Fact file

Distance: Six miles.

Time: Three hours.

Start: Halton Gill.

Right of way: The complete route is along public rights of way, permissive paths and through open access areas.

Date walked: Saturday, September 23, 2000.

Road route: Ten miles north-west of Grassington.

Car parking: Gravelled parking area - honesty box. More space on Stainforth/Settle road in open access area.

Lavatories: None.

Refreshments: None.

Tourist & Public Transport Information: Grassington TIC 01756 752774

Map: Based on OS Outdoor Leisure 30, Yorkshire Dales northern and central areas.

Terrain: Valley and upland grassland.

Footwear: Walking boots.

Points of interest: Open access areas. Remoteness.

Difficulty: Moderate in fine weather.

Dogs: Suitable for dogs but keep on leads or under close control.

Weather forecast: Evening Press and recorded forecast 0891 500 418

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

Directions

1 From car park, Settle/Stainforth road, bridge and right to riverside path (gates, squeezers, stiles).

2 Left to lane/track (ignore 'private' sign), pass two bridges, track swings left over Beck at third, 150 yards.

3 Track on left at houses (access area info plaque), 50 yards, fieldgate on left, track down to bridge over stream.

4 Right to riverside path, 50 yards, gate to open access area.

5 Route option after crossing fallen wall - 10 o'clock uphill to trees/rocky outcrop and then rough path parallel to Foxup Beck.

6Wire fence down to Foxup Beck ends access area, turn left uphill to gate at top corner of fence (waymark), 2 o'clock uphill across rough ground.

7 At fieldgate turn left to good grassy/stony track. Wooden fieldgate. Track swings left downhill to metal fieldgate, track at 10 o'clock.

8 Metal fieldgate (3-way signpost) and right uphill to blue-topped post. Fieldgate.

9 Gate to open access area (info board on gate). Route option, path at 1 o'clock up to Galena Pot then grassy contour path, cross road, explore access area (with limestone pavement), back to road, right downhill back to Halton Gill.

HALTON Gill is in the outer limits, the western Dales. Pick a fine day, but not one likely to be busy with motorists doing the Sunday drive round Pen-y-ghent via Settle. If you have to reverse up paintwork-tight against a stone wall for the twentieth time, sympathy with the obvious irritation on the faces of the farmers will be inevitable.

Every twenty miles and every change of landscape brought different weather. One hopes for the best, and Littondale reputedly has a good microclimate. Farmers were out shopping, recycling machinery at a farm sale. Eventually, I reached the lovely little hamlet of Halton Gill.

For a mile I strolled along the river, the water the colour of weak tea, the short grass firm underfoot. Foxup has almost as many charming little bridges as houses, and here we fork off, along its beck, and into a wonderful open access area. You can tell by the gates en route, awkward or knotted up with twine, that hardly anyone walks here. Do it, before the access agreement ends at the end of September in 2003, in case the Right to Roam fails.

The valley is quite narrow and steep sided, so you do not see out, but it's full of interest. The main visual line is the beck, entertaining water punctuated by dozens of waterfalls, constant music, scurrying runs, gushing springs, a strid, islands, pools, a cave, ferns and mosses, one or two trees. This is limestone land, water appearing, water disappearing, underground gurgling. Anyone paranoid about the odd hole had better give it a miss.

A grey heron was disturbed on its lunchtime patrol, a raptor lumbered over on heavy broad wings, a soft warm wind funnelled up the valley.

Halton Gill is at a thousand feet. Add up all the waterfalls, then add a final rough two hundred feet and we hit a presentable fifteen hundred.

Now there is good grassy track, miles of easy walking with great views. There are no houses, farms or barns, just the slopes of Horse Head, big, bare and beautiful, a square mile in sunshine, a square mile in cloud shadow.

After a while you look down on Halton Gill snuggled tight under the slopes of Horse Head. There's an eye-catching fan shape of walls, then losing a little height, it's time for a meander through access area number two.

Here is Calena Pot, and the Red Dot Pots and Flamethrower hole. An ancient field system is identifiable as the land looking least suitable for a field, and there are long views down Littondale. It's a valley famous for flowers, a bit late for this, but perfect for their colourful fungi replacement. A lass zig-zagged between the limestone pavement collecting her supper in a Morrisons bag. I warned her about the Red Dot Pots.