Following in the footsteps
(Walked this 1.11.18, gorgeous sunny day but with a nippy breeze!)
This is a nice walk for a Sunday afternoon and as you pass through Wycollar you can stop at the cozy café and have home made soup or tea and cakes! Waterproof boots definitely required. I’m lucky because this walk starts at my front door so it’s one I’ve done in all four seasons but each and every time I marvel at the variety of scenery and the depth of history on this easy ramble.
Approx 5.5 miles
Allow 3 hours if you stop at the café. (Allow 4 if you want to include a walk up Boulsworth).
Park at the end of Hollin Hall Trawden BB8 8TJ near Floats Mill, or if you want to start and end at a good pub, park up at the Trawden Arms BB8 8RU and walk up through the village keeping to the left of the church at the top of the hill.
At the end of all the cottages and the newish mill development (Floats Mill), turn right off the tarmac road onto a narrow lane which leads up to a clutch of houses and follow this round to the left for about half a mile. As the lane forks by a farmhouse, take the right fork past a bungalow and on over the cattle grid.
As you cross the field, beautiful wild Boulsworth Hill rises a mile away on your left and sheep nibble and stare on the laneside. Bent trees ride the ridge on your right and you can see a dark green forest ahead. Over the cattle grid (gate on right) keep to the left of the farmyard you now enter, and look for a footpath sign over a little stream and up old stone steps which are so pretty but can be slippy.
Someone is currently converting a barn here, into some kind of studio and it looks fabulous – “ooh” I thought – “maybe a nice location for my retreats!”
Pass the four cottages and through a gate past another farm and barn conversion and across a small wooden bridge which leads to another gate. Through the gate turn sharp right and follow the path along the field edge. You’re only 15 minutes from Trawden now but it feels like you are in the middle of nowhere. I often stop in this field and looking up at Boulsworth, I slow my breathing right down and say some thank you's to the Universe for allowing me to live in such an amazing place.
About half way along this field start to walk 45 degrees left away from the field edge and head towards a small walkers wooden gate in front of the woods. Don’t go through the large gate (right of the little gate). It’s always boggy here so watch your step. You’re straight into the cool spruce woods with their bright green mossy carpet, the path is clear and straight, but then suddenly you’re in a field, surrounded on three sides by the woods, it’s a secret field and if you’re lucky like I was yesterday, a young red deer will bound out of the reeds not 30 yards from you and bounce away over the tussocks, with it’s white tufty back end bobbing up and down!
Stand and drink in the stillness and listen to the wind in the trees.
Watch your footing across this field area, it’s often boggy underfoot and very up and down; I find my poles a real help here. Just keep heading straight across.
Back into the woods again, these are denser woods but shafts of sunlight fall through the tall pines and sparkle on hanging dew drops. I shook a branch and laughed as the drops cascaded onto my face and mouth. I licked my lips and tasted the pine!
I’ve walked through these woods many times over the past 4 years or so and although I know others do too, because of the footsteps I follow, I’ve never once met anyone in the woods, it’s a well kept secret!
Emerging from the woods onto the moorland you often see belted Galloways, these lovely black and white curly coated cows, were bred to thrive on low quality and often boggy pastures in Western Scotland, so they are well suited to Lancashire’s wet moorlands! But on this day, the sky is blue with just a few fluffy clouds seemingly balancing on top of Boulsworth and there isn’t a belted Galloway in sight!
Through the small wooden gate you’ll see the old Roman road which runs the length of Boulsworth and you turn left here onto the track. But before doing so yesterday, I sat myself down on a conveniently placed flat boulder and got my notepad and pen out. When I’m walking, words pour into my head and my poor long suffering dog is used to me sitting and scribbling as I sip my flask coffee. The sun was warm on my face though the wind was sneaking round the corner of the wall, so ten minutes was enough and on we strode.
You now keep on the old Roman road (which today forms part of both the Bronte Way and the Pennine Bridleway) for a couple of miles. The views across left to Ingleborough and Penyghent are spectacular on a clear day and if you are feeling full of energy and you want to see for 40 miles or more in every direction, you can climb up Boulsworth. Just follow the concrete track off to the right just past the first farm you come to, it’s a steep climb and you need to bear right on the top to reach the trig. Once at the trig, after drinking in the glorious views, go back along the ridge for half a mile or so and then drop back down near huge boulders, leading you eventually back onto the lane (add on an hour for this).
But yesterday, I kept to the lane, stopping for a second time to write a poem (Stone), sitting on my woolly hat on a stack of round fence poles leaning against a sun warmed barn wall. Another cup of coffee and some flap jack shared with the dog and I was off again. Keep straight on - don’t turn left through a gate where the lane leads to a farm, go straight on up a slight rise (there’s a wooden signpost here which I think says Wycollar 2 miles) and the lane now becomes an old stone flagged path. This part of the walk is just you and the wild, no farms, no sign of human habitation other than the dry stone wall on your left. Just the hill and a stream in the bottom and ferns and the odd sheep. After 20 mins or so you’ll reach a newer man made path which leads you round to the left and into Wycollar Valley. Keep on this path over the big wooden bridge and the rushing stream and stay on this for another half a mile. Eventually the path becomes a clear lane again and at this point there is a farm gate and stile on your left and a path/lane leading down into Wycollar Valley. Take this path which soon leads you past a farmhouse where you join a lane proper with a rushing stream on your left. This is Wycollar Water and some of the oldest stone bridges in Lancashire pass over it. 15 mins now and you’re in Wycollar with it’s fascinating ruins and bridges and the lovely café I mentioned at the start. The ruins are Wycollar Hall, famed for being regularly visited by the Bronte sisters. In fact, a picture of the Hall was used on the front cover of the 1898 edition of Jane Eyre.
After your café stop you’ve 2 choices. Either follow the tarmac lane out of the village to the car park and then turn left on the road, picking up the signs for Trawden and entering Trawden just 100 yards left of the pub, or turn left out of the café and look for a lane 50 yards on your right . Walk up here about 5 mins or so and look for a path slightly right into a wood up wooden edged steps.
A bit of a climb here straight through the woods and then over 3 stiles and 3 fields picking up a lane to Germany Farm. Round the RHS of the farm and through a really boggy bit and over another field. Just go straight across and head for a converted farm ahead slightly right. Through a metal gate with the converted farm in front of you and immediately left down a little snicket to another stone stile. The path is clear and you drop down the left of a large field with two copses of trees inside stone walls, one on your left and one on your right. Pendle Hill is ahead of you and Trawden in the valley bottom below. At the end of the field you emerge bottom left through a small wooden gate and take the lane left down to Foulds Mill.
As I said at the start of this piece, I feel blessed to have walking like this right on my doorstep. Daily, I can walk in countryside unchanged for hundreds of years, in the footsteps of so many; from Roman soldiers following orders, to the Bronte sisters challenging the patriarchal society of the 19th century. Whatever changes and challenges we face, nature doesn’t judge, it remains constant and it accepts you as you are. It’s where I can truly be me. No make-up, comfy clothes, no rush, no conversations either inside my head or out. Just a sense of being at one with nature, feeling the stones under my feet and the wind on my face. Heaven.
(Walked this 1.11.18, gorgeous sunny day but with a nippy breeze!)
This is a nice walk for a Sunday afternoon and as you pass through Wycollar you can stop at the cozy café and have home made soup or tea and cakes! Waterproof boots definitely required. I’m lucky because this walk starts at my front door so it’s one I’ve done in all four seasons but each and every time I marvel at the variety of scenery and the depth of history on this easy ramble.
Approx 5.5 miles
Allow 3 hours if you stop at the café. (Allow 4 if you want to include a walk up Boulsworth).
Park at the end of Hollin Hall Trawden BB8 8TJ near Floats Mill, or if you want to start and end at a good pub, park up at the Trawden Arms BB8 8RU and walk up through the village keeping to the left of the church at the top of the hill.
At the end of all the cottages and the newish mill development (Floats Mill), turn right off the tarmac road onto a narrow lane which leads up to a clutch of houses and follow this round to the left for about half a mile. As the lane forks by a farmhouse, take the right fork past a bungalow and on over the cattle grid.
As you cross the field, beautiful wild Boulsworth Hill rises a mile away on your left and sheep nibble and stare on the laneside. Bent trees ride the ridge on your right and you can see a dark green forest ahead. Over the cattle grid (gate on right) keep to the left of the farmyard you now enter, and look for a footpath sign over a little stream and up old stone steps which are so pretty but can be slippy.
Someone is currently converting a barn here, into some kind of studio and it looks fabulous – “ooh” I thought – “maybe a nice location for my retreats!”
Pass the four cottages and through a gate past another farm and barn conversion and across a small wooden bridge which leads to another gate. Through the gate turn sharp right and follow the path along the field edge. You’re only 15 minutes from Trawden now but it feels like you are in the middle of nowhere. I often stop in this field and looking up at Boulsworth, I slow my breathing right down and say some thank you's to the Universe for allowing me to live in such an amazing place.
About half way along this field start to walk 45 degrees left away from the field edge and head towards a small walkers wooden gate in front of the woods. Don’t go through the large gate (right of the little gate). It’s always boggy here so watch your step. You’re straight into the cool spruce woods with their bright green mossy carpet, the path is clear and straight, but then suddenly you’re in a field, surrounded on three sides by the woods, it’s a secret field and if you’re lucky like I was yesterday, a young red deer will bound out of the reeds not 30 yards from you and bounce away over the tussocks, with it’s white tufty back end bobbing up and down!
Stand and drink in the stillness and listen to the wind in the trees.
Watch your footing across this field area, it’s often boggy underfoot and very up and down; I find my poles a real help here. Just keep heading straight across.
Back into the woods again, these are denser woods but shafts of sunlight fall through the tall pines and sparkle on hanging dew drops. I shook a branch and laughed as the drops cascaded onto my face and mouth. I licked my lips and tasted the pine!
I’ve walked through these woods many times over the past 4 years or so and although I know others do too, because of the footsteps I follow, I’ve never once met anyone in the woods, it’s a well kept secret!
Emerging from the woods onto the moorland you often see belted Galloways, these lovely black and white curly coated cows, were bred to thrive on low quality and often boggy pastures in Western Scotland, so they are well suited to Lancashire’s wet moorlands! But on this day, the sky is blue with just a few fluffy clouds seemingly balancing on top of Boulsworth and there isn’t a belted Galloway in sight!
Through the small wooden gate you’ll see the old Roman road which runs the length of Boulsworth and you turn left here onto the track. But before doing so yesterday, I sat myself down on a conveniently placed flat boulder and got my notepad and pen out. When I’m walking, words pour into my head and my poor long suffering dog is used to me sitting and scribbling as I sip my flask coffee. The sun was warm on my face though the wind was sneaking round the corner of the wall, so ten minutes was enough and on we strode.
You now keep on the old Roman road (which today forms part of both the Bronte Way and the Pennine Bridleway) for a couple of miles. The views across left to Ingleborough and Penyghent are spectacular on a clear day and if you are feeling full of energy and you want to see for 40 miles or more in every direction, you can climb up Boulsworth. Just follow the concrete track off to the right just past the first farm you come to, it’s a steep climb and you need to bear right on the top to reach the trig. Once at the trig, after drinking in the glorious views, go back along the ridge for half a mile or so and then drop back down near huge boulders, leading you eventually back onto the lane (add on an hour for this).
But yesterday, I kept to the lane, stopping for a second time to write a poem (Stone), sitting on my woolly hat on a stack of round fence poles leaning against a sun warmed barn wall. Another cup of coffee and some flap jack shared with the dog and I was off again. Keep straight on - don’t turn left through a gate where the lane leads to a farm, go straight on up a slight rise (there’s a wooden signpost here which I think says Wycollar 2 miles) and the lane now becomes an old stone flagged path. This part of the walk is just you and the wild, no farms, no sign of human habitation other than the dry stone wall on your left. Just the hill and a stream in the bottom and ferns and the odd sheep. After 20 mins or so you’ll reach a newer man made path which leads you round to the left and into Wycollar Valley. Keep on this path over the big wooden bridge and the rushing stream and stay on this for another half a mile. Eventually the path becomes a clear lane again and at this point there is a farm gate and stile on your left and a path/lane leading down into Wycollar Valley. Take this path which soon leads you past a farmhouse where you join a lane proper with a rushing stream on your left. This is Wycollar Water and some of the oldest stone bridges in Lancashire pass over it. 15 mins now and you’re in Wycollar with it’s fascinating ruins and bridges and the lovely café I mentioned at the start. The ruins are Wycollar Hall, famed for being regularly visited by the Bronte sisters. In fact, a picture of the Hall was used on the front cover of the 1898 edition of Jane Eyre.
After your café stop you’ve 2 choices. Either follow the tarmac lane out of the village to the car park and then turn left on the road, picking up the signs for Trawden and entering Trawden just 100 yards left of the pub, or turn left out of the café and look for a lane 50 yards on your right . Walk up here about 5 mins or so and look for a path slightly right into a wood up wooden edged steps.
A bit of a climb here straight through the woods and then over 3 stiles and 3 fields picking up a lane to Germany Farm. Round the RHS of the farm and through a really boggy bit and over another field. Just go straight across and head for a converted farm ahead slightly right. Through a metal gate with the converted farm in front of you and immediately left down a little snicket to another stone stile. The path is clear and you drop down the left of a large field with two copses of trees inside stone walls, one on your left and one on your right. Pendle Hill is ahead of you and Trawden in the valley bottom below. At the end of the field you emerge bottom left through a small wooden gate and take the lane left down to Foulds Mill.
As I said at the start of this piece, I feel blessed to have walking like this right on my doorstep. Daily, I can walk in countryside unchanged for hundreds of years, in the footsteps of so many; from Roman soldiers following orders, to the Bronte sisters challenging the patriarchal society of the 19th century. Whatever changes and challenges we face, nature doesn’t judge, it remains constant and it accepts you as you are. It’s where I can truly be me. No make-up, comfy clothes, no rush, no conversations either inside my head or out. Just a sense of being at one with nature, feeling the stones under my feet and the wind on my face. Heaven.
