The Hubby wanted to climb a big hill to touch a far flung trig point, but I wasn’t in the mood. The Dog was due a walk but she wouldn’t be able to do 6 miles up a 2,000 ft hill, so Daughter, me and The Dog took the low road, dropping him and Daughter’s partner off in the village of Barbon for their walk while we continued on up the valley of Barbondale before eventually dropping into Dentdale.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dent,_Cumbria
https://www.visitcumbria.com/yd/dentdale/
We parked up in the main car park on the edge of the village of Dent, a charming huddle of stone cottages, paid for a ticket, wrapped up well and headed along the cobbled street, down a pathway through the churchyard and onto the road out on the other side. We walked down to the bridge and dropped down to the the riverside. We let The Dog off lead and began to follow the route we had plotted on our OS map.
Dentdale is probably my second favourite dale after Swaledale. It is just stunning – the pretty traditional village of Dent nestling at the bottom of a wide valley with farmhouses dotted all around, the fell sides rearing up on either side. It is just beautiful and so so quiet. Though it is in the county of Cumbria, it is part of the Yorkshire Dales National Park, after that organisation’s recent expansion and therefore comes under their protection. It really does confuse the tourists!
We hugged the river. The cloud was high and there was a hint of sunshine trying to push through. We wandered through gates and over stiles, across fields, spotting sheep and their young lambs. There was a definite a feeling of spring in the air and it was a lovely stroll through gorgeous countryside.
We found ourselves walking down a cobbled path that started to look more like an overflow for the river than a footpath, so much so that we wondered if we had taken a wrong path, but checking, we were on course. A bridge appeared and it looked like that we would waddle underneath it, but suddenly the path veered left and up and we ended up level with the bridge! Rather relieved, we crossed the bridge and came to some stepping stones crossing the river. This walk was getting exciting! There were probably about 10 stones, but the river wasn’t particularly deep – if you fell in, you would just get rather wet boots. We couldn’t see the last stone, fearing it had been washed away so Daughter decided to investigate and trotted across. The Dog took the easy route and strolled purposely into the water, supping water as she did, despite the cold. She has always loved water so any excuse to get in it. Daughter reported back – stone is there, just slightly submerged and all is good. We crossed it without incident and The Dog waded, looking pleased with herself.
We were now on the other side of the river and hadn’t gone very far when we noticed that the river had gone silent. We glanced down and just saw a dry river bed covered in cobbles of varying sizes. We looked back and could just about see water in the distance. We just stood and stared. How did that happen? One minute a flowing stream, next dry as a bone! We carried on intrigued, searching for evidence and figuring out the reason. Suddenly we spotted pools of water and then a flow of water! We couldn’t access the riverbed as it was fenced off, but between the trees we spotted what looked like a sinkhole and the water trickling down. Ah ha! It looked like it all disappeared underground for a while. We considered the idea of a water table feeding the river and it had dropped – February had been quite a dry month. Later while studying our maps in depth in a warm cosy cafe, we discovered the area to have quite a few limestone caves. Limestone is a porous stone, so there would be many escape routes for the water. It all started to make sense.
We reached the halfway stage – we crossed a wooden bridge and had a bit of a pull, up a hill, getting our hearts working. The Dog was on lead as there were sheep in the field, either with lambs or on the verge of giving birth. Despite being nearly 15, The Dog’s inner collie emerges and she has the urge to round up creatures, including humans. Farmers have every right to shoot your dog if they are worrying livestock in any way. Today, The Dog decided to stick to her Labrador character, be the perfect hound and ignored them completely. We then came to a ladder stile with a rung missing, so The Dog was unceremoniously manhandled to the platform on top (she’s not impressed with this treatment) and was preparing to leap down the other side before I managed to catch her (she’s so impatient) and lowered her down, much to her annoyance. She is probably still capable of making a decent landing, but we didn’t want to risk her face planting the road and carrying her home.
We found the river again and wandered along. We hadn’t met anybody really on this walk. It was lovely, enjoying each other’s company. We found another section of missing river which set us off again looking for sinkholes. Finally we reached the bridge again, The Dog starting to dawdle and wandered up back through the churchyard to a cafe we know called Stone Close, where we had a coffee, a sandwich and The Dog got a treat. It’s a small little place, but has a good menu and quite cosy. We were the only ones in for a while and then everybody came in, filling it up. Suitably stuffed, we wandered around the village which didn’t take us long really. The road is cobbled and narrow, the house doors right on the street. There’s a little village shop and remnants of other businesses – Martin Bank still had its sign above a window, Dent Reading Rooms. It was a mixture of cottages – some whitewashed and little alleyways (or ginnels in this part of the world). We snucked down one, finding a door lintel marked 1673! It was quiet, hardly a soul around, but Dent is quite popular in the summer months and on the outskirts there are a couple of large caravan and camping sites. There was also a museum, but with time ticking on, we didn’t go in.
We have a “Stalk Your Own Family” app on our phones and we could see our intrepid pair starting to make their way down from Calf Top, a nearby summit. The Dog looked like she just wanted to sleep, so we found the car and retraced our steps through the hamlet of Gawthrop and climbed out of Dentdale. The countryside here was just fellside dotted with sheep with steep sided hills. We peered upwards to see where our walkers might be but it was just a sheer rise of grass and rock. There’s nothing up here, but it’s just stunning scenery. We dropped back into Barbon village and decided to meet them, much to The Dog’s disgust – we walked along a tarmacked lane until we met up them. They looked flushed with success, but tired. We lured them with a promise of a steaming cup of coffee and a slab of cake at The Churchmouse, to celebrate their achievement. The Churchmouse is a purveyor of fine cheeses, but also doubles as the local shop and cafe. We listened as a game of Top Trumps started with how many steps they had done, elevation, heart beats etc. Tired, but happy, we retired to the car and headed home for tea and well earned sleeps on the sofa.
Later that night, we watched a programme about the state of Britain’s rivers and was appalled to learn that every river was probably polluted. I had been taken in by the clearness of the water, the blues and greens and the vibrant plants, but was this a river in trouble? It made me feel sad that this picture perfect corner of Cumbria probably wasn’t immune to pollution (probably from farming practices) and that we need to look after our countryside. It does make you think……..
Paul Whitehouse, Our Troubled River, BBCiplayer.
apathtosomewhere 