Medlock Valley Way Return

Distance: 12 miles
Ascent :
Weather: hot and sunny

We walked back home from Manchester along the Medlock Valley Way, stopping for a long lunch and a rest under a tree at Park Bridge.

I had a horrible hangover.

Pennine Way Summary

Total distance: 285.5 miles over 16 days


Our accommodation list:

Edale: Rambler Inn
Crowden: Peels Arms
Standedge: Carriage House
Hebden Bridge: Hare and Hounds
Haworth: Old Silent Inn
Malham: Buck Inn
Horton in Ribblesdale: Crown Hotel
Hawes: Bulls Head Hotel
Keld: Keld Lodge
Middleton in Teesdale: Teesdale Hotel
Langdon Beck: Landon Beck Hotel
Dufton: New Inn
Alston: The Cumberland Hotel
Greenhead: Samson Inn
Bellingham: Cheviot Hotel
Byrness: Forest View Inn
Kirk Yetholm: The Border Hotel

Pennine Way Day Sixteen - Byrness to Kirk Yetholm

Distance: 28 miles
Ascent: 1440m
Weather: sunny and warm

We were up at 5 and away about quarter to 6. We went back along the track that runs parallel to the road, munching pastries. Just before we headed uphill, we had a brief stop for Rob to put some padding on his bruised ankle. The birds were singing loudly and the midges were out in force.

A very wet muddy, slippy path up leads straight up the hillside through forestry. It was quite hard work and a bit of a shock to the system first thing in the morning.

Byrness Hill is the start of a grassy ridge that runs along the border between England and Scotland. Along the way, we discussed bog avoidance tactics, as there is a 'horrible' bog at Houx Hill which had been much mentioned by various people we'd met along the Way - often in sentences including 'up to my knees' and 'mountain rescue helicopter.' We'd seen on a website that improvements were to be made there and were hopeful that they might have begun. We needn't have worried, we got there to find a beautiful paved path weaving it's way through the mire.

Away from Houx Hill the ground becomes drier, and there are wooden duck boards over Ogre Hill. The ogre appears to have ripped up all the trees and left them in big piles of sawdust.

Through the tree stumps, a posse of angry small birds was chasing off a cuckoo. We passed a lichen covered signpost; eventually managing to decifer the words The Heart's Toe. Sadly too far off route to go and investigate what that could be.

The path goes around a Roman fort and medieval village (remains of) which looks big and impressive on the map but is just grassy lumps. There are strange signs around saying archaeological sites with symbols for no digging, no vehicles and no flame throwers.

A sharp corner is turned up Dere Street, a Roman Road, which we followed a while before turning off over a bridge and contouring around Wedder Hill, where we saw some feral goats with lots of little bleaty kids.

We are quite close to another military range here, and heard the sounds of guns but didn't see any of the promised pyrotechnics.

We veered off the right path slightly and came down a Goat trod to get back on track. It was about 10 o'clock and getting warm. The weather was forecast to be good today so we'd brought extra water with us.

Stopped at hut, more running repairs on Rob's ankle and I put my spare inner sole into my left shoe to cushion it a bit.

We met up with another Pennine Wayfarer, who walked with us for a few miles. Most of the afternoon, we followed a line of stone flags over moorland.

I startled a grouse and her chicks,  they all rose up out of the ground and scattered in all directions, the mother squawking and not knowing which way to run.

The path took us over Lamb Hill, Beefstand Hill, Mozie Law. At Windy Gyle the trig point raised up strangely on a pile of rubble. Not sure why, maybe they measured it wrong.

More stone flags down and across moors, following the fence border, and a steep peaty slope up (stopping for a snack at a rock near the top) from King's Seat to junction above Hanging Stone where we decided to make the excursion to The Cheviot, which is more stone flags with one peaty, very muddy step. A quick photo and back.

On the way back, there was a phone incident and I had to go back 50 yards to look for it.

Getting back to the Pennine Way, we crossed the rocky top of Auchope Cairn and had a very steep descent down to a hut, using our walking poles for the first time on the walk. Then back up to 600m to the top of The Schil, via bogs.

Down gentler descent to Corbie Crag on Black Hag, crossed fence that was a bit worse for wear (at the last difficult muddy bit) and down a gently winding grassy track into the valley.

Saw hares, bunnies and a big deer fence.

The last mile or so is down a mercifully smooth lane down into Kirk Yetholm with one (seemingly) last steep bit of road up and down, just when you have started thinking you've finished, and we came to the green in Kirk Yetholm outside The Border Hotel and the end of the Pennine Way.

Pennine Way Day Fifteen: Bellingham to Byrness

Distance: 16 miles
Ascent: 500m
Weather: damp start, mostly dry, heavy rain shower late on

Rooks, Partridges, Skylarks, pippets, yellow green birds (possibly siskins)
Deer: 1
Bunnies: none!

The Pennine Way heads out of Bellingham on a road and then follows a track up to and through a farm, before leaving the tarmac and crossing the grassy fields. It was humid and cloudy and the route took a pleasant path (bit wet underfoot but firm) through heather over to Whiteley Pike where we stopped for first lunch and a sit down.The route to the lane at Gunstone is described as stone slabs slowly sinking into the bog. The slabs have been relaid since, but it looks like some are heading towards the same fate.

The path over Padon Hill (south and north) was quite rocky and a bit slippy, dropping down to a fence and some properly submerged slabs. Gorless Crag was muddy, wet and steep. At the top we headed around Rumblingsike Bog, following the boundary stones, where it was muddy, wet and flat.

There was a section of very wet forest, before we emerged on to a wide track that goes straight through Redesdale Forest. There were beautiful views over the forest, with patches of blue sky and atmospheric dark clouds. Eventually the atmosphere began to fall, so we put our waterproofs on, narrowly avoiding being mown down by a huge forestry truck.

A muddy path lead around to the River Rede and into Byrness. We are at the Forest View Inn, where the service has been excellent and we've even had our socks washed for us. Brave man.

Pennine Way Day Fourteen - Gilsland to Bellingham

Distance: 24 miles
Ascent: 1150m
Weather: Rain

Dipper, swans, housemartin flying in and out of nest
Wild strawberry, Orchids
Moments of bog related anxiety: 3
Bunnies: 2
Path uncertainty: a bit

We rejoined the Vallum this morning, it was liberally coated in sheep poo, and followed the Hadrian's Wall national trail for the morning. It took a bit longer than I was expecting, because it is considerably harder going than I expected. There are a lot of ups and downs, quite steep in places. The sight of the wall leading over the crags in the clouds into the distance was very impressive.

We briefly stopped at Walltown, which was an old quarry - where they dug out the dolerite to make roads again, this time taking part of the wall as well. This went on until the 1940s when someone noticed and put a stop to it.

The Pennine Way has been moved up to join the Hadrian's Wall path, it used to run along what is now marked on the map as The Roman Military Way. That is lower, and has less ascent, but no doubt is boggy.

We turned off north at Turret 37A and were immediately welcomed back to the Pennine Way with a muddy hillside down into a cow field with some ankle deep 'bog' water to wade through. And thus it began.

We alternated between moors (Bog) and forestry tracks (wet) and eventually made it to a road. Not necessarily the right road, but it was solid so we walked along it. The Way caught up with us very soon, and we crossed some farmland, with some slightly upset cows, down to a little stream that was quite a torrent, and had to jump over it. It was wide but manageable.

The last few fields into Bellingham were wet but the path was quite clear, right up until we realised that the signposts on the ground are different from the map, so we followed the old route into town.

We are staying at The Cheviot Hotel, which has fine porter and fine burgers and hopefully the roof won't leak on our heads during the night.

Pennine Way Day Thirteen - Alston to Gilsland

Due to a technical problem with the Blogger App, the entire post that I'd written for today is stuck in publishing limbo and it doesn't appear to be possible (even for the Sheep Trods' Head of Technical Stuff) to recover it. So with the aid of maps and photos, here's what we remember.

Distance: 19 miles
Ascent: 600m
Weather: fair

The Pennine Way is joined by Isaac's Tea Trail out of Alston, northwards out of town and up on to the moors. Isaac Hardy was apparently an 'itinerant' tea trader and notable Victorian who came from these parts - whether he liked walking or not I am not sure but he now has a trail named after him.

Along the valley by the South Tyne River there is another footpath, the South Tyne Trail, which many people use instead as it goes along a disused railway line (now opened again for tourist steam trains, although we didn't see any engines running today) along the valley floor rather than wiggling around over the moors to end up at the same place. Over breakfast this was suggested to us as a good option "unless you are purists." We appear to be sticklers purists. We got to see Whitley Castle, a Roman Fort, which has extensive ditches and fortifications, cows and sheep.

Throughout the morning we saw a lot of other walkers, almost all of them from afar, on other paths or lanes, studiously avoiding the Pennine Way. Across one field, where the fingerpost clearly pointed the way diagonally across the field the grass meadow had clearly not been walked through in weeks and one of the stone step stiles had a big cobweb across it. At Merry Knowe you get to go through the backyards of a row of stone cottages, climbing over stone walls between each one, which was quite amusing.

A short detour at lunchtime took us to The Kirkstyle Inn where we had baguettes,chips and a pint each - which may not have been a good idea as I felt a bit bleary for the rest of the afternoon.

A straight path follows the Maiden Way Roman Road (course of) by a wall, and the going was good, mostly along a nice grassy path and into pretty valleys. Leaving the Roman road, we headed into Hartleyburn Common, where the Way leads between Round Hill and Cross Rig. We were following a nice track which lead us straight into the middle of a bog. Four wet feet later, we made it to higher, firmer ground on Blenkinsopp Common.

The Pennine Way leads to Greenhead to meet the Hadrian's Wall footpath, which is also a national trail. It is very popular so we'd booked accommodation in Gilsland, 1 mile west at Mile Castle 48. We left the PW at the Vallum (big ditch) at Haltwhistle Golf Club and followed a public footpath down to meet Hadrian's Wall. The footpath lead through a cow field and through a farm yard, muddying our shoes nicely just before we got to the pub. We stayed at the Samson Inn, named after the train - it is right next to the railway line. There are a lively mix of tourists, history buffs and dart players.

Pennine Way Day Twelve - Dufton to Alston

Distance: 21.5 miles
Ascent: 1140m
Weather: cloudy
Humming snipe, golden plovers, curlews, hebridian sheep, geese in the mist, goats, millions of bunnies and chickens.

As we were leaving the New Inn, they were getting ready for a busy day preparing for the Appleby Horse Fair - by moving the furniture and taking all the pictures off the walls.

The way back to Dufton didn't seem so far this morning, as we knew what to expect and how to avoid the swampy lake obstruction. In Dufton, there was a disparity between our map route and the guide book, so we it may be that we took a short cut, but it wasn't deliberate.

A wood lined footpath headed up on the moors, becoming a track through sheep fields. There were a couple of young sheep headbutting and scampering, who turned to look at us all innocence as we passed.

The Pennine Way turns off the track just through a gate with a stream and becomes a rocky path in the grass. A steep climb took us up to Green Fell, Knock Hush and into the clouds. The streams up here are called Hushes, from when there was mining for lead in the area. Dunfell Hush is marked as disused, so does that mean that the others are still in use? There are a lot of old mine workings and shafts. And Shake Holes. So many Shake Holes.

We passed the Knock Old Man cairn and walked over The Heights, Great Dunn Fell (which apparently has a big white radar dome on the top, we just saw the bottom of a couple of masts and some funny looking blobby things.)

A stone flagged path leads down towards Little Dunn Fell (where I thought we were at Cross Fell but we weren't) and then over some streams and up on to Cross Fell. There was bad visibility and we followed the map and a line of cairns to the shelter.

We had lunch at the shelter (with good company) and then followed the map and line of cairns off the summit.

The clouds began to clear as we descended, and apart from a few rain showers, it was dry most of the day. There were some impressive Cumulonimbus clouds and little patches of blue sky. A clear track lead down into Garrigill (where the shop and pub are shut down but they do have nice public loos) and then we walked alongside the South Tyne River (which you get to through a very strange scrap yard / chicken farm / rabbit sanctuary place) and though meadow fields until we got to Alston. You can tell you are getting near town by the amount of dog poo on the paths.

We are at the Cumberland Hotel in Alstom, which is nice. I have had a Bewcastle Brown Ale and Rob is having Yates. We have seen some horse and traps go by and there are quite a few horses in the field at the back. Again it seems that we've been lucky with the weather, as there are some cyclists here who've come from Penrith and it rained most of the way.