Happy 50th birthday Dales Way - and many more of them.

 

Easy to see why the Dales Way is one of of the UK's most popular walks

March 23rd 2019 was the 50th Anniversary of the first public walk on the Dales Way, the 80 mile walk from Ilkley to the shores of Lake Windermere.  Today around 4,000 walkers a year complete the trail making it one of Britain's most popular long distance paths. 

Our Jess at the start of the Dales Way in Ilkley

The end is in sight

In 1968 an Act of Parliament, the Countryside Act, gave local authorities powers to allow public access to riversides. Members of West Riding Ramblers approached the Countryside Commission and the old West Riding County Council with a plan to create a path that followed the banks of the river Wharfe. The authorities turned down the idea but undaunted WRR went ahead anyway and the idea of the Dales Way was born - a long riverside trail from Ilkley to the source of the Wharfe high on Cam Fell. 

High on Cam Fell

Colin Speakman and the late Tom Wilcock took on the job of surveying and planning the route and Colin went on to write the first guidebook which has been in continuous publication ever since. 

Colin with the 1st and 11th editions of his guidebook

They quickly realised that Cam Fell isn’t a great place to end a walk so continued across the watershed and followed the River Dee down Dentdale and the River Lune from Sedbergh to finish on the shores of Lake Windermere. An 80 mile walk from the edge of the industrial West Riding to the Lake District through the Yorkshire Dales National Park.

The article in the paper

On Monday March 10^th 1969 an article appeared in the Yorkshire Evening Post about this new path inviting readers to join members of the Ramblers Association to walk the first section from Ilkley to Burnsall on Sunday March 23^rd returning by bus. Colin remembers the group expecting a dozen or so walkers. Around 130 turned up and the bus company had to put on extra buses to get everyone back. Sadly no photos survive of the day.

The Dales Way Association is planning a series of events to celebrate the 50th Anniversary year including a recreation of the first walk that Colin will lead. 

You can see them on the website at www.dalesway.org

90 Glorious Miles (or how a Dent farm girl who thought hikers were a pretty odd bunch came to create a long distance walk)

I grew up in Dentdale. My dad was a shepherd and we lived on a farm called Stonehouse, huddled just under Arten Gill viaduct on the Settle Carlisle railway line. 

Under Arten Gill viaduct

Fell walking wasn’t something we did for pleasure in those days though we certainly did plenty of it. Our sheep were on Whernside, the highest of the Yorkshire Three Peaks, and in the days before quad bikes we walked up and down the mountain several times a year, bringing sheep home for lambing, clipping, dipping and tupping.  

Dad feeding sheep

And we certainly met plenty of walkers – the farm was close to the Youth Hostel and we’d giggle at the hikers as we called them trailing past in their orange cagouls heading for their bunkbeds while we went home to watch Top of the Pops in front of a nice warm fire.

So how did a farm girl who thought walkers were a bit bonkers end up creating A Dales High Way - the long distance trail that stretches all the way from Saltaire to Appleby through the Yorkshire Dales National Park?

To find out come and join us at Baildon Methodist Church at 7.30 on Tuesday 11th July where I'll be finishing the story and showing slides from the route as part of Baildon Walkers Are Welcome AGM. 

You don't have to be a member to come along. everyone's welcome at Walkers Are Welcome!

New Friends

On October 27th 2012 I joined a walk along the Dales Way link route from Menston to the start of the trail in Ilkley. It was the Dales Way Association's AGM and the walk was a chance for members to get to know each other before the business meeting in the afternoon. There was a woman walking on her own and she didn't seem to know anyone else but we're a friendly lot and soon she was chatting to other walkers. She told us her name was Eileen and that she'd walked the Dales Way many times with her late partner Roy.

After the meeting Eileen came up to the committee and gave us a substantial cheque. She asked us to use it in memory of Roy to improve the route that he had loved so much. Coming to Ilkley that autumn was the first time Eileen had been in the Dales since Roy had died and an incredibly brave thing to do, to walk with strangers on a route that meant so much to them. 

Eileen made new friends that day and we have seen her every year since and finally the improvements she initiated are finished. On Monday I joined Dales Way committee members and Yorkshire Dales National Park staff at the newly renovated suspension bridge over the river Wharfe at Hebden.

If you are walking on the Dales Way please take a moment to stop and read the little plaque on the side of the bridge and think about Roy and Eileen and the happy times they spent there.