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The Route

Once a remote corner of the North Riding of Yorkshire and part of the ancient Forest of Teesdale in which deer roamed freely, the area that the walk passes through now lies entirely within the county of Durham. Middleton-in-Teesdale is the largest town hereabouts, formerly a local centre of lead-mining activities.

From a long trail of boulders, it is possible to chart the course of the glacier that fashioned this region more than 10,000 years ago. It swept over gaps from the Eden valley, the Lake District and even the south of Scotland, carrying Shap granite and Borrowdale lava as far as the mouth of the Tees, where an accumulation of granite pinpoints what must have been the terminal moraine of the Tees glacier.

The walk begins from a parking and picnic area at Bowlees. From here take a nearby footbridge and walk through Bowlees to the main road. There, opposite the telephone box, take to a clear path towards woodland flanking the unseen River Tees. Once in the woodland, a clear path leads down to cross the river by Wynch Suspension Bridge. The original Wynch Bridge was built in 1704 for miners, but it collapsed in 1820 and had to be rebuilt 10 years later.