Nostalgia Fest

I walked into Malham for the second time today.  I think I already mentioned that Sara and I walked a circuit around the Yorkshire Dales in the summer of 1995.  The village of Malham was the destination of our first day’s walk.  We walked I don’t remember how many miles from Settle.  I know it was more than the 7 miles a nearby road sign claims.  I remember we took a very scenic and indirect route.  At any rate, we wound up in Malham sitting at some ancestor of the picnic table on which I am sitting and writing this now. 

 

Feeling flush with victory on our first day of distance walking, we almost immediately went out for a further walk out to two nearby beauty spots – Janet’s Foss and the Goredale Scar.  Both of these were on our route for the next morning, but I can’t remember whether or not we knew that at the time.  It’s a lovely walk, and I did it again today, since it is not part of my walk tomorrow and because I’m missing Sara so much.  Doing something we had done together before made me feel a little closer. 

 

The walk from East Marton was very easy after the more vigorous walks of past days.  It was barely 10 miles even with a few side trips I tacked on and some poking around a few of the villages the trail passed through.  Most of the walk was either across gently rolling fields or along canals and rivers.  There were a few climbs, but nothing I’ll remember for long or feel in the morning. The path finding was also easy, which was good, because while I’d done my usual work of building the route for my GPS, I got caught up doing email and talking with the hostess and never managed to put the route into the little gizmo.  At least having done it got the most important turns and maneuvers into my brain.

 

The increasingly agricultural nature of the land I walked through was made clear when I came upon three goats doing the balance beam along a fence top, yielded the path to a woman on horseback, and saw two fellows in updated English country gentleman attire carrying a businesslike shot gun and walking out to upset PETA members everywhere.

 

As Mom and I had discovered in the Lakes, dandelions are looked upon here more as a wildflower than as a weed.  Ungrazed fields are often carpeted with them.  The denser ground of paths seems to discourage them, so on many of the fields I walked in the morning, it was easy to find the way, since it was the bit of plain green grass in an otherwise yellow field.  The sheep and cattle must like them fine, because I saw fields that still had quite long grass but almost no dandelions, suggesting that they get snapped up fast when a field is opened.

 

It was a hazy morning, but my hostess in East Marton had assured me I would have a “cracking day” for a walk, so I was expecting it to clear.

 

The Way took me right through the village of Gargraves.  According to the map and the guide, I was meant to see a little less of it, but I couldn’t find the stile over to a footpath, so I wound up walking through more of town.  It’s all full of lovely stone buildings.  I wandered around a little sightseeing.  Got good photos of the church, the pub, and a few houses.  I also got to see the tail end of a cycle on the canal lock. 

 

After walking out of town there it was mostly fields.

 

Late in the morning I passed into the Yorkshire Dales National Park.  My hostess from last night is somewhat on the outs with the park people.  Her family farm is inside the park boundary, so there’s a lot of red tape and restriction on anything they want to do.  She and I got along very well.  I think I made big points when she told me they were just farmers and I responded that running a successful small farm probably calls for more different skills than any other way of making a living.  This is something I honestly believe, but I also know it makes farmers feel good to hear it.  She told me they milk 150 head of cattle and have around 1,000 sheep.  From the quality of the bacon at breakfast, I’m guessing they may also keep a few hogs for household consumption and that I got slipped some of the good stuff. 

 

Early in the afternoon, it started to spit with rain just enough to encourage me to put on my raingear.  This was the first day for which no rain was forecast at all, so I guess I should have suspected a downpour.  Somehow, it didn’t seem like it was going to amount to much, so I didn’t bother with my rain pants, which are pretty awful anyway, or my rain hat which was buried deep in my pack. I wound up getting about medium wet, as a result of which, I finally caved in and bought a better pair of rain pants in a gear shop here in the village, so some good comes of everything. 

 

Writing is difficult at the moment, because I caught back up with my Canadians and they encouraged me to have an unwise second pint before dinner.  It was good to see them again.  It looks like we’ll be close to in synch from here on out, including both staying at the same inn tomorrow night.  They’ve given up on the camping scheme after one very wet night.  They made mostly youth hostel reservations for the rest of their trip and got a service to send their camping gear on to where they’re planning to stop walking.  They tell me they’ll be skipping over the hills like spring lambs, and I’m sure I’ll have plenty to compare them against.

 

Dinner service starts momentarily, so I think I’ll go have a bite, then continue this when I’m a little more coherent.

 

All right, I’m writing again in the front parlor of Ebor House where I am staying in Hawes, almost two days from when I stopped writing to have dinner and clear my head.  Lest anyone worry, I have not spent 48 hours in a drunken fog.  The journal muse never got back to me on Monday evening, and last night I had too much good company to slip away until I was again disinclined to writing.  All of that in good time.

 

Back to Monday’s walk.  Much of the way beyond Gargreaves, I was strolling along the river Aire.  That made the day a fairly level walk.  Every so often, the path would skip a bend in the river to take me over a couple of fields.  Even with the rain, it was a beautiful, relaxing walk. 

 

I walked through another little village.  I said I wouldn’t remember any of the climbs from Monday, but looking at my photos reminds me that I was uphill all the way through this village.  Again, there was beautiful gardening at several of the properties and some fun decorative stonework on one big place that I’m pretty sure was the manor house for the community. 

 

The rain slackened and ended just as I got into Malham.  It had been a very short walk, so I was in early.  I took advantage of the time to do some sink laundry (not that doing the laundry takes long, but the extra hours in the afternoon gave everything a fighting chance to get dry.  Not only is it extra drying time, but it is extra drying time while the heat is on in the hotel.  That makes a big difference. 

 

After laundry and the now routine mix of a bath for my boots then a bath for me, I walked out to recreate the walk Sara and I had taken together to call on Janet’s Foss (a waterfall in a little glade) and the Goredale Scar (a waterfall at the head of a big chasm).  It’s a level stroll along mostly good gravel paths that first weave through pastures to the east of town.  I can’t say I remembered it all keenly, although there was one disused barn thepath skirts around that I remembered seeing before and taking a picture of.  Fatuously, because I already have a snap of that barn in a box at home and it hasn’t changed much, I took its picture again.  Eventually, the trail enters a dense wood. 

 

In a wet May (rather than a drought stricken August) the trees around the foss have vibrant green leaves and the understory is thick with more of that wild garlic I had seen in Thornton, Ramson’s Garlic, a nearby sign informed me.  I think that’s what gets called ramps in Virginia.  For the last few years, they’ve been the culinary obsession of epicures in Middleburg.  Should anyone from that set see this, don’t rush off to get your tickets.  No collecting allowed.  The whole place had a delicate scent of garlic, which has given me an as yet unsatisfied craving for a very garlicky meal.

 

When Sara and I visited, the waterfall was a tiny trickle.  There was a local there assuring us it was usually lovely.  I never doubted her, but I can now testify from first hand experience.    It’s a beautiful little falls, and there’s evidence all around of sculpted rock from when the stream was a river.  The story of the place, whether actually traditional or invented for tourist benefit, I know not, is that a fairy noble named Janet lives in a cave that’s very obvious beside the falls.  The cave was entered at one’s peril.

 

The last bit, at least, is certainly true.  The whole Dales region is riddled with caves, caverns, underground waterways.  The interiors are mostly slippery limestone and drops of scores of feet are reportedly common.  I saw more evidence of this on Tuesday and will describe it later.

 

Beyond the Foss, I walked along a wide curve of road, then went through a gate into a broad valley with banks rising on either side.  In the course of a short walk, the banks rise steeply until they form walls of hundreds of feet around a narrow gorge.  The stream that runs through it now is clearly the shrunken descendent of a substantial river.  The walls are carved in ways that may have inspired details in Gaudi architecture.  Except for a couple having tea on a couple of boulders, I had the place to myself.  I spent a little time just ogling around and remembering visiting it before with Sara.  I took a few pictures then retraced my steps back to town.

 

I took my computer down to the Hikers Bar, ordered a pint of Old Peculiar, then sat down to write until the Canadians showed up again – but you already know that part.  I’ll close this chapter now lest I get into some kind of loop.

 

Garmin Facts: 10.3 miles in 3:47 walking 46 resting, 2.7 moving average 2.3 grand average.  Nearly level – 249 meters climbed.  Plus about 3 un-monitored miles out to the scar and back.