Helmsley to Sutton Bank and the White Horse of Kilburn
Tuesday 10th June 2008
11 miles of walking, 10 miles on Cleveland Way
Click here for all our photos from this walk.
Today's walk was quite short and not over strenuous; a gentle introduction to the Cleveland Way. It was also far more interesting than I had expected, with less road walking. The weather was dry and sunny, but the wind stopped it from feeling too hot.
After buying provisions for lunch, we photographed the official start of the path (the old market cross in Helmsley's Market Square). We had been chatting to Mr and Mrs Leckenby at Argyle House, so by the time we got to the Tourist Information Centre by Helmsley Castle, it was after 9.30am so the TIC was open and we were able to get our Cleveland Way 'passports' stamped. Having collected one stamp, we became determined to get stamps from all the locations listed; childish or what!
We left Helmsley around 9.45am, past the stone 'Cleveland Way' seat, rather unimaginatively located in a car park. We soon passed Tina, walking the other way (though we didn't know it was Tina at the time); we met up at Cote Few (tonight's B&B) and discovered that she had been staying up at Griff Farm, so had walked back to Helmsley to look around. We climbed out of Helmsley, also passing a school party, with excellent views back to the Castle and sheep and horses in the foreground. Then into woodland, with a descent followed by an ascent as we crossed the pretty little valley of Blackdale Howl. We emerged by Griff Lodge with splendid views down to the wooded Rye Valley and beyond.
We joined the very minor road to Rievaulx Bridge, rebuilt in the 18th Century after flooding destroyed the original (so the floods in Helmsley just before we visited a few years ago were not a one-off). We decided to walk down to Rievaulx Abbey (not on the Cleveland Way). It was all very pretty but we decided not to actually go into the Abbey, partly because we weren't sure we had enough time to do it justice and partly because a school party was just arriving. So we retraced our steps to Rievaulx Bridge and then along a road through more attractive scenery, including the whitewashed Ashberry Farm.
We left the road onto a forestry track through attractive woods around Noodle Hill and we were soon in Nettle Dale, walking past some artificial lakes created to attract wildfowl - they seem to have attracted fishermen too; there were 4 or 5 here. We crossed Nettle Dale Beck on stepping stones and continued up Nettle Dale then Flassen Dale - the wooded hills and wildflower meadows here felt almost alpine. A short steep climb up through the trees brought us onto a more gradually climbing track, with superb open views. We followed this almost to Cold Kirby, taking a minor path to the right just before the village, which descended round the church then brought us up to the wide main street. Sampson (as Helen and Tom tell us the guidebook should be known) says of Cold Kirby "whose name you will appreciate if you experience a fresh north-easterly at this exposed site 800 feet (245 metres) above sea level". It wasn't cold today; a pretty little place.
At the end of Cold Kirby we turned onto Cote Moor Road (actually a track) which took us across farmland, and we began to see gliders from the Yorkshire Gliding Club at Sutton Bank. We walked along a wood to Hambleton House which is a horse training centre (there used to be a racehorse up here but not any longer), then to the A170 at Hambleton Inn and, a few steps further on, past Cote Few, where we are staying tonight - but it was only just after 1pm!
We followed the road (not the route of the Cleveland Way) to the National Park Centre at Sutton Bank. We ate our lunch at a picnic table then had our 'passports' stamped, looked at the exhibition and had ice creams. We followed the official Cleveland Way detour along the top of the limestone escarpment, past the Gliding Club then past the 'distinctive knoll of Hood Hill' to our right and round the corner to the White Horse of Kilburn. We could only see a small part of the white horse (we were able to identify an eye and an ear) but the views over the Vale of York were superb. We could see the cooling towers of Ferrybridge Power Station, 35 miles away to the south. On the way back we watched a glider taking off (being towed by another plane) and traffic going up and down the road at Sutton Bank. We followed the route of the Cleveland Way back to Cote Few, through a wood, seeing a deer on the way.
Mr Jeffray was cutting the grass outside Cote Few and Mrs Jeffray welcomed us warmly. We have a nice big family room, but all three rooms are occupied tonight and we're all sharing a shower room, so we leapt in there quickly before anyone else arrived! There was no tea making stuff or TV in the room but that wasn't a problem - everything was provided in the sitting room beneath us. In the evening we walked down to the Hambleton Inn and had a lovely meal.
