Pockley

The valley is wooded with hazel, birch and especially translucent beech. The fresh canopy was brightly lit by the sun, dappled, branch slashed and hot in the clearings. The ground and the slopes were coloured by the flowers, the primrose, orchid, wood sorrel, violets, avens with their drooping heads, stubby blue bugles and some bluebells.

The River Riccal was dry, not a drop, and wild garlic encroached on to its cracked and stony bed. A stoat nipped across our dusty track. We felt the spring shunt into summer.

This valley encourages the stroll and linger, rather than the march.

Since I was last here, a good number of signposts and arrows have been put up by the parks authority to mark the side paths; along one of these, a party laid out a picnic rug in a circle of sunshine.

We stayed on the main thoroughfare and now and then met walkers.

A woman reported a deer, another a ‘black puma’, doubtless in jest, and we told of the stoat and the ants. Riccal Dale is the valley of the ants, worth remembering at your sandwich stop.

Eventually, after we had done a couple of miles up the valley and above the dry riverbed, we could see some water. This is counter-intuitive, because normally rivers have more flow downstream, but there will be water underground, flowing through the cracks and channels and caverns of the limestone.

The river was stationary at first, puddles birdbath deep, but soon there was a rustling flow to refresh the dale.

And here the flowers peaked with acres of bluebells, intensely blue; the “faint honey smell” wrote the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins; “faded denim” suggested nature writer Richard Mabey. There is also a Scout camp and an acre fenced off for pheasants.

Riccal Dale is not a small valley and at the start of the walk it was quite deep and steep sided; by the time we came to leave, it was considerably more of both.

A track leads up Hasty Bank via a farm of that name, 300 feet made steady.

The climb brings the tops and the open, a platform of flat fields inclined to the south. The back lane runs straight for a mile over these, gradually losing 200 feet of height and saturating us with the scene over Ryedale to the Howardian Hills.

The traffic was one farm pickup.

Fact file

Distance: Six miles.

General location: North York Moors.

Start: Pockley.

Right of way: Public.

Dogs: Legal.

Date walked: May, 2010.

Road route: From Helmsley, east on the A170 for one mile, left signed ‘Pockley 1’.

Car parking: Roadside in Pockley.

Lavatories: Helmsley.

Refreshments: Helmsley.

Tourist and public transport information: Helmsley TIC 01439 770173.

Map: Drawn from OS North York Moors Western OL26.

Terrain: Valley.

Difficulty: Moderate.

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

When in doubt look at the map. Check your position at each point.

Keep straight on unless otherwise directed.

1. Road south to end of village, pass barn at end on your left.

2. Hedged track on right by small parking area (fingerpost).

3. Path on left down into wood (no sign), 100 yards, gate (waymark).

4. Footbridge over River Riccal, up bank for 100 yards. Right to main track. Ignore all side turns.

5. At plank bridge on left (waymarked post), fork right downhill on good track and pass tin shelter to your right after 200 yards. Track swings left, ignore a ford on right. Cross Scout camp field, path into trees, 100 yards, gate (waymark), 200 yards.

6. Footbridge over River Riccal, uphill by barns, pass house to your right, join track, 200 yards.

7. Right to track steep uphill (link waymark on gatepost). Track loops left at top (fingerpost), 100 yards, fieldgate (waymark) and right to track across field.

8. Fieldgate and right to road back to Pockley.