Nine of us set off on this splendid 10 mile and a bit tramp [no bias here from one of the Walk Leaders, of course] around the lower slopes of Wensleydale from Carperby. For the previous week the weather forecast for Sunday had been pretty wretched. But by Saturday night the Beeb were saying the North East might get a bit of rain but they weren’t being particularly dogmatic about it. It was raining at 7am Sunday morning but by the time we had breakfasted, packed our waterproofs and gathered two of our fellow walkers, the roads were dry and the clouds high and scudding along. Not sunny exactly but good walking weather as we say in the SOC. The circular route left the road at the Village Cross end of Carperby and took us across grassy meadows and passed by maturing spoil heaps of long abandoned, once extensive, lead works. One short but slightly stiff climb up to the top of Disher Force and then on across low moor to Askrigg for a welcome drink at the pub and a nice dry picnic bench in the autumn sunshine for luncheon. The afternoon return meandered along the banks of the Ure, roughly along the line of the now long defunct western part of the Wensleydale Railway. The walking was easy and the views along the way were splendid of the ever-present bulk of Penhill and glimpses of the Roman Road going up over Whether Fell out of Bainbridge. Being a low dales walk there were a plethora of narrow stone stiles to negotiate but the nimble membership of SOC found these but a minor inconvenience. We returned to Carperby, after taking in Aysgarth Falls, across a final verdant hay meadow where the team gamely posed either side of a lonely stile as the missing dry stone wall. Thank you, from left to right, Ray, Yvonne, Judith, James, the stile, Mandy, Graham, Patrick and Andrew for your excellent company!
Jane McLennan