Walks by Bus and Train in the Dales

Walk 4: Horton to Settle (Indirect)

Part of upper Ribblesdale taking in both valley scenery and a taste of the higher country.

Map: Outdoor Leisure Map  No.2

Distance:  6.8 miles ( 10.9 km). 

Walking time:  3½ hours

Getting There:  3 buses per day Settle to Horton (one on Sundays).  The Leeds - Settle - Carlisle railway line serves Horton and Settle.

The Route: From the station, head towards the village for 300 yards and turn right at the footbridge.  If starting from the village, go through the main car park alongside B.6479, pass the toilets and over the wooden footbridge.  Either way, take the path which descends a few steps into the field by the end of the footbridge, cross onto the riverside and follow it downstream for almost 1¼ miles to Cragghill Farm. 

Stay on the riverside as the river starts to swing left.  Where the path leads into a large open field, turn half-right initially across to a solitary tree, and then ease a little further right following a faint ridge and track to a gateway and ladder-stile on the far side of the field.  Beyond the stile, follow an old walled lane until it passes under the railway and meets a surfaced access road.  Turn left there to a T-junction at Helwith Bridge, left past the pub, over the river bridge, and right at another junction to the main road (B.6479).

Go left on the roadside for only about 50 yards.  Where the road swings left, leave it and continue ahead into a unmade lane. This rises gently for 350 yards, bears right, then left and divides.  Take the right-hand lane and follow it for just over half a mile. Cross the stile on the right there onto a path initially along the wall side.  This path is well used and visible all the way down the slope with stiles at each wall acting as markers.  When Stainforth village comes into sight it is to the left of the path line, but the path bears leftwards in the last 3 fields into the village.

Walk into the village and forward over the Stainforth Beck bridge to the Craven Heifer.  Opposite their front door, turn left up a side street to the T-junction at the top, go right 7 or 8 yards, then left up an access between houses.  Bear right at the top and over the stile into the end of a field.  Walk forward and, as the field opens out, bear left following a track to the top gate opposite.  Through that, keep easing leftwards following a line of yellow marker posts (do not follow wheelmarks towards the barn), then alongside the top fence.  Go through a small gate in that fence and slant up the wood on the obvious path.  Above the wood, continue forward for 400 yards and bear left as you approach Lower Winskill Farm to pass close to the farmhouse.

Continue up their access lane for almost 150 yards, then turn right at the sign and stile into a field.  Cross the field bearing slightly left to a gateway in the far corner.  Beyond that, the path goes right briefly to a fine viewpoint.  It then descends quite steeply through woodland initially, skirts the edge of old quarry workings on the right, and forward as a lane to Langcliffe.  After the first few houses in the village take the left fork to come out by the school, carpark, Village Institute, Church and Green in this attractive village.

Here one meets the road from Littondale, turn right, follow it through the village and out of the far end to the main road.  At that junction, go right just 10 yards, cross the road (carefully) to the gap stile and narrow walled lane which goes down the slope, over the railway, to the cul-de-sac road serving the mill and caravan site.  Turn left along that for a third of a mile to meet B.6479 again and walk along the footway, past Watershed Mill and into Settle.

Getting back:  Use the same bus or train services as shown above.