Читать книгу The North York Moors. 50 walks in the National Park онлайн

38 страница из 57

Leave Lockton and its little youth hostel by heading for the A169 road, as if going directly to Saltergate. If arriving by bus, the bus stop is beside the main road. Cross the main road to enter a field. Don’t follow the grassy track alongside it, but strike diagonally right across the field. If there is no trodden path, keep to the right of a pylon to find a track leading down through a gate. Go down the track into a wood and pass through a couple more gates. Watch carefully, as the route avoids Staindale Lodge in the following manner: turn right as marked up a grassy slope, turn right up an access road to a gate and stile, turn left to follow a track through a wood, then just before reaching a cattle grid, turn left to cross a stile and walk down to Staindale Lodge. Keep to the right of outbuildings, cross a ladder stile and turn right along a track.

Follow a grassy path through Holm Woods, then continue walking through meadows in Stain Dale. Use power line poles as guides when looking ahead to spot gates and stiles. Pass to the right of buildings at Low Staindale, then climb a little to find a grassy track and follow it down to ford a stream. Turn left to go through a kissing gate and enter little Dovedale, with its ancient oak woodland and flower-rich grasslands. Cross a little footbridge over Dovedale Griff and walk along the grassy floor of the dale. Cross another little footbridge and follow a stone-paved path up a ridge called Needle Point, which is sparsely wooded, with a lush ground cover of heather and bilberry. The path levels out and runs through a groove in the heather, then a sandy path leads to the Bridestones, at around 200m (655ft). Turn right here, away from the oddly sculpted rocks, to follow the path into a little valley full of birch and bushy bilberry. Climb uphill a little and swing right to pass more curious outcrops, including the deeply undercut, top-heavy Pepperpot.