Читать книгу The Lune Valley and Howgills. 40 scenic fell, river and woodland walks онлайн

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From the flanks of Green Bell into Great Swindale

Return to the waypost and take the leftmost of the two descending paths, which bypasses left of Stwarth. Stay with the left branch past two more forks, and a track soon develops that winds above the intake wall and finally meets a lane east of Weasdale.

To the left the lane heads down into the small settlement. There, take a bridleway on the right, which leads to Weasdale Nurseries. Keep ahead through a gate beside the front porch of Low Weasdale Cottage, walking forward through a second gate to join Weasdale Beck. Over a footbridge, continue through a gate beside a barn, remaining briefly with the river before moving away across the fields towards the house at Gars. Leave the corner of the penultimate field through the left gate, walking across to a small gate in the property’s rear wall. The Right of Way winds through the yard, or, alternatively, follow the boundary left to the lane. Turn right back to Wath.

WALK 2

Newbiggin-on-Lune

StartRavenstonedale (NY 722 042)Distance6½ miles (10.5km)Time3hrTerrainField paths and disused railwayHeight gain240m (787ft)MapsExplorer OL19 – Howgill Fells and Upper Eden ValleyRefreshmentsBlack Swan at Ravenstonedale, Lune Spring Garden Centre café in Newbiggin-on-LuneToiletsNoneParkingParking in front of St Oswald’s Church

This walk straddles the subtle watershed between Lunesdale and neighbouring Smardale, where Scandal Beck is one of the principal tributaries of the Eden, a northerly flowing river that enters the Solway Firth below Carlisle. The country here is underlain by limestone, its pale grey countenance reflected in the farm buildings, cottages and dry-stone walls that enclose the fields, but brightened in spring and summer by the flowers that abound in the hedgerows and banks. Beginning in Ravenstonedale, the walk crosses the fields to Newbiggin, where a spring is traditionally held to be the source of the Lune. Following the course of a former railway into the pretty valley of Smardale, it returns to the village past medieval earthworks.