Evestone Lake

Sunday, 7th October
9k (5.4 miles) 2hrs 52 mins
Map : OS Explorer 26 - Nidderdale.

What a delightful October's day with temperatures reaching about 15 degrees and hardly a cloud in the sky. It seems that recently I have started each of these blogs with an apology. In this instance it was a relief to get back to walking, and back is the operative word as I've been laid up with a bad back.  Lots of pain, lots of painkillers and a complete lack of mobility.  So we decided to take a shorter than usual walk and what a cracker it turned out to be !

The walk started in the small village of Sawley, between Ripon and Pateley Bridge (GR : SE 247677). We actually had some difficulty in locating this as neither of our phones seemed capable of picking up a GPS signal. Even the handheld GPS itself seemed reluctant in the first instance to lock on to any satellites - and not a cloud in the sky !

At the south end of the village we escaped the road and walked through fields towards Lacon Hall (GR : SE 247669). After skirting the boundary of the house the route took us out to the aptly named Green Lane (GR : SE 243665).  Here, looking back we had wonderful long range views across to the Hambledon Hills - a view that remains for much of the walk.
Striking out we now headed for Butterton Bridge at the bottom of Picking Gill before climbing the other side of the gill towards Warsill Hall Farm  (GR : SE 234659). Again, the top of the ridge allowed long range views.
Across a couple of fields and we were into High Moor Plantation and a dead straight track which eventually brought us out and across the very busy B6265. However, our route still lay straight ahead towards a farm to take a sharp right turn that dropped us to Evestone Lake.
What a delightful and enchanting place this turned out to be.  The lake is, I presume, man-made and I have no idea why it was created but trees seemingly grow out of rocks at strange angles and, on our visit, hardly a murmur could be heard with the water's surface unbroken and reflecting the trees that surround it.
At the end of the lake we collected our "cache of the day" before climbing steeply through Fishpond Wood to Hollin Hill Farm (GR : SE 234682). From here it was simply a case of following the signs back to Sawley.

A delightful walk which I need to attribute to Paul Hannon and his book "Ripon and Lower Wensleydale". The joy was the superb walk around the lake, the fantastic weather and the opportunity to get some walking under the belt, but, oh how I ached afterwards !

As usual a selection of photographs taken during the walk are available from this link -- just look at those blue skies !!