the cows got us, or more accurately a herd of young heifers. As we came down from the tarn through a field the herd panicked and bolted first towards us and then the drive-way which was gated. The heifers trashed the gate and were off down the road. Luckily even though they had trampled on each other none of them were seriously hurt and we set off for Burneside and the end of that days section.

From Burneside we walked back along the river into Kendal and were reunited with the car, fine food, wine and foot massages.

Although we had another day to go we felt an achievement already in walking back to the place we left 5 days before.

And ....It was great floating in the pool, Liz had her pedicure and the world was a better place.

 

Dales Way June 2005 day 6

 

The last day

Problem with the last day is it is just that - the last day! And that thought played on my mind for most of it, luckily we had another week in the Lakes so it wasn't quite the end of our adventure.

After yesterdays cow experience I was careful not to get too close to any today but it appeared they had different ideas. Had news filtered along the (bo)vine? Cows were beginning to take an unnatural interest in me and I felt as though I was being watched and followed through every field. Perhaps it was something to do with the bright orange camera case I strap to my rucksack?

Well, we went up hills around hills and finally saw the hills, Windermere and the Lakes in the distance, the cows still following and eventually reached the 'seat' outside Bowness dedicated to all those who 'walked the Dales Way'  - AND COWS! the field was full of them heading slowly towards us. Just time for the photo and self congratulation before heading down the street to the edge of Windermere.

Having the seat and therefore the spiritual terminus to the way outside Bowness is a fitting gesture but as it is in the middle of a field on the edge of housing, the full sense of achievement is difficult to achieve. The slightly nervous look on Lizzie's face in the picture of her as she sits on the seat is because just to her left are the cows, getting closer and closer.

 

Unfortunately the only sense of achievement to be realised in Bowness is the relief of getting out of the place as quickly as possible.

The first time I completed the Dales Way the shock of Bowness was more exaggerated than today, then it felt as though this was the first time I had seen other people and roads. I was a friend from school and 4 others who we had met up with along the way, i remember it being difficult to find a cafe that would welcome us in for a cup of tea beacuse theywerea ll doing lunches so we all ended up on the train back towards Manchester brewing tea on a trangia stove and celebrating with a Mars bar. Today the crowds of tourists and really terrible over priced cafes is still a culture shock after 5 days walking.

Liz said 'let's go and find somewhere nice to sit down and have a cup of tea'  Ok so that's down to the station and back to Kendal then?

 

 

Written by kevanliz Link to this entry | Blog about this entry |  Add to del.icio.us |  digg this

This entry has 1 comments: Show Recent | Add your own