Country walk around Sinnington

The visitor is welcomed and well organised with benches, honesty box parking and a sign reading Help Us. The purple Himalayan balsam along the river bank needs ordering out.

We set off up river and for the rest of the walk alternated nicely between woodland and the open. Between the cool, all-greens of dappled light and the sun-baked flower-bright borders of the tracks, where fireweed swayed in the hot dry south-westerly and swallows swept barley fields.

This route is on the southern foothills of the North York Moors and in the National Park, and is well set with signs and comfortable with smooth surfaces.

But foothills it is, up and down, and for the first leg it is up, topping out with a stretch through the southern fields of Appleton-le-Moors. Every plan shape of Appleton-le-Moors is long and narrow; it stands in its medieval layout. From the single arrow straight street, the gardens lead off behind the houses, plots longer than allotments, flowers, fruit and veg to envy; then at right angles cuts Back Lane, the medieval back lane, and then long narrow fields, ours ran for half a mile.

This dropped us into a wood where the hazel had been recently coppiced and, at the bottom, a field laid with a circle of trunks, branches and logs with at the centre the charcoal maker’s lidded steel kilns.

A modern bridge spared us the fords near Appleton Mill Farm, though the water was so very low and in pools covered autumnally with blown leaves.

In Coppy Wood, as in coppice wood, the ground was strewn with the pale straw stalks of faded garlic, ready to drop dark seeds under the oak, ash and hazel.

The next open space was rather strange. It’s a good curvy and atmospheric shape with the river one side and high woods the other, but it is not in good shape. The field is a Countryside Stewardship Site, thus grant funded to “protect and improve the countryside”. It is not sown with any crop, is not a pasture, and is not a meadow. It is rank grasses, thistles and most notably ragwort. Ragwort, though sparkly yellow flowered, is the most significant of the five species covered by the 1959 Weeds Act as it poisons livestock.

A dragonfly explored 100 yards from the river. Quarry faces are of limestone and ivy and we were finished.

Now the green in Sinnington bore the dozen cars of the afternoon walkers, all I’m sure having fun, and there were notes under the windscreen wipers politely reminding of the honesty box. It costs the parish £400 a year to maintain the green.

Fact file

Distance: Four miles.

General Location: North York Moors.

Start: Sinnington.

Right of Way: Public.

Dogs: Legal.

Date walked: July 2010.

Road Route: Sinnington is just off the A170.

Car parking: On the green, honesty box.

Lavatories: None.

Refreshments: The Moors Inn at Appleton-le-Moors and the Fox & Hounds at Sinnington.

Tourist & Public Transport Information: Pickering TIC 01751 473791.

Map: Drawn from OS Explorers OL26 and OL27 North York Moors western and eastern.

Terrain: Riverside and hills.

Difficulty: All weather.

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

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 From village green with maypole, road over River Seven and immediately right to riverside track (bridleway). Fieldgate/gap.

2 Gate/gap (‘Path to Appleton’) on right to path through wood. Small footbridge.

3 Fieldgate into field and 11 o’clock down to gate (waymark), left to track uphill by hedge to your left, 3 successive fieldgates.

4 Into Appleton-le-Moors, pavement, 300 yards, at bench take track on right between houses (Public Footpath sign), 20 yards, gate, path between gardens.

5 Gate (waymark) and left to grassy back lane for 20 yards, stile on right (waymark) to fieldedge track.

6 At corner, path down into wood (no sign), left at bottom of wood, 10 yards, fieldgate, 20 yards, right to metalled drive. When farm to your right, gate on left on corner (blue waymark) and by hedge to right, 150 yards.

7 Over large arched footbridge (waymark), immediately left to gate (waymark) 200 yards and right to track/path at junction (fingerpost Sinnington),fieldgate (waymark), fieldgate (waymark) and into wood, uphill.

8 At close together path junctions ignore left uphill, 5 yards, right downhill and ignore a left after 10 yards. Near bottom and before fieldgate, left to path in wood edge.

9 Gate into field (waymark), 100 yards, angle down to path across flat riverside field. Join path into wood and above river, straight on at junction (3-way fingerpost), join road to green.