A couple of weeks ago three of us walked another section of the Lady Anne Way. This is a long distance path which runs from Skipton to Penrith in Cumbria, 100 miles altogether, we’re doing it in little chunks! We walked the first two sections last month, this time we jumped a head and walked part five, it’s all to do with how many cars we have available and whether we can use public transport. This section definately needed two cars, so it was a good one to do with three of us.

It was a very misty morning when we set off, but it was one of those mists you know will burn off to a glorious day and if you can get above the cloud level it’s stunning.

We drove up to the top end of Wharfedale, through Buckden, up the steep hill past Cray and over the tops to Bishopdale. I’ve driven this way many times and the view when you first see Bishopdale is I think one of the best in the dales, unfortunately it’s on a very steep, bendy road where there is no where to stop to take a photo!

We drove to Worton in Wensleydale, a little village where the day’s walk would end. We parked a car and then all piled into the second car and retraced our steps over the tops. The mist was just starting to lift and Wensleydale looked beautiful.

We parked by the wonderfully named Hell Gate, just above the hamlet of Cray. Our walk was mainly along old drovers lanes and after a sharp climb up it was interesting to look back to where it joined the tarmacced road over to Bishopdale, you could imagine how they were just as important as each other once.

As we climbed on to the moorland, Wharfedale still had wisps of mist and looked hazy in the morning light.

We realised as we walked along that we could just see all of Yorkshire’s Three Peaks, their summits just peeping over the skyline, Pen-y-ghent, Ingleborough and Whernside. I’ll hopefully be on the top of Pen-y-ghent tomorrow! If you’re still looking for the third peak, I did say just peeking over!!

At this time of year the moors have lots of ground nesting birds, there were lots of lapwings but we didn’t see any curlews. Once when we were walking at this time of year we saw a lapwing do the classic distraction technique of pretending to be injured to lead us away from her nest, she hopped along with a wing dragging just ahead of us. It was fascinating to watch.

We followed old green lanes for most of the walk, these tracks will have been there for centuries, I love that feeling of history as we walk along them. This one is called Busk Lane.

The views from the top over Wensleydale and the hills beyond were amazing. If you look closely the sheep has a tiny lamb hiding underneath her.

As we started to descend into Wensleydale, Addlebrough hill really stood out, it had such a distinctive shape. Apparently there was a Roman fort on the top. What puzzled me is that I’ve had many, many holidays in Wensleydale as my mum had a cottage just a couple of miles further down for about twenty years, but I’ve never noticed Addlebrough before, I can only think it’s other side looks completely different!

Walking further down into Wensleydale we got a brief glimpse of Semerwater, I think it’s the second largest natural lake in Yorkshire and it’s only little, but it’s very pretty, as are the cute lambs!

Wensleydale is very different to Wharfedale, it’s a much softer landscape. We meandered down the farm track until we reached the road that would lead us back to Worton.

I was pleasantly surprised by this walk, having driven over from Wharfedale to Bishopdale many times in the past it can be a pretty bleak landscape, it could have seemed endless, but we had an amazing walk, the scenery was stunning, the tracks were good, we did around 8 miles altogether, a great day out.