Here for the beer

Beer and walking boots were the order of the day in Rosedale Abbey where a pair of size 13s hung over a brand new 'Inn Way' signpost.

Andy Wilson, the boss of the North York Moors National Park Authority, confidently cut the laces and author Mark Reid's boots came crashing down to launch the fingerpost into the local walking stratosphere.

Encouraging this, the most sustaining of all hangover cures, Andy Wilson said the newly signposted 89-mile route would bring people into the healthy countryside, bring in commerce and keep jobs in Rosedale and bring in beer, that 'good British tradition', and he eulogised the 'excellent' Landlord and Black Sheep.

After a stint at the Milburn Arms we staggered off, the sun high for haymaking, to do a bit of Mark Reid's route (backwards).

Abbey remnants, the River Seven, a sandstone trod, and a caravan site - all passed in a blur, then we found the main route, Daleside Road, a back lane that leads to the hamlet of Thorgill and then becomes a track that pushes further up the west side of Rosedale.

This is an ace few miles. A contour at a breezy distance above the valley floor, on a stone-walled, farm-studded line that separates the rough from the smooth, the cultivated from the steepness and the crags.

We took a summer siesta among the purple foxgloves, watched the clouds shape in the sky and gazed across the valley to the eye-catching pattern of 16 large, dark, sandstone arches where 19th century miners burnt the local ironstone to lighten it for its rail trip to hungry blast furnaces in Middlesbrough.

Eventually, near the head of the valley, we had to part company with the 'Inn Way'. It enjoys another eighty or so miles of the best of the moors, Farndale, Bransdale, Bilsdale, Levisham, Egton, Hawnby, starting and finishing at Helmsley, six stages with overnight and midday stops at watering holes of repute.

We took deep draughts, of water, and dropped down to the River Seven, gave way to a flock of sheep and then headed down the valley. Lapwings stood in cut fields, kestrels kept to the sky and then at miners' cottages turned holiday homes we slipped into cool woods for a carpet of needles, the scent of resin and the flash of a lizard.

North Dale showed up next, a lovely valley with a fine farmstead, and we fed with this valley back into Rosedale, a mile of views, stream, grassland, cricket pitch and the promise of a pint.

Fact file

Distance: Six and a half miles.

Time: Three or four hours.

General location: North York Moors.

Start: Rosedale Abbey.

Right of way: The complete route is along public rights of way.

Date walked: Friday June 17 2003.

Road route: North from the A170 at Wrelton. Moorsbus route.

Car parking: Two free public car parks either side of the Milburn Arms.

Lavatories: Near the more central of the car parks.

Refreshments: Inns and teashops

Tourist and public transport information: Pickering TIC 01751 473791. National Park Info Point at the Abbey Stores, Rosedale Abbey, 01751 417 475.

Map: Based on OS Explorer OL26 North York Moors western area.

Terrain: Valley.

Points of interest: The Inn Way To The North York Moors by Mark Reid costs £7.95, published by Innway Publications, www.innway.co.uk

Book your nights at the inns in good time, the Inn Way is already popular.

Difficulty: Moderate.

Dogs: Suitable.

Weather Forecast: Evening Press and recorded forecast 0891 500 418.

Directions

When in doubt look at the map.

Check your position at each point.

Keep straight on unless otherwise directed.

1.From village green, path between school-yard and church (signed), cross road, cross campsite (path by fence), bridge over River Seven, steps up, stone flags diagonally across field, right to lane.

2.Ladderstile on left, 25 yards, fieldgate on right then 11 o'clock across fields then by walls/hedges (fieldgates & stiles).

3.Right to track and left to road which soon turns to track (gated).

4.Pass conifer wood, track slopes down - ignore left fork uphill, 150 yards, fieldgate to grassy track in field.

5.Right to tarmac, becomes road, right at junction.

6.Track on left uphill (signed bridleway), 150 yards, track on right, skirts below house and gardens, immediately gate on left to path through woods, crosses stream.

7.Ignore right fork downhill at waymarked post. Right to road, 25 yards, track on left, 25 yards, left to track, 100 yards downhill, grassy track on right immediately before fieldgate (waymark). Turns to path gently descending at 11 o'clock.

8.Left to road, 20 yards, right and down to footbridge over beck, immediately 30 yards up slope, diagonally across field corner to footbridge, stream, gate and contour through next two fields then fieldgate, 1 o'clock down to ladderstile and beckside path back to Rosedale Abbey.

Please observe the Country Code and park sensibly. While every effort is made to provide accurate information, walkers set out at their own risk.

Click here to view a map of the walk

Updated: 15:30 Friday, June 27, 2003